24V charge


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Posted by David Sherman on Sunday, March 13, 2005 at 11:57PM :

In Reply to: M37 engine swap/24V charge posted by Jay Hitchcock on Sunday, March 13, 2005 at 10:38PM :

On my 24V vehicles I usually just charge the two batteries separately with a 12 volt charger, checking the voltages now and then and swapping the charger around to equalize them. I tend to try to squeeze every extra year of life possible out of a large collection of batteries so it's rare that both of them charge equally anyway.

If the batteries are pretty well matched, and the truck is at my house, I have a very large and ancient pre-WWII Signal Corps battery charger with fine and coarse tap selectors on its transformer and an accurate ammeter. It will charge any battery combination up to 28 volts total. I set the tap switches so it's putting out 6-8 amps and let it charge at that rate until the batteries are up to about 13.8 volts.

The adjustable charger is also excellent for salvaging a sulphated battery that I would otherwise have to junk. I just crank up the voltage until it starts to absorb some current, even if that means going to 20 volts initially on a 12 volt battery. Once it starts to charge, I'll check it every hour or so and turn down the voltage if need be to keep the current below 8 amps. Once the battery is up to a reasonable voltage with the charger disconnected, I'll let it set for a day and check the voltage, do a load test, and check the electrolyte in each cell. Usually one cell will be sulphated the worst and I'll have to overcharge the rest of the battery until the worst cell comes up to the right specific gravity. If overcharging has "boiled" too much water out of any of the cells, I'll add water as need be. I have batteries that had sat at zero voltage for months and wouldn't take any charge with a normal "automatic" 12 volt charger, but after giving them the frankenstein treatment, I've gotten years more life out of them. It takes a bit of attention and usually a week or so to do a good job of it, but it sure beats junking a $120 6TL or other expensive battery. Of course you can't do with with "gel" or "absorbed" batteries because there's no way to add water to them after you overcharge them.



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