Got an old Battery i should have disposed of a while ago. It's showing just over 3 volts on the terminals. I cracked open the tops and there doesn't appear to be much (any?) liquid inside, although it still weighs a reasonable amount.
Lidl smart charger, he say no. It reckons it's a bike battery (fair enough given the voltage) then refuses to charge it.
Recoverable with some de-ionised water and hooking it up in parallel with a good battery to fool it into charging it?
Or just take it to the recycling centre and stop being a pie? I kind of want a spare battery though...
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>> Recoverable with some de-ionised water and hooking it up in parallel with a good battery
>> to fool it into charging it?
>>
Thats what I would do. If it doesn't work you have lost nothing.
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Not playing ball. Ho hum.
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Hooking it up to a good battery ought to work.
But to be sure, I'd want to try charging it with a 'stupid' charger before deciding if it was any good or not.
I'm starting to think the 'smart' chargers are too clever for their own good.
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It has been discussed in a previous thread (at length) about the lack of intelligence of the smart chargers when faced with a very flat battery.
Only solution is a couple of hours of brute force charging with old technology before connecting a smart charger. I think I would be wary of paralleling a a fully charged battery with as the the likely current could been very high, depending on the internal resistance of the duff battery.
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I've 2 chargers, a lidl one and a bigger black and decker one, but they're both of the too smart for their own good variety!
I'll nip down to my grandpa's, he's got an old school one, i'll give that a whirl.
Last edited by: Skoda on Sat 16 Apr 11 at 20:21
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Think the smart charger is telling you it will gas off and go bang. Loudly:)
Last edited by: NortonES2 on Sat 16 Apr 11 at 21:15
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>> Got an old Battery i should have disposed of a while ago.
>> It's showing just over 3 volts on the terminals..
If it's that old and ignored that it has no electrolyte in some of the cells... IMHO it's a doorstop.
Even if you manage to get the cells back and have 12 volts at the terminals there will be little capacity.
If you have a use for a separate battery, buy one for the job, and use it periodically.
However, If you're just doing this for fun, carry on, but take appropriate care - and then take it to the tip.
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It is probably knackered or at least past it best anyway. If it was me I would fill it up with water and then weigh it in down at your local scrap merchants. You may be surprised what it is actually worth in scrap value...
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try and top it up with heavy water:)
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It's totally knackered. Get rid of it.
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i was once stuck in romford in the eighties with a duff battery but managed to give it the kiss of life by filling it with battery acid from another defunct battery from my uncles garage
worked for ages afterwards
dont try this at home kids as your clothes literally disintegrate in front of your eyes
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Badge of respect at my old school was acid burns in the uniform. You had to be clever to be doing chemistry!
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>> Badge of respect at my old school was acid burns in the uniform. You had
>> to be clever to be doing chemistry!
>>
Same as mine. It wasn't cool to wear a lab coat, or goggles. The top aces were those who had burnt hair or pock-marked skin from experimenting with explosives. We used to wait until November 5th to let off the big ones.
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>> Recoverable with some de-ionised water and hooking it up in parallel with a good battery
I think you need to fill it up with Battery acid (sulphuric IIRC), the electrolyte will be too weak if you just top it up with water.
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If charged long enough and slow enough then the de-ionised water will eventually turn back into acid.
Most of the smart chargers will only charge batteries if the open terminal voltage is above 4 volts.
Provided none of the plates of the battery are warped then filling with de-ionised water and then a slow charge for several hours with a standard 12v mains adapter (something low current output) should raise the voltage enough to put a smart charger onto the battery and charge it properly.
Just make sure you have plenty of fresh air circulating when charging.
If you smell a rotten egg smell then that's the battery converting the water back to acid and releasing hydrogen at the same time.
and don't light a ciggie anywhere near it !
Provided the plates are not buckled and you have enough time then the battery should be recoverable.
I done something similar a couple of years back with an old car battery and a 5 watt solar panel.
Left it for a few weeks and it worked.
Repeated charging for 5 hours then left not charged overnight helped.
The battery will never be as good as brand new but it is still usable.
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So is it not true that the plates dissolve and leave a pile of iron, which touches the plates and discharges the battery? That's what I always understood - though thinking about it, if the plates have dissolve then the pile of iron filings wouldn't reach them...
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Crikey, what people think!
The battery is scrap. A "batt-aid" tablet in each cell, and a fill of distilled water, might produce some improvement - but it's still scrap.
If you want to go to a lot of trouble for very little gain, do this:
(1)
Shake the battery up and down.
Shake it from side to side.
Shake it backwards and forwards.
Shake it up and down again.
Tip out the contents, if any, they will be horribly corrosive and contain lead and antimony compounds, as well as sulphuric acid, so they will be rather horribly poisonous, too.
Filter the stuff, or let it settle. Put it back in, equally in each cell, and top up with distilled water.
Repeat from (1).
When you tire of the above, tip out the stuff again, and re-fill with battery acid.
Charge the thing up, and be amazed at how much capacity it's got! Yes, better than it was, but still very poor indeed, and it's still scrap because the plates are sulphated and/or more bits and pieces of them will fall off and make their way to the bottom again, whereupon you will need to repeat the above.
Yes, stuff can build up at the bottom of cells, and short them internally - but it's not iron.
Last edited by: FotheringtonTomas on Tue 19 Apr 11 at 11:13
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>>>>Tip out the contents, if any, they will be horribly corrosive and contain lead and antimony compounds, as well as sulphuric acid, so they will be rather horribly poisonous, too.
Filter the stuff, or let it settle. Put it back in, equally in each cell, and top up with distilled water.
Repeat from (1).<<<<
When you tire of the above, tip out the stuff again, and ingest with a good dose of whisky - close your eyes and give up.
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Saving a Battery - Old Navy
