Interesting garage sale day.

[pyrocasto]

Well, all morning I spent in my car going to different garage sales trying to find something that might interest me. After 3 hours of sales, I had found 3 movies and 2 CFLs. Not very exciting. After I had given up and went home, I remembered seeing a yard I wanted to stop by and talk to the owner about. This guy got a citation from the city because he had too much crap. That's perfect for me.

I looked around his property for a good hour, found out he's an awesome guy. I saw a few items that caught my eye. First off, a few high lift well pumps laying around. A bunch of different radiator setups, from anything that has a radiator. A walmart deep cycle battery, same as I already have in my solar setup. Some box fans and motors.

My eyes finally fell apon these beauties:

He said he had six and they came out of an electric boat. Like I said, the dude was nice. He gave me these for free and so I took them home to test. If I found out they work, I'll give him some money for them next time I go.

I looked them up and I believe they are 255 ah a piece, and new value at $375 or so. Well, one is dead and only reads 8 volts, charger wont touch it. The charger brought the other 2 back and is charging now.

So what should I do with these, as to take care of them? If I leave the charger on them, is that all I can do since they are sealed maintainence free, or is there something else I can do to help the life and workingship(is that a word?) of them?

Also, is it possable to use that 8volt dead battery for something? Since it still has some kind of a charge, I didnt know if I could use if for something that didnt require 12 volts.

Now I'm very happy to find a guy like this, and I'll go back later this week for the other deep cycle probably.

[Peppyy]

I can't believe they are really sealed. It looks like they have some sort of caps on them.

The first thing i would do is make sure they have enough fluid in them. Top them up to the correct level with distilled water. I have brought several apparently hopeless batteries back to life by watering them.

Wish I could find something like that around here Good luck with them.

[Nando]

All the batteries, including the maintenance free, have ways to fill them out -- required for production, SO LOOK and learn to open the valves covers and re-fill with DISTILLED water and re-charge with a not to heavy current ( ~ 3 to 5 amps)for days,.

Regards

Nando

[pyrocasto]

Right now I'm on 6amps and I've jumped around on 2 batteries. Now one has been charging for a good 6 hours now and is still slowly climbing. I will charge the other one afterwards.

The dead one though, wont charge with the charger, so I guess I'm gonna try and start it with one of the good batteries, and see if I can get the voltage climbing at all.

From empty to new it will take at least 2 days per battery to charge.

I'll try and pop off the caps(looking things) and fill with water. Hopefully I can get that dead one going, since that's a potential wad of money.

[ibeweagle]

dont know about some of this advice it is what I have heard take the 8 volt one and dig a hole for it and short it out with car battery cables for a short time one second to get bad shorted cell burded clear of short hole is in case battery blows up also get a battery desuffider or build one yourself cheers ibeweagle

[nothing to lose]

Yes, don't be in a hurry, lots of money, take the time.

I have read about 2 amp charging in a battery manual once. Supposedly it gives the sulfations more time to disolve durring charging than a faster rate would. So trickle them slow as you reasonably can, 2amp was recomended for "Reconditioning" dead batteries for  new life, provided they are not internally damaged or shorted.

As for the 8volt one, I'd look for an old fasioned always on charger that does 2amps and let it run for days. These auto chargers or "Smart Chargers" are brain dead junk when it comes to problem batteries. My smart charger gives me errors all the time, then I charge a bit some other way and it will work fine. I hate that!!

For instance I can try to charge or pulse charge a really weak battery and the charger refuses to work, connect jumper cables to a car and run it 5 minutes or less and the charger will work fine. I have had to do that with at least 4 batteries to get the charger to turn on in desulfate mode (pulse charge), but once I got it to turn on then it ran the 24hrs fine, it shuts off after 24hrs, so I have to reset to run it again and then it works fine all the time. But to get it to work the first time I need some type of way to charge a dead battery some when it's really dead!

