Battery Life/Charge

[fried1765]

I agree with “fried1765” on avoiding poorly-designed, low quality trickle chargers which are advertised for battery maintenance purposes.

I never recommended “el cheapo” battery chargers. I only point out that one does not need to spend $50 - $100 or more to get a quality maintainer. The ones I linked to above have been continuously on my rare and expensive airplanes year-round, both of which are equipped with AGM batteries. Those airplane batteries are expensive…and those airplanes are exceptionally reliable. I‘ve also hosted/attended maintenance ”seminars” at which the mfr’s representative of a popular battery “maintainer/tender” has given a magnificent presentation in which charts and graphs purported to represent the special needs of different battery-systems need his company’s special high-priced “maintainer/tender…. and he offered dramatic illustrations of how catastrophic damage will be done by “el cheapo” (by which he meant “any other brand”) battery chargers.

LET ME STATE SOMETHING: Most people use their vehicle batteries to START their machines.

Although we also may use the battery to start the airplane…that is NOT THEIR TRUE PURPOSE!
The True Purpose of an airplane battery is to have a Reliable Source of Emergency Electrical Power
when the airplanes’ source of generated electricity fails In-Flight!
If you are inside an airplane, flying at night, in bad weather, and the nearest airport is miles away You Need electricity to run the avionics so you can navigate through an instrument approach while still running essential equipment such as lighting to see the instument panel, operate the radio transcievers to communicate your emergency to Air Traffic Control, operate the Radar Transponder so ATC can provide assistance, and still have enough stored electrical power (I.E. Batttery) to get the Landing Lights operating while keeping the anti-ice protection or whatever other equipment is necessary to get safely back on the ground somewhere…. THAT IS WHAT A BATTERY IS FOR in an Airplane!

Ordinary vehicle and tractor owners are only concerned about getting the engine started… but a QUALITY BATTERY MAINTAINER is a MANDATORY piece of equipment for an airplane operator.

The ones I linked to above are every bit as “quality” and have the same components as the expen$ive ones with all-the-Hype of an Interstate battery. They’re what have kept my valuable airplane batteries properly conditioned year-round now for the last decade.

PS: While I’m not an electrical engineer…. I authored the Service Manual on Electrical Systems for the classic airplane club which has been THE source of info for that particular airplanes type-club (collectors club counterpart for antique auto clubs) for two decades now. I only point that out to support that the statements I’ve made in this thread are not simply personal anecdotes.

Hope this helps.

"landing lights"?????
Who the heII needs landing lights?
(I was a Navy pilot)

 

[GeoHorn]

"landing lights"?????
Who the heII needs landing lights?
(I was a Navy pilot)

YOu were a NAVY PILOT?? REALLY???

SOooo …how many ships did you pilot into harbors..??

If I were ever to join the Navy…I’d never want to be a pilot. I’d rather be a Naval Aviator and fly airplanes.

(PS: Glad you’re back home…and Thanks for your Service!)

 

[Goz63]

Do you own any West Germany manufactured Weatherby rifles?

What!?!

 

[William1]

I have a Interstate distributor real close to where I live. I bought one for my Garden Tractor, it has been excellent. I bought one for my Kubota, it has not been excellent. Voltage is never (at rest) higher than 12.6 and will dip to as low as 11.9 with the glow plug on. Slowish cranking. I've taken the battery back and they do a specific gravity test and claim it is fine.
Pricing from Interstate was cheap, but I'll get a Deka from my Kubota dealer next time.
My guess is batteries Interstate sells come from different manufacturers. Some sizes are good batteries, others are marginal.
I have a 'Duracell' on my Generac 22.5KW genset, it is fine after four years.
I have all my vehicles on maintainers. Sadly, there is no power where my Kubota is and I had to resort to a solar charger. 80 watt panel but it is in the woods and often does not get a lot of sun except in the winter. Better than nothing.
I also got a 'AntiGravity' jumpstarter just in case.

