Do I Need To Start My Bus Every Day?

[firebuild]

Originally Posted by TJones

A battery maintainer will help. With your batteries at full charge you will get the most heat out of your glow plugs and crank the engine the fastest. This is what I use.

https://www.amazon.com/Schumacher-SC...SJL&ref=plSrch

Ted

Hey there Ted, or anyone else who can answer: I bought this exact maintainer but I jsut came across somebody asking if it could be used on his Ford f-350 with a dual battery system (mine is e-350 with dual batteries), and this was the manufacturer response:

"As the SC1300 is only 1.5A maintainer it is not recommended to charge a dual battery system"

You've been using this awhile, do you have one battery or two?

One guy said it works for dual battery if you install it at the alternator but that is above my skill level - I was just going to install it next to the main battery. I know the batteries work together but I know they don't charge together when I put the regular charger on them - only the one directly connected charges. So I just figured I'd put it on the main starting battery and not really worry about the other one. Is there some reason NOT to do that?

[TJones]

I have mine on two 8D batteries. I have a higher amp charger to charge the batteries if they were low. The maintainer just keeps the batteries topped off and makes up for self discharge. I'm not sure how your batteries are wired. In both of my f-350s with 7.3s both of the the batteries are wired together. A way to check is to connect the maintainer to one battery and then measure the voltage with a multimeter. Then check the other battery. If they are the same voltage then they are connected so they can both be charged. If your batteries are not connected you may want to check and see if they should be. I would think the bus should be using both batteries for starting.

Ted

[firebuild]

Originally Posted by TJones

I have mine on two 8D batteries. I have a higher amp charger to charge the batteries if they were low. The maintainer just keeps the batteries topped off and makes up for self discharge. I'm not sure how your batteries are wired. In both of my f-350s with 7.3s both of the the batteries are wired together. A way to check is to connect the maintainer to one battery and then measure the voltage with a multimeter. Then check the other battery. If they are the same voltage then they are connected so they can both be charged. If your batteries are not connected you may want to check and see if they should be. I would think the bus should be using both batteries for starting.

Ted

They look connected, but I can say for sure that their voltage does not always match based on the reading on my charger. I need to get me a multimeter, it comes up often enough. Anyway, you do use this with dual batteries - That was my main concern. Thanks!

[TJones]

You may want to clean your battery terminals on both batteries as that could be causing a difference in voltages and would lead to poor performance.

Ted

[Booyah45828]

Big issue on using a maintainer with dual batteries is if the batteries are seperated by an isolator. If they are, then hooking to the alternator lead will charge both batteries.

I think the manufacturer doesn't like it because it is a smart charger that has multi stage charging, and having 2 batteries hooked to it could confuse it.

[cadillackid]

my brother lives in fairbanks AK.. and up there, in town anhyway many places to park have plug-ins... not like the big cities of the states for electrioc cars but for block heaters.. his 6.0 ford started on its own accord down to minus 30 or so.. but usuallty he left it sit all winter because it was 2WD and useless in the snow.. the batteries were pulled and kept indoors till spring... with nicely charged batteries the truck usually fired right up without issue..



leaving diesels run doesmt seem to hurt them as long as you dont extract all of their heat.. when it was predicted to go below 0, dad left our scout diesels running in the driveway over-night all the time.. it never hurt them.. he left the "ignition key" off so the heater wasnt pulling away heat.. he only has one of those scouts still but has both engines.. one with 375k and the other with close to 200k.. both suffered no ill effects of being left turned on for sometiomes days at a time.. the alternator did not charge the batteries with the key turned off.. thiose engines in the scouts had the same familiar controls like those of us here with mechanical DT360/466. have.. the key and then the pull-cable shut off.. since the alternator wasnt active, the batteries werent over-charged from the long idles..





so what is the minimum temperature a fullyt charged Lead acid battery should be left outside un-warmed? or say left in a vehicle unused but charged.. I know partial or dead batteries freeze at relatively warm temps.. but im interested in batteries like are on my busses.. so I leave my DEV bus sit with its batts after being driven. and the main electric turned off so no parasitic drop.. how cold can they safely get?


-Christopher

[BlackJohn]

"how cold can they safely get?"


I think that is completely dependent on age of the battery and maintenance if any. I never buy maintenance free batteries period.
If you are consistently in the colder regions, battery blankets help even not plugged in. The sun on your hood helps more than you would think.
Mine sit out of my bus but never on a cement floor and seem to hold their charge, sitting on boards.
No two batteries are equal either so hard to say about max temp before worrying, -30f is trying for any battery.
The biggest thing at that temp is danger of explosion whether boosting or charging. You need caps off the cells or you have one big explosion possible.
Best to wear eye protection doing those operations, connect the neg of the boost batteries to an engine ground, (alternator bracket is good), not the dead batteries. At the very least, look away while making that connection. Battery acid on your face any time is major trouble but more apt to occur at low temps.
Battery inspection for bulges in the case is a sign to not even bother charging or boosting, just replace and be done with it.
So to answer your question, there is no right answer.
Windchill temps have no bearing, just what the ambient is.


John



John

[cadillackid]

ive not had much luck boosting a bus.. i have found best thing is to charge it. seems most of the batteries are maint free these days.. I'll have to check on the new ones i just got for my red bus..



im not a huge fan of maint free.. heck I remember extending the life of old batteries cheaply years ago by flushing and putting in new fluid and id get another couple years..

