12v car battery chargers....
 

so buying a charger:-

screwfux have a 4A at £20 & a 6A at £30.

the 4A one is "not recommended for batteries over 50Ah" ?

(my borrowed charger has a "2A trickle charge" setting....)

So is that just marketing bull**** to induce me to buy the more
expensive charger? or is there a basis?

Jim K

12v car battery chargers....
 

On 27/03/2013 21:26, Jim K wrote:
so buying a charger:-

screwfux have a 4A at £20 & a 6A at £30.

the 4A one is "not recommended for batteries over 50Ah" ?

(my borrowed charger has a "2A trickle charge" setting....)

So is that just marketing bull**** to induce me to buy the more
expensive charger? or is there a basis?

Jim K


I would recommend getting a proper smart charger, like this
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/350420431601

As it will also charge gel batteries.

Aldi/Lidl have them every so often.


--
Toby...
Remove pants to reply

12v car battery chargers....
 

On Wednesday, March 27, 2013 9:26:32 PM UTC, Jim K wrote:
so buying a charger:-
screwfux have a 4A at £20 & a 6A at £30.
the 4A one is "not recommended for batteries over 50Ah" ?
(my borrowed charger has a "2A trickle charge" setting....)
So is that just marketing bull**** to induce me to buy the more
expensive charger? or is there a basis?
Jim K

its boll----


NT

12v car battery chargers....
 

On 28/03/2013 10:38 a.m., Toby wrote:
On 27/03/2013 21:26, Jim K wrote:
so buying a charger:-

screwfux have a 4A at £20 & a 6A at £30.

the 4A one is "not recommended for batteries over 50Ah" ?

(my borrowed charger has a "2A trickle charge" setting....)

So is that just marketing bull**** to induce me to buy the more
expensive charger? or is there a basis?

Jim K


I would recommend getting a proper smart charger, like this
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/350420431601

As it will also charge gel batteries.

Aldi/Lidl have them every so often.



But

http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-revi...DateDescending

12v car battery chargers....
 

On 28/03/2013 01:33, Gib Bogle wrote:
On 28/03/2013 10:38 a.m., Toby wrote:
On 27/03/2013 21:26, Jim K wrote:
so buying a charger:-

screwfux have a 4A at £20 & a 6A at £30.

the 4A one is "not recommended for batteries over 50Ah" ?

(my borrowed charger has a "2A trickle charge" setting....)

So is that just marketing bull**** to induce me to buy the more
expensive charger? or is there a basis?

Jim K


I would recommend getting a proper smart charger, like this
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/350420431601

As it will also charge gel batteries.

Aldi/Lidl have them every so often.



But

http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-revi...DateDescending


So one person has complained they had a problem with one unit.

--
Toby...
Remove pants to reply

12v car battery chargers....
 

On 28/03/2013 08:45, Toby wrote:
On 28/03/2013 01:33, Gib Bogle wrote:
On 28/03/2013 10:38 a.m., Toby wrote:
On 27/03/2013 21:26, Jim K wrote:
so buying a charger:-

screwfux have a 4A at £20 & a 6A at £30.

the 4A one is "not recommended for batteries over 50Ah" ?

(my borrowed charger has a "2A trickle charge" setting....)

So is that just marketing bull**** to induce me to buy the more
expensive charger? or is there a basis?

Jim K


I would recommend getting a proper smart charger, like this
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/350420431601

As it will also charge gel batteries.

Aldi/Lidl have them every so often.



But

http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-revi...DateDescending



So one person has complained they had a problem with one unit.

Which is not, so far as I am aware, the one Aldi/Lidl sell... And from a
crappy supplier, it appears.

--
Rod

12v car battery chargers....
 

In article ,
polygonum wrote:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-revi...DateDescending



So one person has complained they had a problem with one unit.

Which is not, so far as I am aware, the one Aldi/Lidl sell... And from a
crappy supplier, it appears.

And I'll bet it cost a lot more than the Lidl unit. That's not to say the
Lidl one is 100% reliable - I've had one fail. So keep the receipt as it
has a three year money back warranty.

The thing is, the actual performance of the tiny Lidl one is actually
better than some conventional chargers costing a lot more - and taking up
several times the space. I have a Halfords one which says 11 amp on the
front - yet the Lidl one charges a battery faster.

