Home » Public Forums » GMCnet » Battery Desulfator Experiment
| Battery Desulfator Experiment [message #139824] |
Thu, 18 August 2011 13:49  |
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Matt Colie
Messages: 8547
Registered: March 2007
Location: S.E. Michigan
Karma: 7
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Senior Member |
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Did you ever wonder about "Desulfators" and other things that might well fit in the snake oil catagory?
Well, so did I. I know I am not the only guy with batteries that die from cycling and deep discharging. It is annoying and expensive.
I have recently managed to recover two 12V batteries that would have otherwise have been forced to replace.
- The first was the battery in our poor old POS tracker. The battery that came in it was marginal and that was two years ago. It got to where I had to jump it and hope it didn't stall in the early part of the trip, or put a battery charger on it for at least the prior day. If it was off a charger for more than a day, no bets. It sat untended for a month after the recovery and the battery had no difficulty starting the engine at all.
- The last time the lights went out, the housenet was in trouble after 6 hours (but the power came back) and it should last about three days. After the Tracker, I moved the little box (described later) to the group 31 AGM that is the power for the housenet UPS. The box ran on that for about four weeks. Then, when I disconnected line power and watched the terminal voltage drop, it was decreasing at a rate that looks like we should be good for at least two maybe two and an half days.
This just may work - I am continuing my experiments.
I did a great deal of research and found that most lead/acid batteries die from a very simple problem. I don't want to get into semantics and maybe some P-chem person in the group can straighten out the names, but there are several lead-sulfur-oxygen sets that form easily and some are better at going back into solution than others. The wrong one can reduce an LA battery's capacity. It turns out that the wrong kind can be pushed up the energy ladder to become the right kind without all that much effort.
The electric way to do this is to fire 40+ volt pulses only a few milliseconds wide back into the battery. If the battery has any power left, you should even do it with the battery's own power as not much is lost. The test cases I have run so far, this was simply not possible, the Tracker was too flat and the housenet UPS would have required it be out of service.
If you search the web for "Battery Desultaors" you will find kits and assembled units that run the price gammet between twenty and eighty dollars. I decided that I would start on the low end (we had a houseful of little boys such that a kit was out of the question) an E-Bay survey lead me to choose a unit that had a delivered price of thirty-one dollars total. That unit was one with the dubious label as WizBangPlus.com. I am not recommending that supplier at this time, but only because I don't feel I have enough data to do so. My little box - and favorite battery charger are currently at the home of a friend (another engineer) and running the same test on a third battery that is known to be toast.
All I am saying at this time is that there does seem to be hope. The solar power people have been talking about this for a while now, and just maybe they are right. Stay tuned, but be patient as I don't expect to have solid data for another few months.
Matt
Matt & Mary Colie - Chaumière -'73 Glacier 23 - Members GMCMI, GMCGL, GMCES
Electronically Controlled Quiet Engine Cooling Fan with OE Rear Drum Brakes with Applied Control Arms
SE Michigan - Near DTW - Twixt A2 and Detroit
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| Re: [GMCnet] Battery Desulfator Experiment [message #139826 is a reply to message #139824] |
Thu, 18 August 2011 14:08  |
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ljdavick
Messages: 3548
Registered: March 2007
Location: Fremont, CA
Karma: -3
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Senior Member |
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Isn't someone here a former submariner? If anyone worries about batteries it would be those guys!
Great topic - I look forward to reading about it.
Larry Davick
Fremont, California
The Mystery Machine
'76 (ish) Palm Beach
----- Original Message -----
From: "Matt Colie" <matt7323tze@gmail.com>
To: gmclist@temp.gmcnet.org
Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2011 11:49:58 AM
Subject: [GMCnet] Battery Desulfator Experiment
Did you ever wonder about "Desulfators" and other things that might well fit in the snake oil catagory?
Well, so did I. I know I am not the only guy with batteries that die from cycling and deep discharging. It is annoying and expensive.
I have recently managed to recover two 12V batteries that would have otherwise have been forced to replace.
- The first was the battery in our poor old POS tracker. The battery that came in it was marginal and that was two years ago. It got to where I had to jump it and hope it didn't stall in the early part of the trip, or put a battery charger on it for at least the prior day. If it was off a charger for more than a day, no bets. It sat untended for a month after the recovery and the battery had no difficulty starting the engine at all.
