Question about car battery sulfation
Is sulfation of a car battery a real problem or is it part of some sort of marketing ploy for sellers of "desulfator" devices?
|
I don't have first hand experience with desulfering a battery, but there is plenty of info online on how to make one:
https://www.flex.com/~kalepa/lowpower.htm |
My understanding is that when used normally, 12v starting/accessory batteries don't suffer from sulfation (compared to a similarly constructed battery that is discharged deeply) because full charge is pretty much always maintained by the alternator.
Sulfation occurs when a battery is left partially discharged for a long period of time. Yup: Quote:
EDIT: sulfation is more of a problem for EV's, since the pack may go days (or weeks, in my case) between "full" and needing a recharge. The guy who donated his used floodies to project ForkenSwift runs desulfators on each battery in his Ford Ranger EV (and will also admit he hasn't done any controlled testing to say whether they prolong batt life). |
Quote:
Thank you for your reply. My question about sulfation is if it's true that sulfation is accelerated when the car battery is exposed to high temperatures such as the fact that it's in the engine compartment of the car as well as very hot external atmospheric temperatures? |
My (not at all solid) understanding is that lead plate corrosion is more of a problem with high temperatures. Though I suspect a partially discharged battery will sulfate faster in warmer temps as well.
One of the reasons the US military is so interested in improved battery tech is because PBa doesn't hold up well in hot temps (ie. Iraq). As this US military Iraq battery dump attests: https://www.evworld.com/images/iraq_b..._graveyard.jpg |
yikes.
|
Yeah, no kidding.
And knowing that mil-spec is somewhat (slightly?) different from ForkenSwift-spec, I bet there are more than a couple of batts in that pile that would work quite nicely for my purposes... |
Quote:
But like Metro posted, it's not a big problem as you're not cycling the battery and then leaving it undercharged. Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
After that didn't work, the desulfator was put on and after 1 charge cycle (which took a day), what was once a dead battery was a viable battery that was no longer puckered up from sulfation. So there wasn't so much of a control as there was a try things until you find something that works attitude (as is/was the ethos of that community). Perhaps it's worth noting that the batteries is and were used for an electric wheelchair - a likely candidate for battery abuse :p |
All times are GMT -8. The time now is 11:16 AM. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.8 Beta 1
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.