Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Battery question

[David Buchner <buchner@wcta.net>]

On Tuesday, Jan 28, 2003, at 12:02 US/Central, Warrend Greenway wrote:

> I am mostly worried about potential explosions and venting during
> charging, since they would still be under an air-tight deck. Are
> you talking about the gel-cell, or sealed-lead acid, David? The
> reason I ask, is because those batteries have a small fraction of
> the energy density of a marine deep cycle lead-acid. Do you have
> some good battery sources?


No I don't, but the ones I'm thinking of, which I think are called AGM, 
are I believe yet another technology, in addition to the two sealed 
kinds you mention. I think they've been discussed here before. You can 
get a car battery version of them at auto parts stores, and they're 
advertised as being able to mount them in any position and not have to 
worry about leaking or sloshing. I think they're a lot more expensive.

Re: venting: My house runs on conventional deep cycle batteries, and I 
keep them inside. They're in an enclosed compartment under my 
workbench, which has a 1 1/2 PVC vent pipe going out the top corner of 
it to outside, and a 2-inch muffin fan blowing into the compartment, 
that I try to remember to run while charging. So far, there hasn't 
seemed to have been an explosive build-up... but then I'm not in the 
habit of lighting matches in there to check.

In a sub, I'd be nervous even if I'd well ventilated them during 
charging, because it seems like leftover bubbles would continue coming 
out the vents as you moved around and jostled them, and you're in this 
confined space with whatever gases you have after you stop ventilating 
and close that hatch.

There's always hydro-caps, but I don't like that you have to take them 
off when equalizing, which I try to do pretty regularly.

(http://customer.wcta.net/buchner/building16.html, in case you care)


David
buchner@wcta.net
Osage, MN, USA
http://customer.wcta.net/buchner