- The last time the lights went out, the housenet was in trouble after 6 hours (but the power came back) and it should last about three days. After the Tracker, I moved the little box (described later) to the group 31 AGM that is the power for the housenet UPS. The box ran on that for about four weeks. Then, when I disconnected line power and watched the terminal voltage drop, it was decreasing at a rate that looks like we should be good for at least two maybe two and an half days.
This just may work - I am continuing my experiments.
I did a great deal of research and found that most lead/acid batteries die from a very simple problem. I don't want to get into semantics and maybe some P-chem person in the group can straighten out the names, but there are several lead-sulfur-oxygen sets that form easily and some are better at going back into solution than others. The wrong one can reduce an LA battery's capacity. It turns out that the wrong kind can be pushed up the energy ladder to become the right kind without all that much effort.
The electric way to do this is to fire 40+ volt pulses only a few milliseconds wide back into the battery. If the battery has any power left, you should even do it with the battery's own power as not much is lost. The test cases I have run so far, this was simply not possible, the Tracker was too flat and the housenet UPS would have required it be out of service.
If you search the web for "Battery Desultaors" you will find kits and assembled units that run the price gammet between twenty and eighty dollars. I decided that I would start on the low end (we had a houseful of little boys such that a kit was out of the question) an E-Bay survey lead me to choose a unit that had a delivered price of thirty-one dollars total. That unit was one with the dubious label as WizBangPlus.com. I am not recommending that supplier at this time, but only because I don't feel I have enough data to do so. My little box - and favorite battery charger are currently at the home of a friend (another engineer) and running the same test on a third battery that is known to be toast.
All I am saying at this time is that there does seem to be hope. The solar power people have been talking about this for a while now, and just maybe they are right. Stay tuned, but be patient as I don't expect to have solid data for another few months.
Matt
--
Matt & Mary Colie
'73 Glacier 23 Chaumiere (say show-me-air) Just about as stock as you will find
SE Michigan - Twixt A2 and Detroit
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Larry Davick
A Mystery Machine
1976(ish) Palm Beach
Fremont, Ca
Howell EFI + EBL + Electronic Dizzy
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| Re: [GMCnet] Battery Desulfator Experiment [message #139836 is a reply to message #139826] |
Thu, 18 August 2011 14:57 |
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Matt Colie
Messages: 8547
Registered: March 2007
Location: S.E. Michigan
Karma: 7
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Senior Member |
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| ljdavick wrote on Thu, 18 August 2011 15:08 |
Isn't someone here a former submariner?
If anyone worries about batteries it would be those guys!
Great topic - I look forward to reading about it.
Larry Davick
<BIG Snip>
|
Larry,
You bet they worried, and they learned a lot about what matters.
There maybe some submariners in the group, though the Nautilus was launched in 1954 the last US electric submarines were actually in service until 1990 (Barbel class) because they were so quiet. When very young, I did have the privilege of sailing long passages with several submariners, one of whom was a WWII battery man and later and engineering officer. He impressed on me at that time (and I actually listened) that lead acid batteries do not like to be charged in parallel. Other than that, there is little that can be related to modern battery construction. They used to actually do same kind of cleaning that this box does be disassembling the battery plates and chemically cleaning them.
There were countless other stories that do not relate to motorhomes or even the world today.
Matt
Matt & Mary Colie - Chaumière -'73 Glacier 23 - Members GMCMI, GMCGL, GMCES
Electronically Controlled Quiet Engine Cooling Fan with OE Rear Drum Brakes with Applied Control Arms
SE Michigan - Near DTW - Twixt A2 and Detroit
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| Re: [GMCnet] Battery Desulfator Experiment [message #139894 is a reply to message #139824] |
Thu, 18 August 2011 18:27 |
Terry Skinner
Messages: 379
Registered: January 2004
Karma: 0
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Senior Member |
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This is an interesting subject to me. I purchased one of the more
expensive "desulfanator" kits ($65) and so far consider it to be snake
oil. Messed with several defunct batteries with no results. But that
might be because they were too far gone. I am of converting over to
solar and removing the Onan. When I install the four golf cart
batteries I will keep a log on them. Shouldn't take any more than 8 or
10 years to see any results.<G>. The last battery charger I purchased
to use on the tractor has that feature as part of the
charge/maintenance cycle. Again I haven't had it long enough to see
results..........Terry
On Thu, Aug 18, 2011 at 11:49 AM, Matt Colie <matt7323tze@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> Did you ever wonder about "Desulfators" and other things that might well fit in the snake oil catagory?