Check the water and fill as needed as others said. Yes there should be some way to open and fill them. If there is no other way for you to do it, you can drill a hole in the top of the battery through the top of the case, then after filling plug that new hole. I have never had to do that, but I know it can be done rather easy! Just do not go too deep and hit any plates inside, take it slow and easy! Also be in a well ventalated area like outdoors, and I recomend and old fashioned hand drill, no sparks from motors that way. Just in case any built up hydrogen inside. Caution is always better than doctor bills, or worse.

You can test each cell once you have a hole in the case. As I recall connect a meter to the Neg post and dip the pos just into the acid of the first cell, it should read about 2v then dip into the next cell and it should read about 4v and so forth, as long as each cell adds around 2v it should be fine, when you hit a cell that adds very little or nothing that's the bad one! You can also test cell to cell sticking the probes into different cells.

I need to see if I can find an old file to upload about this stuff, I am sure alot of people would be interested in it!!

As for using the 8V as is if it does not come back, that is posable. I have an old 6V  from some rechargeable device here I use somtimes for a 12V fan. Battery only holds about 4-5V after sitting awhile, but that V and amps is enough to have a decent desk fan for awhile

Probably alot of loses charging a big battery to use like that, but after awhile it may even come back around. I had an old 12V that was low volts and draining it then charging at around 2 amps all the time it came back as 12V but weak. Maybe some day it will get strong too or totally die. But for low power stuff like a 12V fan or 12V CFL light it works fine.

If you don't mind the loses it might be worth using if it does anything at all, maybe use for a small test gennie or part of a dump load??

I been thinking on the dump load part some. Who cares about losses with a dump load if you were going to through away the heat anyway as a dump load. Might as well take the loses in charging a junk battery if it has any use at all, or use the dump to run pulse chargers on what may be hopeless batteries and hope the come back, nothing to lose in trying as long as you get enough load for a dump.

[nothing to lose]

I never tried that and I don't think it would work, but since I never tried it I won't say it won't.

BUT, the problem I see here is that the power is in the cells that are not shorted, in doing this you have a short in a cell that has no power. I am not sure you are actually forcing the power from the good cells through the shorted one where it would have any effect on the shorted area itself.

The deep hole would be a good idea for sure if anyone ever tries that idea, and make sure the cables are tight on the battery so no sparks, and be far far away as I have seen car batteries explode when people swipe the cable ends together just to see if they had a good connection. Perhaps they did not have a good connection and that caused sparks at the battery wigh expoded it? Anyway I don't think this is a good idea!

But since I have junk batteries and like big booms and live way far away from people, I may look for a shovel and really long cable!!

 I have an area I want a really large hole anyway, this might be a good way to move out some dirt

[pyrocasto]

Well shoot. I guess I'll change the charger to 2amps and hope for the best. Thanks for the info, and hopefully it will help out. This could take almost a week to charge up! darn

[richhagen]

I'm not convinced he has a short, he hasn't been able to put any power into it at all because his charger probably won't start charging unless the voltage is over a certain amount.  I would probably start by dumping some power through a resistor, say an amp or so if I have a suitable power resistor and see if the voltage climbs up enough over time to charge it with his charger.  Rich

[ghurd]

Kind of sounds like a smart charger to me too.

I would try using one of those cheap chargers to get it past 9V, them go back to the 1st charger.  About any charger you burrow will be dumb and should get it high enough.

I won't say its a good idea, but I have just 'jumped' the 8v one to a 11-12v one with cheap 10' 10ga jumper cables, while the 8v one is on the smart charger.

It gets it high enough for the smart charger to start.

Then disconnect the 2nd battery and the charger will (should?) keep going.

Sometimes it takes a few jumps.

Nobody thinks twice over connecting a 14v battery to a 10v battery...

If the dead one is in an old lady's car at the grocery store and the 14v one is in their running car.

G-

[nothing to lose]

"Nobody thinks twice over connecting a 14v battery to a 10v battery...

If the dead one is in an old lady's car at the grocery store and the 14v one is in their running car."

