How to put away a battery for the winter

[Checkswrecks]

Copying the following great post here which was written by _Cy_, over on ADV in the big battery thread:
http://advrider.com/index.php?threads/motorcycle-batteries-agm-gel-wet-lithium-iron-phosphate-lifepo4.757934/page-124
- CW



How to put away a battery for the winter:
this is for folks with AGM and LiFePO4: all voltages need to be taken with a known to be correct meter.
for sloosh PB those will need some type of trickle charger which is NOT recommended for AGM/LiFePO4.

1. When putting up an AGM/LiFePO4 for short term storage .. it's best to start with a full charge. putting a LiFePO4 or any other li-on into long term storage covers a topic on it's own.

2. both AGM and LiFePO4 are low self discharge batteries. it's not unusual to see LiFePO4 hold a charge nicely for 1+ year. internal protection circuits if any can add to self discharge. AGM in good condition can easily hold a charge for 6+ months. all PB batteries including AGM like being close to full charge to avoid sulfation.

3. after charging AGM/LiFePO4 to full charge .. disconnect battery terminals (ground) to terminate parasitic drain if any.

4. every 6 months or so .. go back and charge back to full. for AGM that would be about 12.85v after sitting overnight .. for LiFePO4 that would be 14.6v immediately after charging to full .. then depending on internal electronics .. about 14.2v to 13.9v after sitting overnight for LiFePO4. it's OK to scrub surface charge by applying a small load if you don't have patience to wait overnight.

acceptable chargers:

trickle type chargers like battery tenders are not on my favorites list. but will work in a pinch .. so long as you understand time limitations. depending on AH size, it could take several days to reach full charge at say 500 milliamps. trickle chargers are NOT recommended for recovering AGM/LiFePO4 from dead. my recommendations when attempting to recover from dead is to charge at 1C. this will be covered in more details in an upcoming tutorial on recovering batteries from dead and/or extremely low voltage.

lots of choices for AGM/LiFePO4 .. most any 12v PB charger with enough amps (not trickle charger) will do .. make sure 12v charger in question doesn't have a desulfation mode which typically spikes voltages to 15.1v+ which could kill both AGM/LiFePO4.

for LiFePO4 if one has $$$ go with Optima LiFePO4 charger .. otherwise go with an old dumb 12v charger like say 10amp Schumacher, but make dead certain it puts out 14.4v and no more. these typically sell for $25 range. your bike's alternator is really just a dumb charger driven by your engine with voltage regulator limiting volts delivered.

ALL batteries will naturally self regulate amps/absorbtion rates as it reaches closer to full charge. but will not regulate voltage delivered. (note charging lithium cobalt cells is a topic to itself)

think water in a pipe: amp = flow ... voltage = pressure
voltage delivered determine force amps will be pushed into cells.



Last edited: 26 minutes ago

 

[Sierra1]

So....is Deltran wrong/lying when they say that their Tenders are made for AGM batteries? The ST1300 I had was fitted with an Odyssey AGM battery. It lasted three years being charged daily by a Battery Tender. Granted, it was driven almost daily. But on the flip side, the battery was less than 80% at the end of the day.

 

[Dogdaze]

Ok, now I'm confused ::010:: Is this saying that I should NOT place the S10 on a trickle charge over winter?

 

[ace50]

It misses one glaring thing. The COLD! If you store your bike outside, take the battery out and bring it in! Batteries don't like cold, especially for extended times.
My bikes are inside anyway, but I pull my lawn mower battery out and trickle charge them all, every so often.

 

[OldRider]

Ok, now I'm confused ::010:: Is this saying that I should NOT place the S10 on a trickle charge over winter?

There are a lot of trickle chargers that put out a constant small milliamp charge 24/7 and I think that's what he's saying not to use. You want to use a smart charger that knows what's going on in the battery and adjust itself accordingly.

"trickle chargers are NOT recommended for recovering AGM/LiFePO4 from dead." A trickle charger doesn't have enough horsepower to bring back a dead battery, you'll need something meaner.

 

[Nikolajsen]

It misses one glaring thing. The COLD! If you store your bike outside, take the battery out and bring it in! Batteries don't like cold, especially for extended times.
My bikes are inside anyway, but I pull my lawn mower battery out and trickle charge them all, every so often.

Hmm, I have always been told, that the self discharge wil be half, for every 10° celsius the temperatur is lowered (until freezing)

 

[Checkswrecks]

Sierra - Deltran makes and suggests different tenders for AGM and Li-ion. As OldRider rightly points out, they are not meant to bring up a dead battery. Both _cy_ and Deltran say this, so no lies involved.

Dogdaze - The chargers do very small cycles of power and discharge, keeping the battery at or near 100%, which induces a wear factor. Like ace50, rather than leave the tender on continuously, what I do is put it on a bike for a day or so every several weeks, then move it to another bike when that day is up. If it looks like a ridable day is coming, I'll put the tender on the night before.


As ace50 infers and _cy_ says, disconnecting the battery to prevent parasitic drain is the key. Once that is done, either AGM or Li-ion will hold a charge really well for the few months of our winters. The old lead batteries with the caps suffered with cold much more than the current AGM and Li-ion, so I'm not as concerned about cold damage as I once was. (Still a good idea to bring them in when less than 0F/-18C.


Nikolajsen - Yes, self discharge goes down with temp for either style of battery. The problem is more that the capability also goes down, so people will try to simply flip on the key and start with a cold battery.