>
> Well, so did I. I know I am not the only guy with batteries that die from cycling and deep discharging. It is annoying and expensive.
>
> I have recently managed to recover two 12V batteries that would have otherwise have been forced to replace.
> - The first was the battery in our poor old POS tracker. The battery that came in it was marginal and that was two years ago. It got to where I had to jump it and hope it didn't stall in the early part of the trip, or put a battery charger on it for at least the prior day. If it was off a charger for more than a day, no bets. It sat untended for a month after the recovery and the battery had no difficulty starting the engine at all.
> - The last time the lights went out, the housenet was in trouble after 6 hours (but the power came back) and it should last about three days. After the Tracker, I moved the little box (described later) to the group 31 AGM that is the power for the housenet UPS. The box ran on that for about four weeks. Then, when I disconnected line power and watched the terminal voltage drop, it was decreasing at a rate that looks like we should be good for at least two maybe two and an half days.
>
> This just may work - I am continuing my experiments.
>
> I did a great deal of research and found that most lead/acid batteries die from a very simple problem. I don't want to get into semantics and maybe some P-chem person in the group can straighten out the names, but there are several lead-sulfur-oxygen sets that form easily and some are better at going back into solution than others. The wrong one can reduce an LA battery's capacity. It turns out that the wrong kind can be pushed up the energy ladder to become the right kind without all that much effort.
>
> The electric way to do this is to fire 40+ volt pulses only a few milliseconds wide back into the battery. If the battery has any power left, you should even do it with the battery's own power as not much is lost. The test cases I have run so far, this was simply not possible, the Tracker was too flat and the housenet UPS would have required it be out of service.
>
> If you search the web for "Battery Desultaors" you will find kits and assembled units that run the price gammet between twenty and eighty dollars. I decided that I would start on the low end (we had a houseful of little boys such that a kit was out of the question) an E-Bay survey lead me to choose a unit that had a delivered price of thirty-one dollars total. That unit was one with the dubious label as WizBangPlus.com. I am not recommending that supplier at this time, but only because I don't feel I have enough data to do so. My little box - and favorite battery charger are currently at the home of a friend (another engineer) and running the same test on a third battery that is known to be toast.
>
> All I am saying at this time is that there does seem to be hope. The solar power people have been talking about this for a while now, and just maybe they are right. Stay tuned, but be patient as I don't expect to have solid data for another few months.
>
> Matt
> --
> Matt & Mary Colie
> '73 Glacier 23 Chaumiere (say show-me-air) Just about as stock as you will find
> SE Michigan - Twixt A2 and Detroit
> _______________________________________________
> GMCnet mailing list
> Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
> http://temp.gmcnet.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/gmclist
>
--
Terry Skinner
253-686-2624
Roy. Washington
'76 GMC
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| Re: [GMCnet] Battery Desulfator Experiment [message #139973 is a reply to message #139894] |
Fri, 19 August 2011 06:55 |
jhbridges
Messages: 8412
Registered: May 2011
Location: Braselton ga
Karma: -74
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Senior Member |
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There's another snake oii you can try to desulphate one. Which someone told me, I thought it UBS (Utter.....) but tried it on three junk batteries and resurrected two of them. Drain the electrolyte from the battery. Fill it with water. (You can use demineralized, there will be enough salts of one sort or another still in the plates for the next step). Hook your charger backwards (Red to -, black to +) and charge it full current for a day or two. Full current being the high setting on a trickle charger - of course, it won't draw much current. Pour the water out, put fresh electrolyte in, and charge normally. I doubt this would work with a switch - mode charger unless you put some resstance across the battery so it would see a reasonable load, but it did work 66% of the time on some old 6 volt VW batteries using a transformer charger.