--
*How many roads must a man travel down before he admits he is lost?

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

12v car battery chargers....
 

In article ,
"Dave Plowman (News)" writes:

And I'll bet it cost a lot more than the Lidl unit. That's not to say the
Lidl one is 100% reliable - I've had one fail. So keep the receipt as it
has a three year money back warranty.

The thing is, the actual performance of the tiny Lidl one is actually
better than some conventional chargers costing a lot more - and taking up
several times the space. I have a Halfords one which says 11 amp on the
front - yet the Lidl one charges a battery faster.

The Aldi/Lidl one is a constant current charger with voltage monitoring
to control the charging process. You can select 0.8A or 3.8A charge rate
(selected as motorcycle or car battery). It will then charge at this
rate until the battery reaches fully charged voltage, and then steps
back to a very much lower maintenance charge rate.

A conventional charger charges at the terminal voltage via a current
limiting resistor (or sometimes using the power supply impedance
instead of a resistor), so although it might supply 11A into a
completely flat battery, as the terminal voltage rises, the current
drops dramatically, possibly well below the 3.8A of the Aldi/Lidl
charger, which is why it will take longer to fully charge.
Some conventional chargers improve on this by charging towards
something over the terminal voltage which will charge faster, but
will also overcharge if you forget to stop the charging.

I have a couple of gripes with the Aldi/Lidl charger:
1) There's no way to configure it to automatically start charging
when mains is restored. If it had this feature, it would make a
very good basis for supporting mains failure battery supply.
2) It claims to have a restoration charging mode for completely
flat batteries, but I've never got that to work - it ends up
thinking the flat 12V battery is a 6V battery, and almost
instantly thinks the battery is fully charged.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

12v car battery chargers....
 

In article ,
Andrew Gabriel wrote:
The thing is, the actual performance of the tiny Lidl one is actually
better than some conventional chargers costing a lot more - and taking up
several times the space. I have a Halfords one which says 11 amp on the
front - yet the Lidl one charges a battery faster.

The Aldi/Lidl one is a constant current charger with voltage monitoring
to control the charging process. You can select 0.8A or 3.8A charge rate
(selected as motorcycle or car battery). It will then charge at this
rate until the battery reaches fully charged voltage, and then steps
back to a very much lower maintenance charge rate.

Yup.

A conventional charger charges at the terminal voltage via a current
limiting resistor (or sometimes using the power supply impedance
instead of a resistor), so although it might supply 11A into a
completely flat battery, as the terminal voltage rises, the current
drops dramatically, possibly well below the 3.8A of the Aldi/Lidl
charger, which is why it will take longer to fully charge.
Some conventional chargers improve on this by charging towards
something over the terminal voltage which will charge faster, but
will also overcharge if you forget to stop the charging.

The Halford one claims to be 'electronic' and certainly does have
electronics, including the provision for charging SLA batteries. As well
as switching itself off after charging - and having reverse connection
protection. But seems as you say to reduce the charge rate considerably as
the battery charges. Which means it takes about 24 hours to charge a
battery so low it won't start a car. the Lidl one does it overnight. I did
stick an ammeter on it, and the most it showed was about 6 amps with a
very low battery. So I'd guess the marketing boys were out in force. ;-)


I have a couple of gripes with the Aldi/Lidl charger:
1) There's no way to configure it to automatically start charging
when mains is restored. If it had this feature, it would make a
very good basis for supporting mains failure battery supply.

It would be useful - but then that's not what it's sold as. It would
probably need to be made to a higher spec for this sort of use.

2) It claims to have a restoration charging mode for completely
flat batteries, but I've never got that to work - it ends up
thinking the flat 12V battery is a 6V battery, and almost
instantly thinks the battery is fully charged.

Not had the need to try it yet. I did have one battery so flat it wouldn't
even switch on - but jumping another across it for a few minutes then
allowed it to carry on charging after that was removed.

--
*Remember, no-one is listening until you fart.*

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

12v car battery chargers....
 

