Resurrecting DEAD battery

[Graham]

Just a little story for those who may be interested:

Last time I drove my 300D was last Wednesday. Since then it has been in my unheated garage. Winter is here and temperatures have been well below freezing.

Yesterday went out to move car. Tuned key and nothing. Really nothing! Put voltmeter on battery - Measured 0 Volts! Put it on 2.5V scale - still 0 Volts ?? I have seen badly discharged batteries, but not zero volts.

Seems seatbelt fell out of door and door didn't close properly - Courtesy light on for 4 days. Still, 0 V??

Tried automatic charger - it would not even start charging. Left small battery maintainer on overnight. No change in voltage.

Today, pulled out ancient Sears charger. Hooked it up and needle went full scale. (15+ Amps)! After about 4 hours it dropped to 12 Amps. Later I disconnected it and read 12V off the battery! Doubt it would stay there long!

Hooked up automatic charger again and it now worked. Says it is charging at 3A which means that battery must have got reasonable charge from old charger.

Going to leave it overnight and then test battery. It is 6 yrs old, so I wouldn't mind changing it. But car will soon be stored until Spring, so would like to get through the next 3 weeks.

Seasons Greetings to All!

[t walgamuth]

Cool! I have one of those old sears chargers....it belonged to my dad. I still use it some.

[jake12tech]

Not sure how it'll do I'm interested in hearing. I have an 8 almost 9 year old battery that went dead from me listening to the radio while the car was sitting as I was working on it (No I was not using my noggin) and the battery went dead. Re-charged it and its good to. Then again it's under the passenger seat and not exposed to the elements as much as your is under the hood.

[barry12345]

When discharged it can freeze the electrolyte I believe. Not sure if a battery is recoverable after that. It may just depend on several factors. At the worse at least it was an older battery you had.


We have a self standing battery shop in our vicinity that has gotten quite popular. They sell new seconds for about 1/2 the new retail. Generally over time the local guys are quite happy with their purchases there.


I am surprised the larger car battery retailers in our area have not tried to get him shut down. It cannot be very popular with them as his business has grown.


We also have a discount meat place that is really thriving. The big monopolistic places have not got him cut off from his suppliers over the years. This too suprises me as those really large food chains have a vertical monopoly setup I suspect. Or an unwritten understanding with their suppliers.


Usually to stay within the law they would run sales continuously at below his retail prices to drive him out. I watched them do it with a larger self standing vegetable enterprise a few years ago. No matter how cheap he sold they marketed cheaper until he was gone. Took about six months if I remember.

[barry12345]

Originally Posted by t walgamuth

Cool! I have one of those old sears chargers....it belonged to my dad. I still use it some.

They were built with decent transformers etc. Their only shortcoming was the rectifiers were selenium. The part inside that looks like a stack of plates. Over time those rectifiers usually become less efficient or were less efficient from new. The silicone diode had not been invented yet when those early chargers were made. Those early selinium rectifiers do not actually usually fail. They are just not as efficient as the silicone diodes.


Today you can order a pair of silicone diodes with a heavy enough current rating delivered from China for about a dollar delivered on ebay. You just solder them to the terminals in the correct orientation and the chargers are better than they were new..


I have a habit of buying like new current battery chargers at yard sales for usually a dollar a piece. These Chinese built chargers are still using the selenium rectifiers. They seem to fail early by going open. The chargers still look brand new in most cases and people seem to put them in yard sales when they fail.


If a selenium rectifier ever shorts the smell is atrocious. Like rotten eggs basically. I have yet to find one where it was not the rectifier that failed open in the modern Chinese chargers with a retail value of less than 80.00. In my opinion they are designed to fail not that long after the warranty period for average users. A calculated way to get you to buy another?


Seems I quickly repair them to give away. The first few I just did to leave one at the cottage etc. Just in case I ever left something on in a car and the battery was too low the next morning. Or someone staying over does it with their car. Or the lawn tractor battery is flat.


You know on those nice evenings where everyone has a drink or two. Personally I do not have a drinking problem at the cottage. I need a reason to have a drink there. Like when the sun comes up or goes down.

At the same time I am positive. I have never had a drink during a total solar eclipse. I would have remembered the blackout.


The wife and her lady friends have become winos when they get together there at times it seems. I noticed when a daughter was here today to go Christmas shopping with her mother. The wife ordered another case of wine from her. I well remember the evening only once when I had to physically semi support the wife as she made supper. To me and others present it was hillarious.


Actually the wife and myself do not frequently imbibe. Yet on occasion it happens. This is why I have so many battery chargers. Regardless of my state I am going to find one of them if the need occurs. At least I have to find some form of rationality or pretext for some of the strange things I do. Although I cannot remember the last time I had a good glow on with booze. I am still well prepared if it happens.

[leathermang]

'''Tried automatic charger - it would not even start charging''''
Some battery chargers require sensing some voltage before they will charge... I hook up a second batter in the loop to fool the charger... only had to do that a few times on riding mower batteries.... I used to have one of those Sears chargers... and got it on a half price sale in the 1970's.