 

[fried1765]

I have a Interstate distributor real close to where I live. I bought one for my Garden Tractor, it has been excellent. I bought one for my Kubota, it has not been excellent. Voltage is never (at rest) higher than 12.6 and will dip to as low as 11.9 with the glow plug on. Slowish cranking. I've taken the battery back and they do a specific gravity test and claim it is fine.
Pricing from Interstate was cheap, but I'll get a Deka from my Kubota dealer next time.
My guess is batteries Interstate sells come from different manufacturers. Some sizes are good batteries, others are marginal.
I have a 'Duracell' on my Generac 22.5KW genset, it is fine after four years.
I have all my vehicles on maintainers. Sadly, there is no power where my Kubota is and I had to resort to a solar charger. 80 watt panel but it is in the woods and often does not get a lot of sun except in the winter. Better than nothing.
I also got a 'AntiGravity' jumpstarter just in case.

"My guess is Interstate sells come from different manufacturers"
You are correct!
Interstate is a marketing company/brand only.

Giving your battery a "specific gravity test" is not "fine".
Take your Interstate battery in for a LOAD TEST!
( I have my own 500 Amp. carbon pile load tester).
From your description above, your battery will certainly fail a load test!

Depending on the area of the country, your Interstate battery may have been made by either Brookfield Business Partners, Exide Technologies, or Johnson Controls (Mexico).

I will NEVER buy another Interstate battery!!!
Interstate's primary product is marketing hype!

 

[GeoHorn]

"My guess is Interstate sells come from different manufacturers"
You are correct!
Interstate is a marketing company/brand only.

Giving your battery a "specific gravity test" is not "fine".
Take your Interstate battery in for a LOAD TEST!
( I have my own 500 Amp. carbon pile load tester).
From your description above, your battery will certainly fail a load test!

Depending on the area of the country, your Interstate battery may have been made by either Brookfield Business Partners, Exide Technologies, or Johnson Controls (Mexico).

I will NEVER buy another Interstate battery!!!
Interstate's primary product is marketing hype!

So if Interstate batteries are mfr’d by three respected battery mfr’s…. then why would they be any worse than buying one of those batteries with another brand-name-label on them?

 

[lynnmor]

Pricing from Interstate was cheap, but I'll get a Deka from my Kubota dealer next time.

I have a 'Duracell' on my Generac 22.5KW genset, it is fine after four years.

Deka and Duracell are brands made by East Penn, I believe they are better than most.

 

[Magicman]

I noticed 'voltage' mentioned in a previous reply. At rest, a properly charged battery will read 12.7 volts or higher.

 

[fried1765]

So if Interstate batteries are mfr’d by three respected battery mfr’s…. then why would they be any worse than buying one of those batteries with another brand-name-label on them?

I did not suggest that Interstate quality was any worse.
I think that battery failures are sometimes the luck of the draw.
My beef with Interstate is that they stiffed me on a warranty replacement, while I was at my then Summer cottage in Canada.
Two Canada Interstate sellers also told me they had dropped Interstate for warranty issues.
If a marketing company sticks it to me,...... I tend to go away...... indefinitely!

 

[ctfjr]

For the past 20 years or more I have been buying my replacement batteries at Costco. I have had excellent luck results with them. They have been in my former L3400 (7 years np), a 350ZX (6 years when I sold it), 2 in the surplus genset (24 volt system) that I have let discharge for months on more than one occasion and several other vehicles I have owned. I would buy them again.

