Do you own a boat? Another GIZMO Review!

[flybob]

Well, here I go again, another “Must Have” GIZMO review!

I own a small weekend sports car, that I do not drive every weekend; so consequently, my batteries do not last as long as they should, and towards the end of their life, I find myself constantly having to boost charge my battery before use. The battery is not dead, just below the threshold to quickly start the car especially if it is cold in the garage.

On the recommendation of a friend, I bought one of those Harbor Freight Float Chargers, I think it cost all of 12.00. Well I used to be and electrical engineer and I know how lead acid batteries work/behave, so I was not too keen on leaving the float charger on 24/7. I was toying with the idea of putting it on a timer, (I love timers!) and then I saw this advertised on TV……HMMMM?


They have several models, basically different power outputs, I know I only needed less than 1 amp at 14-15 volts to do the job, so I opted for the Junior 750mA model. These things are supposed to be Smart and control the charging. They have an entire primer on battery charging on their website, quite good if you are into that sort of stuff, and their charging algorithm is what sold me.

Well, after driving the car around for a couple of hours, thinking my battery should be fully charged, I hooked it up, I got the red light which meant that it was in full charge mode and that the battery was less than 80% capacity! This morning the light was flashing green, which meant the battery was above 80% and now charging at a reduced rate (this is the key to properly charging a lead acid battery. As you can see in this picture, this afternoon, the light was steady green, which means the battery is fully charged and it is now in monitoring mode.


I already love this GIZMO!
So I am posting this, because if you own anything with a battery that goes into storage or does not get used often enough, boat, motorcycle, classic car, etc. you need one of these or something like it.

By the way, all the cable assemblies are included and with inline fuses, and it is rated at 105C basically 220 degrees F, good stuff. They even offer extension cables.

Hope you found my latest review helpful
bob

[briansII]

Bob, the Battery Tender is a great little device. I used one for years on motorcycle and trolling motor batteries. Cool thing is, it's a plug in and forget about deal. I lost mine a while back.

Of course the new boat/blackhole you throw $ at can't use such a simple, and inexpensive item. I now have a digital, on board charger for the boat. It's programmable for different types of batteries, will charge, then maintain/float, and can even "refresh" the batteries. While it's plug in and forget, this cool little unit is NOT cheap.

briansII