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Re: Charging starter battery

I wouldn't use a regular automotive battery charger. You need one that limits the current to around 400 mA max until it reaches the cut off voltage.

-- Red S. Red's R/C Battery Clinic

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us out for "revolting" information.

I've got a 4A 12V Towers Pb starter battery that I would like to charge > using my 4-8 A garage (also 12V) battery charger. Is the charging rate safe > doing this? I was thinking maybe I would fry the batt if I tried it... Any > advise? Thanks ahead of time... > >
Reply to
Red Scholefield
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I use a 7 amp 12V battery in my field box. To charge it I have used, for years, an ACE constant voltage charger, which was cheap and seems to last forever. It starts at 500 ma and as internal resistance goes up the amperage goes down, so that you can leave the battery on charge indefinitely (meaning it's not harmful, not that you should necessarily do it). The battery lasts a long time, also. I'm wondering if 4 amp is big enough for the purpose.

Reply to
John R. Agnew

The wall wart I am using along with the rectifier puts out 500mA max and the voltage is limited to 14.5v. I have left batteries on this thing for weeks at a time with no apparent bad stuff. Charge current when fully charged is a dozen mA or so.

Reply to
Paul McIntosh

Paul,

What's the purpose/need for that regarding this subject? --

Jim Lilly - Team Z

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Using - Virtual Access(OLR), ZAP 4.0, & WinXP Pro w/SP1

Reply to
Jim Lilly

Sounds more like a zener diode maybe... voltage limiter

Anyway.. I haven't tried the 4.5 A batt yet. I hope it is sufficient to provide the torque needed to start my engine...

Reply to
Newbee

Transformers turn line voltage AC into lower-voltage AC. A bridge rectifier turns the AC into pulsed DC. Capacitors smooth out the pulses to give a fairly smooth DC.

Reply to
Morris Lee

Batteries also act like capacitors. If you are just charging a battery, you don't need any extra caps.

Reply to
Paul McIntosh

Morris,

Thanks for that info! --

Jim Lilly - Team Z

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Using - Virtual Access(OLR), ZAP 4.0, & WinXP Pro w/SP1

Reply to
Jim Lilly

Have you thought about getting one of these ....

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? $30 +shipping isnt too bad and they work well.

Reply to
JJ

You will shorten the life of the battery at the high voltage of a car charger. The high amps at the end of the charge is the biggest killer, but the high amps overall isn't good either. If you could limit the amps to about 1 amp, and put a zenier diode to reduce the voltage would help.

Or get the right charger. :-)

Reply to
Morgans

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