My truck sits for a couple of weeks at a time between uses and I like to keep it on a maintainer. I had a Battery Tender Plus that I have been using, but the batteries died after three years, even though it was plugged in all the time (literally only off the maintainer for 30 days or so a year). Anyhow, I'm looking for something different now that will actually work.

What are you guys using? I've got Die Hard Platinums and I would like for them to last as long as possible!

I've got a cheap no-name maintainer that I've been using on my boat for the past 10 years... the Optimas that I have in there are almost 9 years old and are doing great. I would get another one of those, but I can't find it in the store anymore!

 

I keep a battery minder 1500 on my platinum's with no issue. It is a desulfation model. Did your old one do that?

 

Did you have the Platinums with the tender or were those after? What is the amperage on your tender?

 

I have the Battery Tender Plus which puts out 1.25a. Not sure if it desulfates (I think it does), but I know it's supposed to be smart enough to keep the batteries at full charge without overcharging. The batteries that died were standard motorcraft (the previous ones lasted three years as well with no maintainer); I put the Die Hards in about a year ago and have kept the Battery Tender on them as well.

 

I'm using a model from Northern Tools. Keeps batteries charged and once to capacity, goes into a float mode. It performs desulfation and uses only 1 amp to keep the battery up to snuff using a pulse charge. They were on sale for something like $25 and can be plugged in indefinitely.

Most batteries only last 3 years, maybe a little more depending on brand and rating capacity. These trucks are extremely hard on batteries with the glow plug circuit, the small alternator, battery cable size and grounding locations.

Be picky on the model, most just boil the cells to death. I even use one of these on the 4-wheeler, think its a Ctek 800 model.

 

I use a CTEK MUS 4.3. Max 4.3A and has a higher voltage "winter" setting that used 15.8V that the manual says is for certain AGM batteries. I think their points are arguable, but that's the black ink that company puts on paper.

Maunal for the charger:
http://smartercharger.com/wp-content...al-mus-4.3.pdf

Links to product:
CTEK Multi US 4.3 - CTEK Battery ChargersCTEK Battery Chargers

 

Battery minder. Works great on our trucks.

If the truck sits for more then a day or two this will be on the truck.



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Just my op. but you can buy 2 1/2 sets of Costco batteries for the price of one set of Platinums and they are excellent batteries.

 

My truck also sits for weeks at a time.I use a battery minder,Works great,Got it on Amazon.

 

I also run the sears platinum batteries and use this maintainer BatteryMINDer 12V Maintainer for Sealed AGM Lead-Acid Batteries

 

I use a 5a Battery Tender

022-0157-1

 

I've got several Battery Tenders and also BatteryMinders - 2 of the 1500s and my last one a 1510, which is a 1500 with a longer warranty and comes with a set of ring terminals and plug along with a nicer clamp than my 1500s came with. I got a great price on the 1510 just by googling it -- low $40 range, but that place doesn't have them on sale anymore. The difference in the 1500/10 and the 1.3A BatterMinder (that is on sale at Northern and elsewhere again for $25) is 1.3A vs 1.5A and the temperature compensation -- probably only important if you plug the unit in and have it near the battery...

One of the good folks here on FTE turned me on to the BatteryMinder and I use these for all my flooded cell batteries. I use the tenders for the AGMs as I've heard the desulfating isn't either as effective or as needed. But the Tenders do not desulfate.

Now, having gone down this path... Anyone into Solar?? Have you heard of PWM charger/controllers? They will desulfate too...

So, I picked up a cheap solar panel off eBay and a quality PWM charge controller and now have a nifty PORTABLE charger so I don't have to string extension cords all over to where my gear happens to be parked...

Just another way to slice the apple...

And back to the OP: As has been mentioned: take a close look at your charging system on the truck: 140A Alt or more?, good connections?, read the thread on here that TooManyToys put a fair bit of effort into on balancing our truck's charging and discharging (I need to find it and bookmark it and then I can post a link), great piece of work on what really is going on with our cabling...

ok, here it is and I really wish we could get this in the Tech Folder!! Any Mods listening? This is good stuff....

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...l#post15633795

 

If you run the numbers, two large flooded lead-acid start batteries connected in parallel are simply one really big battery, in terms of ampere hour capacity. Any charger needs to be "sized" to whatever battery it's paired with. Better a quality charger with a cheap battery than the other way around, too.

The battery maintainers will provide a float but they are going to choke once the battery pack gets discharged heavily or they become mismatched. The good ones have protection circuitry that will switch into float mode after several hours so they aren't boiling the electrolyte for 3 days straight trying to reach full charge. So they won't ever be fully charged. Any battery actually needs a slight overcharge or they will quickly sulfate. If on the other hand, heavy charging current is provided they will charge fast but warped plates are often the result. Charging rates is a compromise.

Usually no more than 20% of the Ah capacity (Not CCA) is considered the optimum charge current. Fast enough to reasonably charge thoroughly, without excessive outgassing, slow enough to saturate thoroughly. A standard auto start battery might be 40 or 50 Ah? Maybe more. Two big batts in parallel - that means 20 amps is a "trickle" charge!

This in a nutshell, is the problem as I see it. Get the right size charger on them and let them cook periodically to equalize cells/batts and then use a Tender or float for storage.