--johnny
--- On Thu, 8/18/11, Terry Skinner <gmcnut@gmail.com> wrote:
From: Terry Skinner <gmcnut@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [GMCnet] Battery Desulfator Experiment
To: gmclist@temp.gmcnet.org
Date: Thursday, August 18, 2011, 11:27 PM
This is an interesting subject to me. I purchased one of the more
expensive "desulfanator" kits ($65) and so far consider it to be snake
oil. Messed with several defunct batteries with no results. But that
might be because they were too far gone. I am of converting over to
solar and removing the Onan. When I install the four golf cart
batteries I will keep a log on them. Shouldn't take any more than 8 or
10 years to see any results.<G>. The last battery charger I purchased
to use on the tractor has that feature as part of the
charge/maintenance cycle. Again I haven't had it long enough to see
results..........Terry
On Thu, Aug 18, 2011 at 11:49 AM, Matt Colie <matt7323tze@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> Did you ever wonder about "Desulfators" and other things that might well fit in the snake oil catagory?
>
> Well, so did I. I know I am not the only guy with batteries that die from cycling and deep discharging. It is annoying and expensive.
>
> I have recently managed to recover two 12V batteries that would have otherwise have been forced to replace.
> - The first was the battery in our poor old POS tracker. The battery that came in it was marginal and that was two years ago. It got to where I had to jump it and hope it didn't stall in the early part of the trip, or put a battery charger on it for at least the prior day. If it was off a charger for more than a day, no bets. It sat untended for a month after the recovery and the battery had no difficulty starting the engine at all.
> - The last time the lights went out, the housenet was in trouble after 6 hours (but the power came back) and it should last about three days. After the Tracker, I moved the little box (described later) to the group 31 AGM that is the power for the housenet UPS. The box ran on that for about four weeks. Then, when I disconnected line power and watched the terminal voltage drop, it was decreasing at a rate that looks like we should be good for at least two maybe two and an half days.
>
> This just may work - I am continuing my experiments.
>
> I did a great deal of research and found that most lead/acid batteries die from a very simple problem. I don't want to get into semantics and maybe some P-chem person in the group can straighten out the names, but there are several lead-sulfur-oxygen sets that form easily and some are better at going back into solution than others. The wrong one can reduce an LA battery's capacity. It turns out that the wrong kind can be pushed up the energy ladder to become the right kind without all that much effort.
>
> The electric way to do this is to fire 40+ volt pulses only a few milliseconds wide back into the battery. If the battery has any power left, you should even do it with the battery's own power as not much is lost. The test cases I have run so far, this was simply not possible, the Tracker was too flat and the housenet UPS would have required it be out of service.
>
> If you search the web for "Battery Desultaors" you will find kits and assembled units that run the price gammet between twenty and eighty dollars. I decided that I would start on the low end (we had a houseful of little boys such that a kit was out of the question) an E-Bay survey lead me to choose a unit that had a delivered price of thirty-one dollars total. That unit was one with the dubious label as WizBangPlus.com. I am not recommending that supplier at this time, but only because I don't feel I have enough data to do so. My little box - and favorite battery charger are currently at the home of a friend (another engineer) and running the same test on a third battery that is known to be toast.
>
> All I am saying at this time is that there does seem to be hope. The solar power people have been talking about this for a while now, and just maybe they are right. Stay tuned, but be patient as I don't expect to have solid data for another few months.
>
> Matt
> --
> Matt & Mary Colie
> '73 Glacier 23 Chaumiere (say show-me-air) Just about as stock as you will find
> SE Michigan - Twixt A2 and Detroit
> _______________________________________________
> GMCnet mailing list
> Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
> http://temp.gmcnet.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/gmclist
>
--
Terry Skinner
253-686-2624
Roy. Washington
'76 GMC
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Foolish Carriage, 76 26' Eleganza(?) with beaucoup mods and add - ons.
Braselton, Ga.
I forgive them all, save those who hurt the dogs. They must answer to me in hell
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| Re: [GMCnet] Battery Desulfator Experiment [message #140176 is a reply to message #139824] |
Sat, 20 August 2011 08:04 |
Steven Ferguson
Messages: 3447
Registered: May 2006
Karma: 0
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Senior Member |
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Matt,
Most good inverter/converter/chargers have an equalize mode. This mode
nails the batteries with a charge that desulfates the plates. It should be
done once a month and after settling, water usually needs to be added.
Batteries seem to last forever when this is done.
On Thu, Aug 18, 2011 at 11:49 AM, Matt Colie <matt7323tze@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> Did you ever wonder about "Desulfators" and other things that might well
> fit in the snake oil catagory?
