Quote:
Originally Posted by Bluepill
It's common wisdom that earlier design converter/chargers, and current design cheapies like WFCO will not fully charge a battery. To do long-term storage on Flooded lead-acid batteries you need to charge fully and equalize before storage with a proper dedicated battery charger. The NOCO series of chargers are quite good.
https://www.amazon.com/NOCO-G3500-Ul...o+genius&psc=1
Best to charge each battery by itself to avoid uneven distribution of charging current.
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Again, I differ. If a WFCO converter is meeting specs, you are not going to do any better with a $50+ charger except recharge quicker. You will get to the same 12.7V battery voltage (or full charge hydrometer reading) with a WFCO converter - it just takes longer to do it than a 3-4 stage shop charger.
Now, not all WFCO converters meet WFCO spec. Mine would not go into trickle mode, but it took a number of voltage measurements over a two week period, repeated a couple of months apart to verify. I replaced my WFCO converter with a PD converter so I wouldn't boil away the battery water when the battery was fully charged. The PD does charge faster than the WFCO. But in the end, a fully charged battery is 12.7V no matter how long it takes to get there.
All equalization does is inject a short term high voltage (has to be limited to about 14.4V unless battery is disconnected from RV) to create bubbles within the cell. These bubbles force vertical currents within a cell to reduce any stratification of acid concentration. In my little A-frame, going in and out of the trailer produces enough shake/vibration to achieve the same result as equalization.
Some separate chargers will put 14.8V or higher to the battery with the intent to separate some harder lead sulfate deposits on the plates. Those deposits typically start to form when the battery is discharged below 50%. The higher voltage MAY cause issues with 12V electronics (LED lights, stereo, TV, light bulbs, etc) if the battery is connected to the camper at the time. So no converters will do more than 14.4V. The research to date suggests that this extra high voltage only works on the hard lead sulfate deposits some of the time.
Charging parallel batteries separately does no good in the long run because as soon as you put them back in parallel, the stronger battery is going to feed into the weaker battery until the two are at equal voltage. Ohm's Law rules.
My aim is to get a reasonable life out of my batteries while providing sufficient power to my trailer for 4 days and nights. I don't want to spend time taking hydrometer readings or checking water levels every few days. With my current practices (charge batteries with converter, then disconnect for the winter) typically give me 7 years of battery life with both RV and lawn tractor in Colorado winters (unheated garage stored). I'm a happy camper!
Fred W
2014 Rockwood A122 A-frame (2 GC-2 6V 232AH Interstate batteries)
2008 Hyundai Entourage minivan
camping Colorado and adjacent states one weekend at a time