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Never heard anything about what distinguishes the Batery Tender from trickle charging tho.

I really don't understand the difference either, trickle chargers that I'm familiar with all have a "tapering" effect in that the charging rate reduces as the battery approaches full charge, and that's what's touted about a battery tender - seems the same to me except trickle charges tend to have higher (though still low) charge rates. Maybe it's just more sophisticated circuitry.

The battery tenders I have made by Schumacher are max 1 1/2 amp output and says it monitors voltage and turns off when max charge is reached and will turn on again when voltage drops more than 1 volt.

Very small flat box with short cord. I have them permanently mounted out of the way near battery and just run an extension cord when car is parked.

I am a bit skeptical of battery tenders--in my mind a product designed to fill a non-existant need.

My elaborate winterizing procedure consists of doing basic fluid checks and having a relatively full tank of gas. The car is driven about 7 miles to storage, backed in place and shut off. I then pat it affectionatly on the fender and close the garage door. If the car has a working clock, I twist off a battery cable before I go. Four or five months later I get in the car and crank it til it starts and drive home. These are cars are machines, not exotic aquarium fish.

Many of my customers use battery tenders and get nowhere near the 5-7 year battery life I get in my fleet of oldtimers. I believe these tenders are most necessary when storing modern cars with computers as they have continuous battery drain keeping the brain alive.

I have to stand corrected regarding the blower motor be polarity sensitive. It is a shunt wound motor but will always turn the same direction regardless of the polarity.

I was going on my memory of what I thought I learned 50 years ago.


Never Mind

Quote:

I think I have this same "charger" (MC-1). Sounds like it is a tender and charger.

I use $8 tenders from Harbor Freight for my 12 volt batteries (harbor freight charger) They work great for tractor, Tbird, boat, and Harley that I have.

I make sure to disconnect a battery cable before prolonged storage of my cars after what happened to a friend of mine. Some critters had gotten into one of his cars and chewed the wiring, which then shorted and caused a fire under hood. Someone had called him to tell him about funny lights in his garage.