That is true!

When a light or headlights is left on and a battery is toally dead I don't think twice at home either. That's how I get the smart charger junk to work, jump the dead one a few minutes off a running car, then use the dumb smart charger.

I also pulse charge them sometime after that for awhile too. My Couger and pickup truck or both bad for having lights left on all day, I am suprised I never had to replace the battery yet, we are talking the led clock stops working dead!

[pyrocasto]

I jumped it a little, but I'm gonna jump it off my car for a little and see if I can get that darned voltage up a little.(lots of littles)

I can get a 1 amp charger for $12, but anything over that is gonna cost me $30+. I may also hook it up to my solar setup for a little while, see if that charges em up good or not.

[ghurd]

Some controllers need 8V too.

[BT Humble]

My Couger and pickup truck or both bad for having lights left on all day, I am suprised I never had to replace the battery yet, we are talking the led clock stops working dead!

After the 3rd time that happened to me this year(!) I made a reminder beeper for the headlights in my truck.  The circuit was published in Silicon Chip magazine, and the only part I had to buy was a 555 chip...

BTH

[BT Humble]

Well shoot. I guess I'll change the charger to 2amps and hope for the best. Thanks for the info, and hopefully it will help out. This could take almost a week to charge up! darn

I was talking to a chap in a small-town solar power shop a couple of years ago, and his battery reconditioning technique involved hooking the battery up to a 20W solar panel and ignoring it for a couple of weeks...

BTH

[pyrocasto]

I'm thinking of buying a 1 amp charger and letting it go, since I cant get the voltage boosted up much.

[healerenergy]

I don't now that much about batteries but is that a concrete floor those battries are sitting on. If so you might want to put something under them because from what I understand concrete can hurt batteries.

[pyrocasto]

Hate to bust your bubble, but that's a common myth. I think where it started is a few decades ago, battery cases were made of a porous rubber, allowing conductivity through it if they moisture was high. That would make a ground and drain the battery.

Back even before that, they were made with a wooden case and the battery was inside a glass jar in the wood. If the wood got wet, it could swell and break. Thus, moisture also hurt them.

Todays batteries are a poly plastic and 5 times more insulative than the old rubber.

[healerenergy]

Then Im glad I said something because no one has ever set me straight on the subject. That is something I learned 35 years ago from my grand father who recently passed at the age of 98 & 1/2.

[nothing to lose]

I should do that, but I would probably ingore it anyway, already to many beepers buzzers in the world. What happens alot is We leave the keys in a vehice when moving stuff around and of course that beeper, dinger, buzzer, works but we ignore it.

Like sunday, I needed my trailer so I had to move 3 cars to pull it out, left the keys in 2 for when I move them back again. Probably the cars have a buzzer for the lights already, just ignore it because of key beepers.

 The cougar was bad about it because the wife was driving it to work at night and I drove it durring the day alot, so it always had the key left in it, then I would use the truck awhile and the car would sit with the lights on, then it's dead when she goes to work so she takes some other car and in a few days I go out to check the cougar and find the lights on because it was a foggy morning when she came home in it last.

The truck is normally the cargo light or radio that kills it. Some-one put in a CD-player radio and it does not need the key turned on. So if some-one (kid) had it on while we were doing somthing and does not turn it off next day or so the batery is dead. Or the cargo light is my fault working around day break, dark when I start and daylight when I quit, and I forget I had the light on.

Of course we live in the country, not city, and we only leave the keys in the cars when one of us is home which is normally always some-one here. When we both will be gone I go around and get all the keys and hide them, except for the ones we will be driving then.

[TomW]

healerenergy;

Haha, very old urban myth.

The only real problem with setting them on concrete is it creates a big thermal differential in the battery from the concrete.

Mine sit on concrete and have for 3 years with no noticeable problems.  Not a scientific study, mind you, just real world experience. My grandfather told me the same thing years ago and I always set stored batteries on a board until I discovered it Does Not Apply to modern batteries.

