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Author Topic: Battery Charging  (Read 1859 times)

sinjon

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Battery Charging
« on: September 18, 2007, 06:56:57 pm »

Hello,

I am just a tad green, so a very simple question, I have two 6v batteries to charge, the first will finish at 11.00pm tonight, but probably by then I will be in bed. Can I stop it at say 8pm, start the second, run that until 11.00am tomorrow, then put the first one back on for the last three hours. Will it make any difference?
Like I say just a tad green.

Colin
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Colin

DickyD

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Re: Battery Charging
« Reply #1 on: September 18, 2007, 07:03:06 pm »

These are presumably lead acid batteries ? :-\
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boatmadman

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Re: Battery Charging
« Reply #2 on: September 18, 2007, 07:12:25 pm »

If they are lead acid, and you have a decent charger, then the charger should wind down to a trickle charge when the battery is 'full', meaning you can leave it on all night. You need to check the specification of the charger before doing this though, as not all of them revert to trickle charge.

Ian
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Telstar

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Re: Battery Charging
« Reply #3 on: September 21, 2007, 01:26:24 pm »

Hi
  Ian (boatmadman) is dead right, good chargers for lead acid/gelpack batteries have built in a voltage monitoring circuit which follows the characteristics of a lead acid cell, and when it is fully charged changes to 'trickle' charge. These also have the advantage, if you have only partially discharged the battery, it automatically reduces the charge period. O0
Word of caution these chargers (automatic lead acid chargers) must not be used for nickle cadmium or hydride batteries. :embarrassed:.

Cheers Tom
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malcolmfrary

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Re: Battery Charging
« Reply #4 on: September 21, 2007, 01:52:52 pm »

The two previous posters are correct.  For those inexperienced ( and probably the rest of us) a dedicated SLA charger is the best way to go. 
Charging can be split within reason (i.e. no leaving it several months between part charges) without problems.
If you want to make sure a charge stops at a set time, I have found packs of three plug-in mains timeswitches at about a fiver a pack.  These will switch off a a set time.  The downside is that you have to remember to disconnect before they switch back on 24 hours later, and give you another charge sequence, which might not be beneficial.
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