Battery Tender

[Robby]

What type of battery tender should I purchase if I leave the car for a couple of weeks?


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[graytoad]

What type of battery tender should I purchase if I leave the car for a couple of weeks?


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I highly recommend the Battery Tender brand. We have had classic cars and Harleys for years and have been using this brand for a long long time. They always perform flawlessly: never a single problem. ( knock wood) They come with a 'lead' that you attach to your battery so you just quickly plug it in. If you have more than one vehicle that needs tending they also offer multi units that save a few bucks and also solve the problem of not having enough wall outlets to plug into, but we mostly have the individual ones for convenience.

As you likely are aware, all modern vehicles: cars and motorcycles, especially those with alarms, keyless fobs, auto locks are constantly searching for the fob so they always slowly drain their batteries. Even those without have parasitic systems but are slower to flatten a battery. This is not a problem in 'daily driver' cars as the battery gets topped up by driving. A dead battery is a huge P.I.A. in an XLR, many systems need to be reset etc.

 

[WAM]

I use a BATERY TENDER JUNIOR which is a smaller version of the one above. I like the JUNIOR because the unit plugs into the wall outlet and a lead wire runs from the unit to the car, no unit to sit somewhere. You can buy extension wires which I run to the ceiling then down to the car so you don't trip over the wire. I buy them on Ebay for about $25.

If you look at the first picture in my link below you will see the wire running down to the front of the El Camino. If you look at the upper left of the picture you will see the JUNIOR plugged into an outlet which I mounted high on the wall

 

[graytoad]

I use a BATERY TENDER JUNIOR which is a smaller version of the one above. I like the JUNIOR because the unit plugs into the wall outlet and a lead wire runs from the unit to the car, no unit to sit somewhere. You can buy extension wires which I run to the ceiling then down to the car so you don't trip over the wire. I buy them on Ebay for about $25.

If you look at the first picture in my link below you will see the wire running down to the front of the El Camino. If you look at the upper left of the picture you will see the JUNIOR plugged into an outlet which I mounted high on the wall

Is the Junior also a 1.25 Amp? (I was not aware of them) I know our motorcycle units are .7 Amp and I wonder if they would be ample (pun intended) to handle the needs of an XLR. The motorcycle ones would likely would work for a classic car without all the parasitic draining systems etc.

 

[WAM]

graytoad,

I'm not sure about the JUNIOR amps but the description of one should tell you.

They always keep my 2 cars with wet cells fully charged.

I put a Odyssey battery in the XLR and I had to get a AGM BATTERY MINDER to keep it charged and it seems to be working fine.

 

[graytoad]

)

graytoad,

I'm not sure about the JUNIOR amps but the description of one should tell you.

They always keep my 2 cars with wet cells fully charged.

I put a Odyssey battery in the XLR and I had to get a AGM BATTERY MINDER to keep it charged and it seems to be working fine.

Ok, so now you have me curious. My hubby Steve referred to the junior unit as what he considers a M/C unit. They are generally 12V - .75 amp (or 750 mA) so I went to the Deltran Battery Tender website and there are a number of Junior units including a 12V - .75A, 8V - 1.25A and a 6V - 1.25A units of the style you describe. Learn something new every day! Steve was told by a Deltran rep that they generally recommend the 1.25A units for cars and trucks. It is good to know that the Juniors do the job too!

 

[lextoy]

the .75 amp will just take 2X as long to recharge as a 1.5A charger.
for a large auto battery, that could translate into a week to recharge a low battery.
not very effective.
but as purely a maintainer, of a well charged battery, .75A is good enough.
some people prefer a higher rated charger, with 8 amp or 10 amp capability,
for the situation they need to recharge a weak battery, not just maintain it.
depending how many vehicles you have , boats cars motorcycles RV etc...
you might want to have one heavier duty charger/maintainer,
and the rest can be .75 A trickle chargers.
at least once a year something i own has a weak battery, and i rather get it recharged quickly.
the longer it is discharged the more sulfation, aka damage, occurs.
so recharging it quickly with a heavy duty charger is advisable.

PS i use a battery minder 12248. 8 amp capable, or can bump down to 2 Amp. fully automatic.
can be switched for agm gel or wet cell.
use it for my odyssey battery in my 07 XLR. also use it to top off my bmw and prius.
i also have some manual 30 amp chargers for those emergency situations when a battery is totally dead from a door being left open overnight etc...

 

[graytoad]

more info than I want....

Here is more info on batteries than I can 'absorb' on a good day....let alone early in the morning with a short nights sleep.

Battery Tender - Basics of Electricity

 

[pure zen]

We have four Battery Tender PLUS models in use, and have had them working for over ten years w/o any problems.

p z

 

[jdsstar]

I have two, the standerd Battery Tender and one by Black and Decker, both work well. I just connected both leads to the battery terminal, since the battery is located on the right side rear of engine compartment the connection wire was long enough to run the wire up on top of the fire wall. The battery tender connection is capped and fused, so I only have to plug in by the right wiper blade. I did it this way incase of a dead battery, which requrie manual operations to get the hood open. Hope this helps someone. Joe Stella

 

[Popbigguy]

This is the brand I bought. So far so good!

Avoid Battery Sulfation with a Desulfating Battery Charger | BatteryMINDers