Battery Tender questions

[gthorpe]

A while back the charger for my dad's DeWalt drill malfunctioned and overcharged the battery pack, lots of smoke but thankfully the garage didn't catch fire. It appears the charger did not automatically shut off when the battery pack was charged (though not conclusive).

 

This got me thinking, since a battery tender is a similar device I'm wondering if anyone has heard of one malfunctioning and damaging the battery or catching fire?

 

I've noticed that my battery tender feels a little hot when charging, and stays warm when not charging, is that normal?

 

Thanks,

[dazzz]

Hello Gthorp:

Battery tender is not a generic name. The Deltran Battery Tender is a quality piece of equipment. You get what you pay for. I'm sure others make a charger of equal quality but they are not inexpensive. My example of a cheap one is the HF charger that costs about $10 or less. I would not use that on my bike. Look into your alternatives and I'm sure you'll feel better about the whole thing. You can extend the life of the battery by keeping it at optimum charge.

Don

[Peter Parts]

DeWalt experience frightening. But I think those cheapy chargers are made to charge tools fast and so run the risk of cooking the battery if you don't pay attention.

 

On the other hand, those cheap trickle chargers using wall-wart transformers actually work pretty smart due to their design that poops out when the battery is full.

 

The expensive chargers are nice but they are BMW-owner-type sophistication applied to some basic dumb chemistry. BTW, I can't think of any maintenance I do to my Oilhead* sealed batteries besides ride the bike and maybe a single charge if the bike is in pieces over a long winter.

 

My impression is that BMW battery maintenance is an example of an easy to do maintenance that lets people feel they are doing something useful. That's OK for starters, but my suggestion is to ratchet-up your sophistication and work on more subtle aspects of the bike like balancing, breathing, exhausting, suspension, etc.

 

Ben

fall temps return to Toronto... with rain and great piles of wet leaves in the streets soon

 

*Airheads... different story for winter-city driving without a headlight fooler

[gthorpe]

Thanks for the replies.

 

My device is a Deltran Battery Tender Jr.

[Guest Kakugo]

The only electrical appliance I owned which caught fire (kind of) was my old Fuji camera which started to smoke (literally) on top of the Izoard.

I've used battery chargers made by Tecmate of Belgium for years and I've never had a problem with them. These are extremely popular here in Europe and are the best bang for the buck you can buy. Honda and Triumph sell them as genuine accessories without even rebadging or repackaging: that should say a lot about how highly they are regarded, and rightly so.

But the chargers I used before... Good God they were awful! Battery was often really hot when charging (excessive/inadequate amperage?), they didn't charge fully etc. Mind these were not cheap Chinese products but cost about as much as equivalent Tecmate products.

I learned my lesson...