>
> Well, so did I. I know I am not the only guy with batteries that die from
> cycling and deep discharging. It is annoying and expensive.
>
> I have recently managed to recover two 12V batteries that would have
> otherwise have been forced to replace.
> - The first was the battery in our poor old POS tracker. The battery that
> came in it was marginal and that was two years ago. It got to where I had
> to jump it and hope it didn't stall in the early part of the trip, or put a
> battery charger on it for at least the prior day. If it was off a charger
> for more than a day, no bets. It sat untended for a month after the
> recovery and the battery had no difficulty starting the engine at all.
> - The last time the lights went out, the housenet was in trouble after 6
> hours (but the power came back) and it should last about three days. After
> the Tracker, I moved the little box (described later) to the group 31 AGM
> that is the power for the housenet UPS. The box ran on that for about four
> weeks. Then, when I disconnected line power and watched the terminal
> voltage drop, it was decreasing at a rate that looks like we should be good
> for at least two maybe two and an half days.
>
> This just may work - I am continuing my experiments.
>
> I did a great deal of research and found that most lead/acid batteries die
> from a very simple problem. I don't want to get into semantics and maybe
> some P-chem person in the group can straighten out the names, but there are
> several lead-sulfur-oxygen sets that form easily and some are better at
> going back into solution than others. The wrong one can reduce an LA
> battery's capacity. It turns out that the wrong kind can be pushed up the
> energy ladder to become the right kind without all that much effort.
>
> The electric way to do this is to fire 40+ volt pulses only a few
> milliseconds wide back into the battery. If the battery has any power left,
> you should even do it with the battery's own power as not much is lost. The
> test cases I have run so far, this was simply not possible, the Tracker was
> too flat and the housenet UPS would have required it be out of service.
>
> If you search the web for "Battery Desultaors" you will find kits and
> assembled units that run the price gammet between twenty and eighty dollars.
> I decided that I would start on the low end (we had a houseful of little
> boys such that a kit was out of the question) an E-Bay survey lead me to
> choose a unit that had a delivered price of thirty-one dollars total. That
> unit was one with the dubious label as WizBangPlus.com. I am not
> recommending that supplier at this time, but only because I don't feel I
> have enough data to do so. My little box - and favorite battery charger are
> currently at the home of a friend (another engineer) and running the same
> test on a third battery that is known to be toast.
>
> All I am saying at this time is that there does seem to be hope. The solar
> power people have been talking about this for a while now, and just maybe
> they are right. Stay tuned, but be patient as I don't expect to have solid
> data for another few months.
>
> Matt
> --
> Matt & Mary Colie
> '73 Glacier 23 Chaumiere (say show-me-air) Just about as stock as you will
> find
> SE Michigan - Twixt A2 and Detroit
> _______________________________________________
> GMCnet mailing list
> Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
> http://temp.gmcnet.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/gmclist
>
--
Steve Ferguson
Sierra Vista, AZ
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| Re: Battery Desulfator Experiment [message #226408 is a reply to message #139824] |
Mon, 21 October 2013 12:28 |
lw8000
Messages: 201
Registered: July 2012
Location: S.E. Michigan
Karma: 1
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Senior Member |
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FWIW... I've often wondered the same thing about the various products out there that claim they can recover and keep batteries from deteriorating. I have been using the "BatteryMinder" model 12117 , by VDC Electronics, for several years, and so far, no failed batteries. It has a patented desulphation mode that sends pulses through the battery at various randomized frequencies. Does it work? Time will tell, but so far I think it does. It has excellent reviews on multiple websites. Currently I have four regular car batteries that are all 9-10 years old and still going strong. I've been maintaining them with the BatteryMinder since they were about 4-5 years old. I have never had a battery last more than about 7 years previous to this. Maybe batteries have improved, but we will see how long these last. Currently, we have two 6-volt golf cart batteries for our house batteries in the GMC motorhome, and we use the BatteryMinder on them when the motorhome is parked in storage (they must be connected in series as it only charges/maintains 12 volts). We have another BatteryMinder connected to the front engine battery as well doing the same thing.
--
Chris
Chris S. -
77 Kingsley, 3.70 FD, mostly OEM -
S.E. Michigan
[Updated on: Mon, 21 October 2013 12:30] Report message to a moderator |
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