[PSUBS-MAILIST] agm charger

Mon May 18 20:19:31 EDT 2015

Hank, the only thing that I would be worried about is that car alternators are designed to recharge conventional lead acid car batteries.  Deep cycle AGM's are a different beast.  AGM are more susceptible to being damaged by overcharging.  Also most sophisticated battery chargers go through three distinct phases depending on the initial SOC.  With a car alternator, you are not going to get this this unless you go through a PLC and program in the charging curves.

I have had good luck over the last 8 years with on onboard battery charger for AGMs that is used for electric car/truck conversions.  When my boat's main propulsion bank was 120 VDC I used a Zivan NG3 120-18 and now that I have switched to 36 VDC bank, I use a Zivan NG3 http://www.zivanusa.com/pdf/NG3.pdf.  I have had hundreds of recharges using these rechargers with no problems.    You can get a panel mounted  remote display that shows were you are on the recharge.  The suppliers adjust these to match type and capacity of your AGM batteries.  They are a bit pricey but often come up eBay. I really like being able to plug my boat into an AC receptacle and come back the next day with them fully charged having gone through a charging curve that is tuned to my AGM batteries.  For winter storage, you can leave the boat plugged in indefinitely and the system supplies a float charge again tuned to your AGM batteries.  The only negative on this system is that a battery bank is typical made of individual batteries wired in parallel and series.  This system does not have a Battery Management System (BMS) like you would have on a lithium-ion battery that controls charge on individual batteries, just he overall bank.  I have had to replace individual batteries that degraded over time.  
Cliff 

      From: hank pronk via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org>
 To: Personal Submersibles General Discussion <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> 
 Sent: Monday, May 18, 2015 6:11 PM
 Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] agm charger

Scott,
I have been using the same thing and they don't last, we pay 85 dollars here.
I added a couple pictures that show the ballast tanks nicely, I am sure happy with it.
Hank --------------------------------------------
On Mon, 5/18/15, swaters at waters-ks.com via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:

 Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] agm charger
 To: "Personal Submersibles General Discussion" <personal_submersibles at psubs.org>
 Received: Monday, May 18, 2015, 7:05 PM

 Hank,I
 charge my AGM's with a computerized battery charger.
 They cost about $65.00 at True Value Hardware. They charge
 at the correct rate and shut off when the charging is
 complete.Thanks,Scott
 Waters

 Sent
 from my U.S. Cellular® Smartphone

 -------- Original message --------
 From: hank pronk via Personal_Submersibles
 <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> 
 Date:05/18/2015  5:58 PM  (GMT-06:00) 
 To: personal_submersibles at psubs.org 
 Cc:  
 Subject: [PSUBS-MAILIST] agm charger 

 Hi all,
 I am tired of buying battery chargers for Gamma.  I
 think I am over using them and they go haywire.  I read
 that I can charge my AGM's with an automotive
 alternator.  I am thinking of building a battery
 charger with an alternator driven with  a 1hp AC 220 V
 motor.  The alternator has an internal regulator, so it
 will stop charging when the battery is full.  
 Is there anything wrong with this idea?
 Hank
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