 

[lmichael]

Like I indicated earlier. Given the number of total catastrophic failures I have experienced with Interstate batteries I would never ever put one in something I truly relied on for more than cutting my grass. I did not mean to have this go on and on and on. Simply trying to gain insight into my first diesel machine and whatever quirks it may have or not. But, I have owned 4 Interstate batteries in my time. All 4 suffered premature total failure. 3 of the 4 complete failure of the posts (or side terminals). Completely coming out of the battery. But, it's a garden tractor. My safety and possibly my life are not depending on it. Only whether or not my lawn gets mowed. and it was cheap. So it got the "nod". But, I will never ever trust one in a critical installation

 

[fried1765]

Like I indicated earlier. Given the number of total catastrophic failures I have experienced with Interstate batteries I would never ever put one in something I truly relied on for more than cutting my grass. I did not mean to have this go on and on and on. Simply trying to gain insight into my first diesel machine and whatever quirks it may have or not. But, I have owned 4 Interstate batteries in my time. All 4 suffered premature total failure. 3 of the 4 complete failure of the posts (or side terminals). Completely coming out of the battery. But, it's a garden tractor. My safety and possibly my life are not depending on it. Only whether or not my lawn gets mowed. and it was cheap. So it got the "nod". But, I will never ever trust one in a critical installation

I am reasonably certain that the "Interstate" batteries sold by COSTCO are manufactured to be specifically sold at the lowest possible price.
Draw your own conclusions about "Interstate" battery quality at COSTCO.
The label design on COSTCO "interstate" batteries is also very different from the "Interstate" label commonly seen elsewhere.

 

[lugbolt]

yep battery maintainers work good.

I use them on everything that sits. Race car included (although it's 16 volt)--most of the time a 16v AGM lasts 3 years. I'm on year 8. They're over $400 now so the longer it lasts the better....the maintainer was about $100 when I bought it....paid for itself, at least I'd like to think.

Use one on the generator too, it runs maybe twice a year and sits the rest of the time. 10 years on the battery using a maintainer. It's an old Strongbox battery from when I worked at the JD dealer. Might be closer to 15 years? Gosh I didn't realize it's been that long.

Working on golf cars now...never see a gas burner in the shop for anything but electric ones daily. Biggest problem with them? Lack of maintenance....nobody leaves the charger on them (they're almost all automatic chargers)...batteries go bad in 4 or 5 years, sometimes costing up to $1500 for a set of batteries (plus labor). Did a set on a Polaris EV the other day, $2200 worth of batteries including labor and those are lead-acid (non agm) batteries. You gotta take care of them and that also means checking the water level and NOT overfilling them!!

About 10 year ago I was working on a utility vehicle, electric, had 8 12v batteries (was a 48v system, 2 banks of 48 in parallel). Customer said it was having an issue of it'd run a while then die off. So my first thing, the batteries are probably junk. Charged, then since the boss didn't have a rundown box, I just drove it around. The amount of time it'd drive tells me how good the batteries are. I got maybe a minute out of it, it starts slowing down and all at once big boom. Blew the seat off of the frame with me on it, I hit the plastic roof and took it completely off of it's mounting points. Burned the entire back side, butt, back, hair, lots of permanent acid burns, permanent hearing loss too. The business across the freeway called the law they thought a bomb went off (it is roughly 3/8 mile away)--saying it shook their building pretty good. I would imagine so based on how loud it was right under/around me. I told the boss that I was done with electric vehicles since he wasn't willing to get the tooling to diagnose them. For 9 years I didn't touch a one, then changed jobs and guess what? Golf cars.

And people wonder why I am not a fan of EV's of any kind.....you can see why if I lift my shirt and show the acid and heat burn scars all over my back and neck. It's ugly.

 

[lynnmor]

yep battery maintainers work good.

I use them on everything that sits. Race car included (although it's 16 volt)--most of the time a 16v AGM lasts 3 years. I'm on year 8. They're over $400 now so the longer it lasts the better....the maintainer was about $100 when I bought it....paid for itself, at least I'd like to think.

Use one on the generator too, it runs maybe twice a year and sits the rest of the time. 10 years on the battery using a maintainer. It's an old Strongbox battery from when I worked at the JD dealer. Might be closer to 15 years? Gosh I didn't realize it's been that long.

Working on golf cars now...never see a gas burner in the shop for anything but electric ones daily. Biggest problem with them? Lack of maintenance....nobody leaves the charger on them (they're almost all automatic chargers)...batteries go bad in 4 or 5 years, sometimes costing up to $1500 for a set of batteries (plus labor). Did a set on a Polaris EV the other day, $2200 worth of batteries including labor and those are lead-acid (non agm) batteries. You gotta take care of them and that also means checking the water level and NOT overfilling them!!