[barry12345]

Originally Posted by leathermang

'''Tried automatic charger - it would not even start charging''''
Some battery chargers require sensing some voltage before they will charge... I hook up a second batter in the loop to fool the charger... only had to do that a few times on riding mower batteries.... I used to have one of those Sears chargers... and got it on a half price sale in the 1970's.

Sears marketed some really decent stuff years ago up here in Canada. Now far too much of their stuff seems substandard. Americans may not know this but Sears Canada is on the threshold of bankrupcy. Has been for a few years now.


I noticed the retail stores are not that busy for the time of the year. One of our daughters and they all can spend money like few of my generation ever did. Told me today that her and her sisters are buying the bulk of things from Amazon now. Delivery is usually in two days.

[leathermang]

Once I got a Sears $150 shop vise... really huge... for $75....worth the drive for one item....still have it mounted on my welding trailer... use it an an anvil too...

[t walgamuth]

I bought a really big vise but so far have not installed it yet in my cluttered mess of a garage.

[Graham]

Originally Posted by leathermang

Some battery chargers require sensing some voltage before they will charge... I hook up a second batter in the loop to fool the charger... only had to do that a few times on riding mower batteries....

I have done that on sailboat batteries that often were dead after sailing at night with lights and instruments on. I hooked them in parallel with another battery and attached charger. That worked when batteries otherwise would not accept a charge. But those were 6x2V round gel batteries (surplus from telephone company)

Time to go and see how my modern Chinese charger is making out

[strelnik]

Originally Posted by Graham

Just a little story for those who may be interested:

Last time I drove my 300D was last Wednesday. Since then it has been in my unheated garage. Winter is here and temperatures have been well below freezing.

Yesterday went out to move car. Tuned key and nothing. Really nothing! Put voltmeter on battery - Measured 0 Volts! Put it on 2.5V scale - still 0 Volts ?? I have seen badly discharged batteries, but not zero volts.

Seems seatbelt fell out of door and door didn't close properly - Courtesy light on for 4 days. Still, 0 V??

Tried automatic charger - it would not even start charging. Left small battery maintainer on overnight. No change in voltage.

Today, pulled out ancient Sears charger. Hooked it up and needle went full scale. (15+ Amps)! After about 4 hours it dropped to 12 Amps. Later I disconnected it and read 12V off the battery! Doubt it would stay there long!

Hooked up automatic charger again and it now worked. Says it is charging at 3A which means that battery must have got reasonable charge from old charger.

Going to leave it overnight and then test battery. It is 6 yrs old, so I wouldn't mind changing it. But car will soon be stored until Spring, so would like to get through the next 3 weeks.

Seasons Greetings to All!

The local independent battery shop owner always tells me to check the voltage before I charge. If it's 0, expect at least 12 hours on the charger before it's usable. They often can be brought back if you get any kind of specific battery measurement.


I have a 36V fork lift that is zeroed out. I expect to charge it all day Christmas eve, then come back on the day after Christmas to give it another 36V charge for 8 hours at 40 amps.


After recharging the batteries I often give them a stress test. If they are close but fail, they go back on the desulfators to help convert more lead sulfate back to plates. That takes about another 12 hours, then they are ok.

[Graham]

Originally Posted by Graham

Time to go and see how my modern Chinese charger is making out

Charger said FULL

Did a load test. Stayed well within green for 800AH battery (about 11.4v after 10sec load).

Started easily. Went and did some errands - stop/start a few times. No problem. Seems like came early.

Had one problem that I caused. No Power! Foot of my halogen work light had got caught on the transmission cable where it connects to linkage and flipped the little lever the wrong way (Had that happen before, so luckily remembered what can cause that problem)

Anyway, will monitor battery voltage for next while but so far it seems good.

[Clemson88]

New charger designs seem to not recognize a battery that isn't polarized. An old mechanic told me you can actually change the polarity of a battery by hooking it up to a headlight and allowing it to go completely dead.

Then you just hook the charger up on on the wrong poles and let it charge. I can't imagine why or how he figured that out but a battery with a zero charge won't be recognized as a battery by the new style/designed chargers.

If you have a zero charged battery you can trick the new chargers into polarizing it by hooking up one of the poles and striking the other pole with the lead. It appears to send to send electricity through the battery for an instant. Eventually the battery will be recognized as being a battery and the charger will begin to function normally.

[leathermang]

Originally Posted by t walgamuth

I bought a really big vise but so far have not installed it yet in my cluttered mess of a garage.

Tom, I did not intend to imply my garage was clean enough or had room for my vise/anvil.. it is bolted out in the weather to my welding trailer.... sadly.

[tyl604]

A few weeks back I spent almost an hour watching an "ad" on the internet for a way to revive any old dead battery. I kept thinking that he would finally tell me how it was done or what I had to order from him but I got impatient and clicked out of the silly thing. No idea what he was selling or how much it cost - at first it looked like it was free - but will not likely sit down again and go through it. Fairly slick production and ad copy.

I am trying to post a pic of my old Sears charger. Got it before we got married so it is at least 44 years old. Has never failed to charge up a battery and I have used it many, many times. Does 6 and 12 amp and fast or normal charging. I seem to remember that there were other things in the manual that it could do but have no idea what they were. Original wires and clamps and the black paint on the case is slowly disappearing. But a good one.