Battery Minder - worth it or no?

deyoung

deyoung

Line Up and Wait
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Tucson, AZ
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Chris
I need a new battery, and along with it I'm looking at maybe getting a BatteryMinder trickle charger/conditioner, and debating whether it's worth it. It looks like it'll run $325--$350 or so, plus a little time to install.

I haven't been flying as much recently as I want to, and while I plan to change that and be out more frequently, well, you never know. Also, I know batteries don't really like heat, and Tucson summers can have long stretches of days >100dF. The plane is in a hangar, so that's better than sitting in the sun, but it's not cooled.

Do you think one of these will extend battery life by enough to be worthwhile? If it only adds a slight bit then the break even point is pretty far out.

Thanks!
 
Depends on how often you fly, if flying every week or so...no. If idle for months...yes.


Tom
 
Worth it!

I plug my battery in after every flight. Battery minder and Concorde battery.
 
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I'm also in Tucson, and I definitely find that it helps with the life of the battery. Everyone else at the hangars around me uses them as well. From personal experience, I used to go through a battery ~3 years, now it's at least 5.
 
I have mine on a timer. It comes on once a week for a full day. Tops the battery off if I haven’t flown and desulfates it the rest of the day, then off for 6 days.

Hangar neighbor has both his Vtail and A36 on timers too, his turn on for 3 hrs daily.

Theoretically you can leave them on year-round. I just don’t like that. I’m an outlier.
 
My C120 is parked outside and I fly it 3-4 times a week but I still plug it in. I bought a Battery Tender solar panel ($50 amazon) that sits on my storage box and plugs into the airplane. It's able to charge even on a cloudy day.

Might not be necessary, but it's nice knowing every time I come to the airplane it's not something I have to worry about. I have a 4 year old Gill 25 battery and it seems to be going strong.

IMG_3461.jpg
 
weirdjim said:
Harbor Freight has a spiffy little one that they sell for $40-50 that I wrote an article on because it is the best charger I could find in my last 50 years of searching. Attached.

Jim
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Not seeing the viking on their website, only the Cen-Tech which appears to be a much older design.
 
We have on the club plane. Can’t hurt. Might help. Batteries are expensive.
 
If you have an AGM battery (not a flooded cell battery) then don't worry about it too much unless you don't fly at least once a month. AGM batteries have very low self-discharge compared to flooded cell batteries. A battery minder won't hurt as long as it is compatible with your battery type and it is operated properly. A good way to kill a perfectly good battery is to overcharge it or use the wrong charging protocol. I've never put a battery minder on my Concorde RG-25, but make sure I fly the plane on a regular basis to keep the charge topped up. You should get a solid 3-5 years of useful life (that is, adequate emergency capacity, not just enough power to turn the starter a couple of times) by flying reasonably often and keeping your charging system well maintained.
 
Okay ill be the odd ball here. I don't use one and when I got my plane in 2014 I put a new concorde battery in it and it has never seen a trickle charger and I'm in the deep south with high heat as well. Still going strong with no hiccups.....but I might have just jinxed myself. hahaha
 
Whats wrong with the little battery tender wal-mart sells for $20.00? That is what i use on the plane, bikes, boat and lawn mower. WHY in the world would you spend $350???
I never keep it on all the time but on occasion hook it up for a day.
 
pigpenracing said:
Whats wrong with the little battery tender wal-mart sells for $20.00? That is what i use on the plane, bikes, boat and lawn mower. WHY in the world would you spend $350???
I never keep it on all the time but on occasion hook it up for a day.
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That’s kinda what I’m thinking. Your airplane’s charging system definitely doesn’t give it fancy charge cycles....
 
simtech said:
Okay ill be the odd ball here. I don't use one and when I got my plane in 2014 I put a new concorde battery in it and it has never seen a trickle charger and I'm in the deep south with high heat as well. Still going strong with no hiccups.....but I might have just jinxed myself. hahaha
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I would replace it after 5 years, batteries can fail unexpectedly.


