Purchased a new deep cycle battery this evening. Got home and threw it on the charger to see where it was and it was completely dead. Looked around and found out it was manufactured in july of 09, so its been sitting on a shelf now for 7mnths. Is that too long? I don't want to start off with a battery that's been damaged from sitting dead too long.
Marine battery
Boats
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187 Posts
Hey now,
Hi, I'm new to the site, but felt compelled to reply on the dead marine battery that needed to be charged up. Your battery is more than likely okey-dokey but remember that a deep-cycle/marine battery needs to be fully charged before you take it out on the water, and that a slow "trickle" charge is what you need to bring your battery up to a full charge. This might take up to three days to fully charge your deep-cycle battery. You can charge multiple batteries by hooking them together, positive to positive, & negative to negative. This will keep your battery'(s) charging in a 12 volt pattern, called a parallel circuit.
A second method of hooking batteries together is called a series circuit. This method means you hook our batteries together positive to negative, negative to positive. In this form of hooking batteries together increases the voltage of the total sum of voltage times the amount of batteries wired together. An example of this is 12v + 12v = 24volts. Adding another battery in this manner would increase the voltage to 36 volts, & adding one more would increase the voltage to 48 volts.
A four battery, 24 volt system requires that a series & parallel hook-up is being utilized. A combination of both systems.
Goodluck with your battery, it probably just needs a good slow charge...
Hi, I'm new to the site, but felt compelled to reply on the dead marine battery that needed to be charged up. Your battery is more than likely okey-dokey but remember that a deep-cycle/marine battery needs to be fully charged before you take it out on the water, and that a slow "trickle" charge is what you need to bring your battery up to a full charge. This might take up to three days to fully charge your deep-cycle battery. You can charge multiple batteries by hooking them together, positive to positive, & negative to negative. This will keep your battery'(s) charging in a 12 volt pattern, called a parallel circuit.
A second method of hooking batteries together is called a series circuit. This method means you hook our batteries together positive to negative, negative to positive. In this form of hooking batteries together increases the voltage of the total sum of voltage times the amount of batteries wired together. An example of this is 12v + 12v = 24volts. Adding another battery in this manner would increase the voltage to 36 volts, & adding one more would increase the voltage to 48 volts.
A four battery, 24 volt system requires that a series & parallel hook-up is being utilized. A combination of both systems.
Goodluck with your battery, it probably just needs a good slow charge...
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187 Posts
As a quick thought just struck my conscience, I realized that I left out a good piece of information in my previous post. A battery with absolutely no charge that you purchased off of the shelf is not a bad thing. In fact when you purchased the battery, the store clerk should have activated the warranty by removing the current date stickers that come with every 6/12v battery that is sold.
Batteries are sold with a shelf life, and as soon as they are charged the 1st time is when that "life" begins.
They are only good for so long, then they wear out, go dead, then you must purchase another one.
This is not being done to keep the economy going, it's just the way they are designed.
Again, goodluck with your new battery...
Batteries are sold with a shelf life, and as soon as they are charged the 1st time is when that "life" begins.
They are only good for so long, then they wear out, go dead, then you must purchase another one.
This is not being done to keep the economy going, it's just the way they are designed.
Again, goodluck with your new battery...
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1,437 Posts
A note on charging from what was previously said. Charging multipul battteries can be done at the same time as long as they are the same type battery, same amp hour rating, etc,etc. other wise you wont get the same charge in each. Also a good quality battery charger is reccomened, one that will saturate, then float the charge and if it has a pluser all the better. I have a 4ah 12 v battery that I use for my depth sounder and have had for 10 years I use a pluser with a trickle charger and that battery is like new.
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7,936 Posts
I charge my batteries one at a time, just like I put my pants on in the morning, one leg at a time. My batteries are all different from one another though. I sure do hope that my pant legs match, as I don't want to be making some funny kind of fashion statement.
I run my batteries down to as low as about 60% charge before I swap over to battery # 2. Back at the barn, I hook 'em up to my 2-10-20 amp smart charger at 10 amps, set for deep cycle AGM. Charges 'em up just fine.
If they've been sitting for a while, I usually hook 'em up before a go-out, just to make sure that they are "topped off."
I run my batteries down to as low as about 60% charge before I swap over to battery # 2. Back at the barn, I hook 'em up to my 2-10-20 amp smart charger at 10 amps, set for deep cycle AGM. Charges 'em up just fine.
If they've been sitting for a while, I usually hook 'em up before a go-out, just to make sure that they are "topped off."
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1,437 Posts
Jim, good going on charging. We find at work that most batteries fail because of incorrect charging. Most boats/yachts etc come from the factory with the wrong type of charger. Or the dealer puts in the wrong batteries. The battery types ar wet/ gel/ agm. and a charger that will match the battery will provide greater life for the battery.
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