There's a half-myth that turning on a headlight makes a cold Li-ion battery magic cure-all. The theory is that if you turn on the headlight for a minute, then the battery will be good for an engine start. The problem is that the battery won't heat evenly inside and people won't wait for it to. So while the engine will start, this can lead to thermal damage when it is really cold. (I did not say it would not work, hence the half-myth.) During testing of some Li-ion batteries intending to see if we could get cold start damage at -20C (which a lot of people are now seeing), one terminal got up to 157C, which was WAY more than it took to melt the plastic separator material between the anode and cathode windings. The tests support ace50's comment about letting batteries warm before pushing the starter button.

 

[Nikolajsen]

I was just refering to ace50 comment on bringing the battery inside.....I thought that he ment for storage.
And for storage, the cold is a god thing (until freezing), but certainly not if you are going to start up, then it is a god idea to bring the battery inside for warming up.

 

[ace50]

I was just refering to ace50 comment on bringing the battery inside.....I thought that he ment for storage.
And for storage, the cold is a god thing (until freezing), but certainly not if you are going to start up, then it is a god idea to bring the battery inside for warming up.

I did mean for extended storage inside. It's the cold and the temperature swings by being outside.
It's warmer when I start riding again so I don't have to heat it up to start the bike when I put it back in!
Battery inside, constant temp and room temp. Even I like that!

 

[Nikolajsen]

I actually talked once, with a person that took his (lead acid) battery, inside and put it in his freezer, after a full charge
But I believe that being a lead acid battery, it makes perfectly sense.

 

[jackintherok]

RE; Batteries ... This guy seems to know what he's talking about ....http://bmwmotorcycletech.info/newbattery.htm
May be a bit dated (2014) and lengthy.... he's not too keen on trickle charging or keeping a battery on 'maintenance' mode on a smart charger. Don't know about the benefits of putting a battery in the freezer, but if its a flat/flatish lead acid battery the water (when flat) will freeze and depending on design could split the battery case.

 

[Sierra1]

Sierra - Deltran makes and suggests different tenders for AGM and Li-ion. As OldRider rightly points out, they are not meant to bring up a dead battery. Both _cy_ and Deltran say this, so no lies involved.

That's where I got confused....the Tender I purchased had "for AGM" printed on the label. (I knew just enough to find a charger for the newer/modern batteries) The way _cy_ put it, it sounded like he disliked ALL Tenders. And even I knew not to use a Tender on a DEAD battery. (to me, there's a difference between dead, and not enough juice to start) Usually, if I have a DEAD battery, it'll be old enough to just get a new one. So....I'm good. I am fortunate enough to live where it's rare to have two weeks of weather, in a row, that's bad enough to prevent riding.

 

[bigbob]

I had not ridden the 10 in 2-3 weeks. 2014 original battery. Was under 10F in the garage when I put the tender on. Went into charge mode. By the time I got to the door, under a minute, it had quit charging, turned green, and said the battery was good.

 

[ace50]

One additional note on trickle chargers. I have two of them from Harbor Freight. Different part numbers but the same thing. (different suppliers I suppose)
You can get them for less than $10 at times. I bought another one to a workmate as he did a little welding for me. He has a Harley and must have thought a cheap H.F.
unit was not good enough to but on HIS bike so he bought one from Northern Tool. (like that was much better!) It fried his battery!

I checked the voltage output from the N.T. one and the H.F. one. Yep, the N.T. one was over 14V (too much for extended use) and the H.F. one was just over 13V. (about right)
I personally never leave them on all the time anyway.

But I did check my 2 H.F. ones and one is just over 13V and the other was 14.1V, so I use the latter only for a few hours at a time. The former a few days at a time.

So I suggest you check them before you use them!

 

[Cycledude]

Most devices like Battery Tenders or battery maintainers are actually designed not to work on a battery that has somehow been seriously discharged, my guess is the electronics in those types of chargers Simply are not up to the task so that’s why the manufactures design them to do nothing if the battery is to low. If the battery is not already way to low on charge devices like Battery Tenders will work great.

I accidentally left the key turned to the accessory position overnight on my Goldwing, yup the battery was completely dead the next morning. I tried hooking a Battery maintainer to it but all that happened was the little red light came on showing something was wrong. So I put a 10 amp charger on it for about an hour then switched back the the Battery maintainer which now showed charging and left it on over night, the next morning the battery showed fully charged and the Goldwing started fine ! That was the original from the factory battery in my Goldwing and I used it for 206;000 miles, battery was still working fine but when doing a load test it said replace so that’s what I did.
It’s kinda rare for me to use a batter maintainer on my motorcycles but when I do it’s usually just overnight .

 

[jackintherok]

Regarding this "my charger showed a 'green' light thing after charging". My Optimate6 showed a green light after charging what proved to be a really f***ed up battery after only an hour or so. Like the battery capacity had dropped to 2/3rds of FA and the Optimate was telling me that what it had left was 'fully' charged. Found good indication of battery condition is how much charge it takes for how long before it gives you the "green" light.

 

[Sierra1]

Battery chargers/maintainers do wear out. I used to use the cheaper W-M brand, but had to replace them almost annually. Battery Tenders (Deltran) last the longest; I've only had to replace one after years of use. But, receiving a green/charged indication on a less than fully charged battery was a sign the charger/maintainer was failing. When I replaced the old charger with a new one, the battery did recover to a full charge.