Tom
 
I used my Battery Minder sporadically on my old battery and after 3 years and 11 months it died after a short 20 minute flight (leaving me stranded in the process). Since then, I keep the BM plugged in whenever my plane is in the hangar. I just checked and I'm at 3 years and 11 months and it started tonight. I will continue my experiment to see how long my battery lasts while plugged in most of the time.
 
Til last year I had no idea there were so many types, and some are incompatible with certain batteries.
This is just BatteryMinder’s offerings.
(there are many other brands)
Just for aircraft.
(they have em for all sorts of purposes)

Some are stamped “Do not use on Odyssey” (one of my batteries is an Odyssey)
Some have desulfating capability.
Some have temperature modulation (less, or no charging output when the oat is high)
Apparently the wrong charging curve and end voltages can harm batteries.

I did tons of reading but did not come to a reliable conclusion. Lots of staring at graphs, burned up the charger manufacturer’s and battery mfg’s phone lines with questions.

Decided that BatteryMinder seemed to be an industry leader, I had a couple hundred burning a hole in my pocket, didn’t want to waste any more neuron firing on it, got one of theirs.
Did I just get bamboozled & waste some cash? Dunno.
Will be watching to see if if was a good choice or not.
 
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iflyvfr said:
I used my Battery Minder sporadically on my old battery and after 3 years and 11 months it died after a short 20 minute flight (leaving me stranded in the process). Since then, I keep the BM plugged in whenever my plane is in the hangar. I just checked and I'm at 3 years and 11 months and it started tonight. I will continue my experiment to see how long my battery lasts while plugged in most of the time.
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One small problem leaving it plugged in all the time. Each time you get in the plane the batter is fully topped off.... Even if the battery is weak and won't hold a charge it will probably crank. Then you fly somewhere and leave it overnight and it won't start the next morning. I have seen that. Especially in boats :mad:
 
I’ve kept a cheap motorcycle tender on the batteries of two aircraft for over ten years without difficulty or incident.
 
12 years in my car and still going strong. Wife's car battery died at 11 years. Both cars have trunk mounted battery which I think is a major factor, keeping it away from engine heat. My C172 with firewall mounted battery never gets beyond 4 years, despite using battery tender.
 
Bought a $20 or so battery minder from AutoZone or the like. Came with a quick disconnect so I could connect to clamps or ring terminals. Put a couple ring terminals on the Concorde battery and got 7 years out of the last one. No need to spend $250 or $300 on something just because it has "aviation" slapped on the side of it.
 
EdFred said:
Bought a $20 or so battery minder from AutoZone or the like. Came with a quick disconnect so I could connect to clamps or ring terminals. Put a couple ring terminals on the Concorde battery and got 7 years out of the last one. No need to spend $250 or $300 on something just because it has "aviation" slapped on the side of it.
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You're not really comparing apples-to-apples in that case. The cheap, discount store ones that you can get for next to nothing are little (often nothing) more than an AC-DC, step-down transformer with the most basic (if any) of internal monitoring and controls. Those can (ask me how I know) damage your battery if they overcharge it due to poor internal regulation and/or failure, particularly if left operating for extended periods.

The BatteryMINDer brand isn't just a simply (and dumb) trickle charger. It actually features a number of smart features (like accounting for battery type, and monitoring ambient temperature) that allow it to properly regulate and monitor both rate and state of charge. Even better, ones the battery achieves a proper full charge, the charger features a de-sulfating mode that helps to prevent the (probably) most common (if little-know) type of failure for lead-acid batteries. Yes, they cost more. But, I personally can vouch for them doing wonders for battery life, and not just on aircraft. I've used them on motorcycles, cars, tractors, and lawnmowers and the money I have saved due to (in some cases, very dramatic) increase in battery life has *easily* paid for the chargers. If you have a lead-acid battery of any kind, in any kind of vehicle, that sits for extended periods between use, I highly recommend checking them (or one of their near-peer competitors) out.