It is good to bring these things up occasionally and expose them as myths, however, so thats good.

Cheers.

TomW

[ghurd]

We had T-105s on concrete for 4 or 5 years. They are fine.

Recently put them on wood with wheels to make watering easier,

because they are under a bench.

I have seen battery acid or gasses damage concrete.

G-

[fishfarm]

Just to put a nail in this coffin, pyrocasto and TomW have it right. The Trojan battery FAQ addresses this question:

* Storing a battery on concrete will discharge it quicker- Long ago, when battery cases were made out of natural rubber, this was true. Now, however, battery cases are made of polypropylene or other modern materials that allow a battery to be stored anywhere. A battery's rate of discharge is affected by its construction, its age, and the ambient temperature. The main issue with storing on concrete is that if the battery leaks, the concrete will be damaged.

Another interesting item in the FAQ is their date codes if you haven't already seen it:

How do you read the date codes on the batteries?

Positive Terminal- Manufacturing Date. This code indicates the actual date when mechanical assembly of the battery was completed. At this point, electrolyte has not been added to the battery and formation charging has not taken place. LETTER stands for the month and could be anything from A to L (A=January, B=February, C=March, and so on),; NUMBER stands for the date.

Negative Terminal- Shipping Date. This code indicates the month and year when the battery was shipped out of our factory. LETTER stands for the month (see below); NUMBER is the last digit of the year.

*Example: A battery with "I26" stamped on the positive terminal and "J2" on the negative. "I26" means that the battery was assembled, without electrolyte, on September 26th. "J2" means that it was shipped from our factory around October of 2002.

[Ex Mek]

  A few years ago I worked as a plant fitter , machines were left all over the place and one would not start it was due for new batteries as it faled to start several times after standing for a week ( D8) all i had was a gas powered electric welder , so with no more adoo i "Jump" started it with the welder , ( 600 amps / 40 volts ) those batteries lasted another 3 years before they died , I had never heard of a desulphator , maybe that is what the welder did ? or it blew off a internal short ?

[nothing to lose]

K1 (pos)

Oct 2001?

O5 (neg)

 13th of may?

So my L16P batteries are around 7 months and 3years old from shipping date?

 I wonder if they are still under warrauntee

Thanks for the info how to read the dates, that should really help a bit. Like I find a place to buy alot used of trojans, if they all check out about the same otherwise I will go for the newest ones.

Too bad it's stamped in the lead post, so easy to mess up. I had a couple I could not read also. I geuss who ever had these abused them fairly bad, I have some good ones, but also 4 that never came back yet, though I stopped trying them for awhile, time to give them another good try, less than 5 years old? I think I have had these about 6-8 months myself, maybe alot longer?

[fishfarm]

The way I read their instructions, the positive stamp is month/day of month. K1 would then mean November 1st for the assembly date. The negative is month/year. O5 does not compute; the letters should only be A thru L. Could it be D5? That would mean April 2005 for the shipping date.

[nothing to lose]

I guess I did it wrong, for sure theses are not 2005 batteries

Got them at a scrap yard last year!

I will look again, trouble with the stamp being on the lead post, easy to get messed up, I have a couple that have no marks readable, looks like the post was cleaned with a wire brush.

As for bringing back the dead, batteries that is. I think I may have done something?? :O

I got one that I had gave up on up to over 6.5V and it held longer than it ever has before. It was only around 4V when I started with it.

I had some gunk here I bought a long time ago. Probably that EDTA stuff sold under a differnt high price brand. After looking at the link for EDTA that was posted I saw it said DOES NOT DISOLVE IN ACID, disolve in water first then add. The stuff I bought did not say that and I dumped in a tablespoon of powder to each hole. I did not think it worked very well. So now I tested it, took acid from a charged battery and the stuff did not disolve very well. Used water and it did better though I had some crystals  in the bottom of the yogurt cup I used. So I crunched them up with a little steel rod, I think it may have coroded the rod a bit by the time I did 12 holes.

