Chuck_S
Broadview Hts, OH, USA
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105 amp reserve is not a rating I've seen. 105 amp hours perhaps?
105 amp hours is very misleading but technically truthful. Many of these are under 11 volts where the battery will power very little.
105 amp hours is probably about 175 reserve minutes or about 73 useful amp hours. Each. Two of these batteries will provide almost triple the amp hours of a single G24 battery if fully charged.
-- Chuck
'06 Roo 23SS behind '07 Expedition out of Cleveland
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squirescampers
Derry, NH
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Chuck_S wrote:105 amp reserve is not a rating I've seen. 105 amp hours perhaps?
105 amp hours is very misleading but technically truthful. Many of these are under 11 volts where the battery will power very little.
105 amp hours is probably about 175 reserve minutes or about 73 useful amp hours. Each. Two of these batteries will provide almost triple the amp hours of a single G24 battery if fully charged.
-- Chuck
You're right-- I meant amp hours.
I am topping off the batteries with the charger tonight.- Good thing I checked the charge, the 10 amp charger is taking 6 hours to top off.
Is that normal for brand new batteries?
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smkettner
Southern California
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squirescampers wrote:Any suggestions on recharging without having a generator?
Jumper cables direct battery to battery is your best bet but it takes some time like an hour or two to get a decent charge on. Or try talking to a neighbor that is running a generator to let you either parellel charge your battery or use an extension cord to plug in the main connection to let the converter charge.
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Chuck_S
Broadview Hts, OH, USA
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Battery charge works by voltage differential. A wider differential equals more amps flow. As the battery voltage climbs to match the charger output the charge slows to a crawl. Trying to put back (say) 80 amp hours with a "10 amp" charger will take over 12, maybe 16 hours. As the voltage difference gets smaller it takes about the same time go put the last 20% into the battery as the first 80% took, the "10 amp" charger may only be supplying a trickle charge at that point.
Trojan Battery recommends a 3-stage charger have 10% output capacity of the battery for effective charging. A 100 amp hour battery should use a 10 amp charger, a 200 amp battery use 20 amp, etc. Fortuneatly the very competent WFCO converter in many campers has at least those capacities and will vary the voltage in stages for an efficient charge. Low amp rates (via lower voltages) will work but can take days (literally) to fully charge a battery.
Don't be fooled by surface charge. Put your nearly dead battery on the charger for 15 minutes and check the voltage and it'll be just under 13v -- more than fully charged. Don't believe it, that's just the voltage on the surface of the plates, the interior is still nearly dead. But that surface charge limits amp flow, hence the need for a smart charger to boost the voltage to recreate a good voltage differential. Note connecting to your car for 15 minutes will provide this same surface charge. The battery isn't charged, though in less than several hours.
A trick used by the old diesel-electric submarines of WW1 and WW2 was to have very big batteries and run them at the lower end of the charge spectrum. A low battery will absorb amps as a prodigious rate and it's all about amps. Note that last 20% charge takes as long as the first 80% so the subs didn't worry about it unless they had lots of charge time available. We can do this too. Don't recharge until you're down in the 20% range. With (say) 200 amp hours total capacity let them run down to 40 amp hours remaining and charge at 20 amps for 6 hours to get them back to 160 (80%). Trying to charge from 80% to 100% will require 4 to 6 hours daily rather than 6 or so hours every three or four days running at the low end of the charge range.
Deep discharge followed by a quick, partial recharge will minimize your charging requirements and still provide lots of amp hours. Full charge when you have the luxury.
-- Chuck
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oldcurios
The South
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We invested in couple of inverters that we keep charged. They will run almost all of our electrical appliances, including the TV. When not camping, we keep them in the house - they are great during power outages.
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maddog348
Bakersfield,CA
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oldcurios, What do those inverters look like??? THANKS
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oldcurios
The South
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We bought them in the automotive department. One from Sam's Club - it also has an aircompressor built in, and the other from Wal-Mart on sale. They look like large battery chargers. One has a built-in recepticle where you can just plug in. The other has a cigarette-lighter type plug that we bought a converter for (the converter plugs into the cigarette-lighter recepticle and has an electical outlet.)
I hope that makes sense...my husband laughs at me when I try to explain these things. ;-)
We used one of them to run a flat-screen TV with DVD player during my moms 75th birthday party. Worked like a charm.
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maddog348
Bakersfield,CA
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OH, A power station.
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oldcurios
The South
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Pretty much a large battery with an electrical outlet.
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jrat
British Columbia
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Yes - we carry one of those too! Mostly as my ipod fm transmitter is built in to a 12v plug! I also use the compressor to air up my helper springs - nice, light and good for charging cel phone etc.
jrat
That's me, wife and 2 daughters!
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