And, no, I don't work for them, nor do I get a kick-back for every unit they sell. ;)
 
SO why did mine last 7 plus years then with a POS charger and the one before it did not make it that long without the charger?
 
My last battery lasted 10 years and about 1400 hours. I had a $25 walmart trickle charger with the quick connects like Ed described. I put a new one in when I overhauled the engine...probably didn't need to but 10 years???...I figured it didn't owe me anything.

Desulfation???...pffffft.

But, hey, whatever. There are people that spend hundreds on cleaning supplies also.

Parad0x177 said:
The BatteryMINDer brand isn't just a simply (and dumb) trickle charger. It actually features a number of smart features that allow it to properly regulate and monitor both rate and state of charge.
Click to expand...

my cheap charge does that...granted it's not the same one I bought 15 years ago but the ones they have today do that. I have about a half dozen of them with the quick connects for various generators and mowers and skid steers and airplanes and whatnot.
 
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I have this charger that I bought from O'Reilly's for around $75 . I like how I can check the amps on the battery and also the percent charge of the battery.
It will charge and maintain much like a minder but with a few more features. Shumacher model SC1304

Works for me.
SC1304_image.jpg
 
EdFred said:
SO why did mine last 7 plus years then with a POS charger and the one before it did not make it that long without the charger?
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I've had the same or better luck with absolutely no battery "tender" use at all. All I have ever done is charge it with a cheap POS charger when the airplane has been down for long periods of time (such as 3 month long radio jobs)
 
bnt83 said:
I've had the same or better luck with absolutely no battery "tender" use at all. All I have ever done is charge it with a cheap POS charger when the airplane has been down for long periods of time (such as 3 month long radio jobs)
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I don't always remember to hook it back up, and usually leave it off in the summer. But unheated hangar in Michigan winter...lost one prematurely because of that, and put it on the new one. Previous one only went 3 years.
 
EdFred said:
SO why did mine last 7 plus years then with a POS charger and the one before it did not make it that long without the charger?
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I'd explain the problem with drawing conclusions based on statistical sample sets of two, but I don't think I'd get anywhere. So, I'll settle for just saying, "YMMV" and acknowledging that it is entirely possible to get a cheap trickle charger that doesn't fail and works fine in your particular use case. But, that doesn't mean that ALL cheap chargers are going to work that well. As I suggested, I've used them myself and they worked fine, until they didn't, and then my only indication was that I had three (as I recall) basically-new-but-now-useless batteries at almost exactly the same time and it turned out the regulators in the chargers had decided to fail and boil all the electrolyte out of the batteries, since there was nothing to protect the battery in that failure mode.

All that said, I was only attempting to point out that there are identifiable differences between the two price extremes you mentioned, that may be worth considering for some people. If what you have works for you, that is great for you. Carry on.

P.S. I have NO idea why or how you decided that I need to be subject to whatever bottled-up wrath you have on tap. But, I assure you that whatever grave offense (you believe) I have committed was purely accidental. Nothing I've said (in any of the threads) was personal towards you (or anyone) and wasn't even meant as critical. Relax!
 
There is nothing wrong with leaving a smart charger attached to your airplane battery all the time, provided its trickle charge protocol is appropriate for your battery type. One of the quickest ways to kill a perfectly good AGM battery is to apply an inappropriately high trickle charge current over an extended period of time. Many smart chargers, including some "less expensive" have the appropriate program, but some chargers are kinda dumb, and they will fry your battery if left on it for extended periods of time. Just make sure you know what you are doing. There are a lot of affordable smart battery chargers out there. I use one to maintain my Miata battery over the winter months. (I think I got mine on clearance from Sears long ago.) I've used this charger to resuscitate a completely discharged Concorde RG-25. An AGM battery will resist sulfation better than a flooded cell if it self-discharges a bit due to inactivity. If you install an AGM battery and don't let it sit for a year, you will do just fine without a trickle charger. Especially in a cooler climate where self-discharge is slower.
 
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