Anyway I used warm water and added this to the batteries. All I had handy was a 12V Smart charger 2/10/20/40 amps. It does not say 6V on it anywhere, but I figured what the heck. I charged alittle at 2 amps. Did not see much happening, tried 10amps got one cell bubbling a little.  Since I wanted the stuff I dumped in to mix up in there I kicked it into high gear and did a 12V 40amp charge on the 6V trojans :O

 These are just a little smaller than my L16P ones and alot larger than a golf carts.

Well I got that sucker bubbling hard on the first cell and fairly well on the second two. Maybe around 5 minute tops. Then I took turns charging varius ones at 10 or 20 amps and sometimes hitting them up to 40amps. Shutting it off sometimes and sometime it would shut itself off.

When I came in I had one still holding about 6.5V that started at a low 4V (second worst one) and that one never held that high that long before.

The worst one the charger would turn on then shut off with an error every time.

I'd turn on the power and click the amp button up to 40 amps and it would run a second then shut off. I did this about a dozen times. It would only run a second even on the 2amps setting and shut off also. After about 20 tries at 40amps I was finnaly able to get the smart charger to stay on when set to 2 amps. I think the display said 3.5 amps. After a few mintutes on the 2 amps I kicked it to 10amps and it ran, then I kicked it to 20 and it still ran.

Now when I first started it would shut off in a second with the error. After I got it going the charger chargers a little then shuts down to let the batery cool or something, when it tried to start again on it's own it would shut off and give an error again. After hitting it with 10 amps and 40amps a few times and letting it run and resarting and doing it more I finnally got it to actually run like it should.

 This was a 6V and the hole at the neg post was fizzling like an Alkaseltzer! Was getting some bubble from the 2 others also.

When I came in tonight all were showing about 6V or higher. I left 2 wired in series for 12V and the charger is running on those at 10 amps tonight.

When I was out there working on them I was doing each 6V one at a time as a 6V with a 12V charger. Maybe the charger kicks back to 6V? Maybe I was kicking out 80amps at 6V

with the charger instead of the 12V at 40amps?? Not sure about that?

Anyway, that's how I got them to charge up enough to show over 6V, and it has not been long enough to tell anythng yet about how well they full charge and hold a charge, this is better than those 4 have done in the past though.

Tomorrow I will check the 2 sitting and see if they held over night or drop to 4V again. And also see how well the 2 charging now seem to be. These are probably close to 300amphr? L16p is 360amphr and these are only a little smaller.

 Since these were totally dead, 10hours at 10amps is only 1/3 the amphours for a charge in the morning. I geuss a C20 would be close around 15amps so 10amps should be a slow charge.

Maybe there is hope for the hopeless?

[pyrocasto]

Muahahhaa. Went back today to look around. Found a walmart deep cycle(trolling) battery. Checked it, 3 volts. I dont believe I could revive that so I left it alone. ;-) I did however on the way out, find another one of these beauties that I've already got, and it had a good 11 volts. It's out charging now. :-)

[ghurd]

Free again?

I would feel guilty.

Not enough to stop me from taking them! lol

Somebody said one of the local wally worlds is giving $10 for scrap batteries.

Free good batteries AND $10 for the bad ones... hmmm...

Maybe you should have another look at the 3V one.

G-

[pyrocasto]

Oh I want to keep doing business with him, so I gave him $20 a battery(the 3 working ones at least), and figured that was fair. That gives him a little incentive to find more batteries for me. :-)

I'll ask about that $10 thing though, since there are some dead ones anyway.

[hiker]

so did it come back  to life yet[where did the summer go]......

[pyrocasto]

Where did the summer go is right. I've got them most of the way up with a trickle charge, but I still havent used a desulfator on them so I need to purchase one real soon, and get them on there. I guess I'll just go for the solargizer since I havent heard anything bad about it and it's only $20.

LOL, cant believe it's been that long and I still havent got one...