-Christopher

[o1marc]

My charger helps for starting. It's a Schumacher that has 3 settings. A 2-3 amp trickle charge, a 10 amp fast charge and a 50 amp starting charge.

[BlackJohn]

"im not a huge fan of maint free.. heck I remember extending the life of old batteries cheaply years ago by flushing and putting in new fluid and id get another couple years.. "

-Christopher



Exactly! Most top batteries off with tap water or worse but that weakens the electrolyte solution and corrodes the plates.

Long slow charging will dissolve the mess on the plates. I normally charge slow for 24 hours minimum.



Distilled water only folks for long battery service in any vehicle.


John

[o1marc]

i thought that was the whole purpose of AGM batteries, it removes all the mistakes humans can make. No adding water, no fumes to deal with and vent, mount in any position, etc. What's not to like?

When i worked at O'Reilly's a few years ago, a lady brought her Motorcraft battery in for test and/or replacement. I put it on the machine and it said "last 1/4 of life, replace soon." We didn't have what she wanted so she was going to go elsewhere. I told her I would buy her battery for the core charge ($18.00), which she did. I put it in my Dakota truck and ran it for another 3 years.

[PNW_Steve]

Originally Posted by BlackJohn

"im not a huge fan of maint free.. heck I remember extending the life of old batteries cheaply years ago by flushing and putting in new fluid and id get another couple years.. "

-Christopher



Exactly! Most top batteries off with tap water or worse but that weakens the electrolyte solution and corrodes the plates.

Long slow charging will dissolve the mess on the plates. I normally charge slow for 24 hours minimum.



Distilled water only folks for long battery service in any vehicle.


John

Definitely use distilled water for topping your batteries.

As far as slow charging goes..... Charging at C8-C12 will give you longer battery life. Charging at a lower rate contributes to sulfating the plates.

[BlackJohn]

Originally Posted by o1marc

i thought that was the whole purpose of AGM batteries, it removes all the mistakes humans can make. No adding water, no fumes to deal with and vent, mount in any position, etc. What's not to like?

Lack of CCA's compared to lead acid comes to mind firstly, compared to Group 31's


John

[BlackJohn]

Originally Posted by PNW_Steve

Definitely use distilled water for topping your batteries.

As far as slow charging goes..... Charging at C8-C12 will give you longer battery life. Charging at a lower rate contributes to sulfating the plates.

Not arguing but in 50 years driving we always charged slow. Same with 40 years around batteries in the electrical trade.

Thank God for smart chargers then which I now use without issues.
Ya learn something new every day here!


John

[Blueman]

I fill my bus up with #2 and anti gel additive for the winter months and had no problems. If you can you can plug it in to keep the oil warm a few hours before you start it up and should be good to go

[cadillackid]

I looked at the recent battery bill for the ones I put in the red bus... they are AGM's, is that wrong? i wanted them because that bus does have a computer and ifgured if I forgot to plug the maintainer in and they got more flat then they should it wouldnt hurt them..



the 5 year old batteries in my DEV bus that spin it over marvelously are interstates with caps that I occasionally top off the distilled water in.. seems about once a year i need to add a little distilled water to the cells.. its been 2 years since I really stressed them when i did my Cold start with no blick heater at 0f.. (there are no glow plugs or grid heat on a DTA360).. I ripped em hard then. with my 20 second crank time. but they didnt go flat.. I only did that as a test to see if i could start it,.. I keep the block heater on otherwise. .. no maintainer on thise since its mechanical
-Christopher

[Yukon Cornelius]

Originally Posted by cadillackid

I looked at the recent battery bill for the ones I put in the red bus... they are AGM's, is that wrong? i wanted them because that bus does have a computer and ifgured if I forgot to plug the maintainer in and they got more flat then they should it wouldnt hurt them..

-Christopher

That seems to be a common thought up here. Quite a few people run AGM in their cars n trucks for that reason, most places here including grocery stores have plugins. And as others have mentioned this is that kind of north where it's not uncommon to see vehicles running unattended for hours. Most folks running diesels here only shut them down to refuel when we have a cold snap (which I define as -25C/-13F or colder as a daytime high, for more than 3 days) And that's only because the corporation have the sheeple scared into thinking that you can't refuel a vehicle without massive explosions......

So a lot of folks rock AGM batteries so negate the plugins when out and about or in case they forget to plug their vehicles in.....which I did last night, mostly as I was unloading the truck to the garage so I had it pulled forward in the driveway where my cord wouldn't reach....I was supposed to go back out before the night ended.....that didn't happen...-27C again this morning my Fronty was slow to crank but she lit off.

[cadillackid]

my 444E has no block heater.. supposed to be minus 10 to minus 15f with winds of 20 MPH weds night here.. im supposed to leave for a trip to miami on thurs morning.. so we will find if my bus will Light off at that temp or not.. i'll put a trouble light in the battery box weds evening to keep the cells warmer..



I live in a suburban neighborhood and the neighbors already complained when i used one oftheb usses as a generator during a power outage last year so letting it run all night isnt gonna happen.. I'll drive it weds evening and get it all warmed up before i park it...


then i'll head to miami where i need to be more concerned with whether the freon leaked out of my A/C or not vs whether the bus will start


-Christopher

[Tango]

LOL! The neighbors only complained because you had power and they didn't.

[Yukon Cornelius]

Originally Posted by Tango

LOL! The neighbors only complained because you had power and they didn't.

I think Tango is on to something.....