The Ups & Downs in the Life of a Battery

[jacquigem]

Just a few points here:

Please ignore people who are stating myths about Gel batteries, they have evolved a lot since they were first invented.

The batteries that ED has are deep cycle leisure Gel Carbon batteries made by Exide for motorhomes. They are not to be confused with any other type of gel battery. It would be like saying all cars do 180mph or all cars have 4 seats.

The batteries that ED has can be charged continuously at 25% of their Ah capacity. And bulk charged for shorter periods at a higher rate. He has three batteries connected together so they can be charged at with no issues by his CTEK system. The CTEK system fitted to ED's motorhomer has sensors fitted to the batteries to prevent them overheating and damaging the Gel, however, this is far less common in gel carbon batteries.

The batteries that ED has are made to withstand discharges down to 80%, they are true deep cycle batteries. They carry a 4-year warranty, so if they do not perform as they as supposed to he will be getting some new ones.

To answer your question ED,

There is no benefit in deeply discharging your batteries before recharging, you should keep them as full as you can.
Shallower discharges will most likely extend the life of your batteries beyond the 4-years. There are people still happily using these batteries at 10-years old.

Silly thought but is the same true for laptop and tablet batteries . That is donot discharge them fully before recharging ?

 

[Ed on Toast]

Well initial research indicates that using Solar to feed my Fridge (12 volt) is not an option.

So what else can I do with this generated energy, over what I am already using it for?

All small electrical things that are battery operated are slowly migrating over to rechargeable batteries.

I have invested in a small 12 volt slow cooker but have yet to try it out.

Any ingenious ideas?

 

[malagaoth]

C&CC can be very cheap if you are a single traveller - particularly if you qualify fror the ' wrinkly discount' (25% low and mid seasons)

as for what to do with all this power you generate from your solar panels, I have the same issue at home (M/h doesnt have panels) I can sell the juice to the grid for a pittance but its much better to use it if you can do so sensibly.

This means if its sunny a wash load is done, dishwasher fired up (not at the same time) and the electric hot water heater goes on for a couple of hours (saving oil), in a M/h I suppose much the same goes, charge everything which needs charged - phones, laptops, portable radios etc. Li batteries are much more forgiving about being recharged before being fully discharged than NiCADS were.

a 12V slow cooker sounds like a good idea as brief outages wouldnt matter too much - but you would have to be sure that your panels had the power to fuel it - panels often produce a lot less than the stated ampage