About 10 year ago I was working on a utility vehicle, electric, had 8 12v batteries (was a 48v system, 2 banks of 48 in parallel). Customer said it was having an issue of it'd run a while then die off. So my first thing, the batteries are probably junk. Charged, then since the boss didn't have a rundown box, I just drove it around. The amount of time it'd drive tells me how good the batteries are. I got maybe a minute out of it, it starts slowing down and all at once big boom. Blew the seat off of the frame with me on it, I hit the plastic roof and took it completely off of it's mounting points. Burned the entire back side, butt, back, hair, lots of permanent acid burns, permanent hearing loss too. The business across the freeway called the law they thought a bomb went off (it is roughly 3/8 mile away)--saying it shook their building pretty good. I would imagine so based on how loud it was right under/around me. I told the boss that I was done with electric vehicles since he wasn't willing to get the tooling to diagnose them. For 9 years I didn't touch a one, then changed jobs and guess what? Golf cars.

And people wonder why I am not a fan of EV's of any kind.....you can see why if I lift my shirt and show the acid and heat burn scars all over my back and neck. It's ugly.

I guess that you won't be ordering a new Ford electric F150.

 

[lmichael]

I guess that you won't be ordering a new Ford electric F150.

The validity of an electric F150 escapes me. Especially how they show it being used. Take it to a job site run the job site now the batteries are run down. Now....................you have to figure out how to get it home? LOL
The Interstate batteries I have had fail have never been from Costco or Sam's. They were all from a local Interstate dealer here in Rockford IL area.
Again, to reiterate. I only bought the Interstate for the Kubota for 2 reasons. It was WAY cheaper and 2 my tractor will not leave me stranded in a bad neighborhood
Unsure if the other post indicating a Costco Interstate was different than a dealer Interstate was in defense of the brand or not. But, bottom line those green and white batteries will NEVER find their way into a vehicle I own again. 4 out of 4 (100% premature failure) is not good odds LOL. The last one left my wife stranded in a seedy part of Rockford in a blizzard. and was only a year old

 

[fried1765]

The validity of an electric F150 escapes me. Especially how they show it being used. Take it to a job site run the job site now the batteries are run down. Now....................you have to figure out how to get it home? LOL
The Interstate batteries I have had fail have never been from Costco or Sam's. They were all from a local Interstate dealer here in Rockford IL area.
Again, to reiterate. I only bought the Interstate for the Kubota for 2 reasons. It was WAY cheaper and 2 my tractor will not leave me stranded in a bad neighborhood
Unsure if the other post indicating a Costco Interstate was different than a dealer Interstate was in defense of the brand or not. But, bottom line those green and white batteries will NEVER find their way into a vehicle I own again. 4 out of 4 (100% premature failure) is not good odds LOL. The last one left my wife stranded in a seedy part of Rockford in a blizzard. and was only a year old

No way to know, but it would be interesting to know who built your Interstate batteries.
Probably either Brookside Partners, or Exide Technologies.
I don't think the Johnson Controls batteries that are made for Interstate in Mexico, are distributed as far north as Illinois.

 

[GeoHorn]

….
. Burned the entire back side, butt, back, hair, lots of permanent acid burns, permanent hearing loss too.
…

Is that why it was once said that you “Haven’t got a hair on your Azz?”.

(pls. take that as if we were very close friends…).

Yep…BTD….. but didn’t get hurt as you certainly did! I had just walked-away from a travel trailer that had been sitting in storage for a few months… when I heard a BOOM!…. and plastic shards shot across the shop like shrapnel… pieces of the battery-box and battery-case…. Acid all over the concrete floor…. (battery charger had failed in high-charge-mode, failed to drop to maintenance-mode.)
Very lucky INdeed. It’s wise to remember batteries are “energy storage systems”.