On 28/03/2013 13:54, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Andrew Gabriel wrote:
The thing is, the actual performance of the tiny Lidl one is actually
better than some conventional chargers costing a lot more - and taking up
several times the space. I have a Halfords one which says 11 amp on the
front - yet the Lidl one charges a battery faster.

The Aldi/Lidl one is a constant current charger with voltage monitoring
to control the charging process. You can select 0.8A or 3.8A charge rate
(selected as motorcycle or car battery). It will then charge at this
rate until the battery reaches fully charged voltage, and then steps
back to a very much lower maintenance charge rate.

Yup.

A conventional charger charges at the terminal voltage via a current
limiting resistor (or sometimes using the power supply impedance
instead of a resistor), so although it might supply 11A into a
completely flat battery, as the terminal voltage rises, the current
drops dramatically, possibly well below the 3.8A of the Aldi/Lidl
charger, which is why it will take longer to fully charge.
Some conventional chargers improve on this by charging towards
something over the terminal voltage which will charge faster, but
will also overcharge if you forget to stop the charging.

The Halford one claims to be 'electronic' and certainly does have
electronics, including the provision for charging SLA batteries. As well
as switching itself off after charging - and having reverse connection
protection. But seems as you say to reduce the charge rate considerably as
the battery charges. Which means it takes about 24 hours to charge a
battery so low it won't start a car. the Lidl one does it overnight. I did
stick an ammeter on it, and the most it showed was about 6 amps with a
very low battery. So I'd guess the marketing boys were out in force. ;-)


I have a couple of gripes with the Aldi/Lidl charger:
1) There's no way to configure it to automatically start charging
when mains is restored. If it had this feature, it would make a
very good basis for supporting mains failure battery supply.

It would be useful - but then that's not what it's sold as. It would
probably need to be made to a higher spec for this sort of use.

It is however sold as suitable to maintain a battery. The problem for me
is that if there is a momentary power drop out, everything in my house
that needs to restarts, except the charger. With cars out of use for
lengthy periods (kit car and my wife's car when she was ill), the
standing drain of security systems and the like then flatten the battery
totally in about three weeks. I have lost two batteries that way.

It is probably better this way than auto re-starting though, as you
don't know what conditions and dangers there might be if the charger
restarted when you might have deliberately had the power off for some
time and forgotten that the charger is still plugged in.

2) It claims to have a restoration charging mode for completely
flat batteries, but I've never got that to work - it ends up
thinking the flat 12V battery is a 6V battery, and almost
instantly thinks the battery is fully charged.

Not had the need to try it yet. I did have one battery so flat it wouldn't
even switch on - but jumping another across it for a few minutes then
allowed it to carry on charging after that was removed.

I have an old, non-smart charger for recovering "dead" batteries. It
recovered both the ones that I finally lost a couple of times, before
they finally gave up the ghost after yet another charger shut-off.

SteveW

12v car battery chargers....
 

On Thu, 28 Mar 2013 14:33:33 +1300, Gib Bogle
wrote:

But

http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-revi...DateDescending

There was a Mark of Optimate chargers which was dodgy. I think it's
been sorted now.

12v car battery chargers....
 

On Thu, 28 Mar 2013 13:54:52 +0000 (GMT), "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:

It would be useful - but then that's not what it's sold as. It would
probably need to be made to a higher spec for this sort of use.

As a long-term maintenance charger, the Lidl one works very well
indeed, allowing for remembering to reset it every mains failure.
I have a couple of batteries that owe their laid-up survival to the
Lidl charger(s) - one 2001 battery was in my ex-Transit, which was off
the road for the past two years, constantly on maintenance charge. It
started up right away, ready for the buyer to look at.

12v car battery chargers....
 

On 29/03/2013 10:58, Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
On Thu, 28 Mar 2013 13:54:52 +0000 (GMT), "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:

It would be useful - but then that's not what it's sold as. It would
probably need to be made to a higher spec for this sort of use.

As a long-term maintenance charger, the Lidl one works very well
indeed, allowing for remembering to reset it every mains failure.
I have a couple of batteries that owe their laid-up survival to the
Lidl charger(s) - one 2001 battery was in my ex-Transit, which was off
the road for the past two years, constantly on maintenance charge. It
started up right away, ready for the buyer to look at.


+1 - very impressed with mine on a motorbike battery.