Type of battery charger to buy

[chrisski]

Need advice on a battery charger.

I'm looking to buy a battery charger for my RV batteries for when I remove them and take them back to the house. I am planning on getting four batteries, 6 volts, 220 amps each that I will wire 2 parallel and 2 series for 12 volts. When I bring them to the house they would be nearly charged, and not dead from a weekend of use.

To Charge Them in a 12 Volt Setup
I looked for a 12 volt 40 amp charger, but I see what appears to be several 40 amp car battery chargers which do not mention if they would trickle charge batteries for long amounts of time.

Keep Batteries Charged on a mulit station trickle Charger
I would like to purchase a 4 station 4.4 amp per station charger, the Noco Genius G4. It is rated for each station to charge 6V or 12V batteries. This would not be strong enough to truly charge the batteries, but the plan is to take the batteries off the RV charged and bring the batteries to the house and hook them up to this trickle charge.

Keep Batteries charged with multiple 10 amp chargers
I would rather not, but I could purchase a 4 chargers 10 amps each, the Noco Genius 10. This starts to get pricey and is still not at 1/10th the amperage of the batteries.

Surprisingly, Battleborn and Trojan do not sell battery charger and maintainers on their site. I found VMaxx sells battery chargers.

[Mike90250]

Kalifornia has destroyed the battery charger market. All charger shut off after a day. Oh, so that limits what chargers we can buy here. you are SOL if you are trying to recover a bum battery.

[chrisski]

Kalifornia has destroyed the battery charger market. All charger shut off after a day. Oh, so that limits what chargers we can buy here. you are SOL if you are trying to recover a bum battery.

I’m in Arizona, so it may make it hard to find one, but don’t know if AZ has the same ru.es.

Any recommendations on a charger to buy or a maintainer? I’ve had my 1.5 amp battery charger plugged into my four car batteries, and that does not seem to shut off, even when left for months. With that logic, I think the 6/12 volt, 4 station, 4 amp per station Noco Genius G4 would be fine and do just what I want, but don’t know for sure. The reviews say people have left them on this charger for months.

I think that if I need to bring one of the 6 volts back from the dead, I may purchase the 40 amp car charger, and then put it on the Noco maintainer when its recovered. If it comes to that, the maintainer is $200 and the 40 amp charger is $130, so I wish there was one charger maintainer that did it all.

[bob-n]

Any thoughts on the Deltran Battery Tender family of products? I've been happy with them for my 12V battery use. For example:

https://www.batterytender.com/Battery-Tender-6V-12V-3A-Selectable-Battery-Charger_7

They make other models as well, higher and lower current.

[chrisski]

For the battery tender by Deltran, I can’t find the 40 amp one to make 10% to charge all four on one charger. The do have a 5 station 6Volt charger with a four star rating at twice the price of the Noco G4 I mentioned which has 4.5 stars. THe battery tender only makes a couple of 6 volt units, and looks the strongest one is the 5 station one I mentioned at 4 amps.

I’ve got Battery Tenders charging my 4 batteries at my house.

[Mike90250]

I have 2 of the Genius chargers, as small float chargers, on batteries that are seldom cycled. I'm trusting in their algorithm to not boil the batteries dry
If your batteries are really low, a 40A automotive charger will bring them right up to full, and then you can put them on the trickle charge.

The C10 charge requirement is for batteries in cycle use, to insure they charge up in 1 day,

[SunEagle]

Have you looked at the RV type like IOTA. They make multi stage charges for RV battery systems which I believe include a "float" stage. They also range in amp ratings which should cover the 40A you are looking for.

[chrisski]

Have you looked at the RV type like IOTA. They make multi stage charges for RV battery systems which I believe include a "float" stage. They also range in amp ratings which should cover the 40A you are looking for.

This could be a serious contender. I think I could get the 45 amp RV Battery charger, but I am a little unclear if I need to buy an $30 AGM card to attach to that. The brochure on the company web page says its good for AGM batteries, but further in sells an add on module to optimize the charging profile based off what battery you have. The charger itself comes with a standard 15 amp three prong plug. Also, the price will be really close to the NOCO Genius G4, maybe slightly more because I'd need to wire the batteries and then plug this in as if it were in the RV.

Amazon does not sell the 45 amp IOTA or the charge controller, but E-Bay sure does.

[SunEagle]

This could be a serious contender. I think I could get the 45 amp RV Battery charger, but I am a little unclear if I need to buy an $30 AGM card to attach to that. The brochure on the company web page says its good for AGM batteries, but further in sells an add on module to optimize the charging profile based off what battery you have. The charger itself comes with a standard 15 amp three prong plug. Also, the price will be really close to the NOCO Genius G4, maybe slightly more because I'd need to wire the batteries and then plug this in as if it were in the RV.

Amazon does not sell the 45 amp IOTA or the charge controller, but E-Bay sure does.

I found a DSL-45/IQ4 12V IOTA charger on Amazon for $164 but I have Prime so maybe I get additional items

[Ho jo]

This is what I use on 4 6 volt 208 ah flooded battery Screenshot_20200707-105710_Chrome.jpgScreenshot_20200707-105847_Chrome.jpg

[chrisski]

This is what I use on 4 6 volt 208 ah flooded battery Screenshot_20200707-105710_Chrome.jpgScreenshot_20200707-105847_Chrome.jpg

Do you have this charger at your house or in an RV?

The intent right now is to get GC2 golf cart batteries and install them in the RV when I travel, and when not traveling, keep them at home on a charger. I had been planning on AGM batteries, but I found a set of interstate GC2 flooded lead Acid for sale for half the price. One thing that had been keeping me from the flooded lead acid batteries is building the venting system. I can find reasonably priced GC2 battery boxes that I can attach a vent hose to so its vented out of the storage compartment the batteries will be in, but other than that I’ve found it impossible to find cases or hoods to vent some Trojan Batteries or other models I was looking at.

[Mike90250]

Look to boat yards. They have individual battery cases, with passage for cables, and a vent hose could be easily adapted

https://www.westmarine.com/battery-boxes-hold-downs

[Ho jo]

For 3 or 4 summer months I use the charger for my TT.
To supplement my solar array
The Iota is used for frequent extended rainy days.

For the rest of the year the batteries are mostly just sitting on float waiting to be used.

I have Mine mounted on the tongue.
no need for a box or venting.

I park in the shade and
My solar array is 100 ft away in the sun.

batteries last longer when kept cool.

[chrisski]

Look to boat yards. They have individual battery cases, with passage for cables, and a vent hose could be easily adapted
https://www.westmarine.com/battery-boxes-hold-downs

Couldn't find the trojan cases there.

I guess where I'm stuck, is that if I go with 400 - 450 AH of power at the 20 hour rate, I can't find a lot of batteries out there that will provide that much AH. I did find a Group 903 Trojan battery which is 12 X 7 X 18 inches for L X W X H, and I just can't find battery cases that are built 19" tall to house Group 903 batteries. I've spent hours looking for a Group 903 battery box, and even longer trying to figure either how to fab a compartment out of something like fiber glass, weld one, or even build it out of plywood.

I've come to the conclusion that I can't get myself 400 AH of battery power and by myself install these batteries unless I go in parallel. Just to get this project moving, I'm planning on 4 six volt batteries in series parallel to get to my 12 VDC 440 AH. I just do not have a way to mount these externally and at this point for my first project don't want to put down $4k on lithium batteries.

[chrisski]

For 3 or 4 summer months I use the charger for my TT.
To supplement my solar array
The Iota is used for frequent extended rainy days.

For the rest of the year the batteries are mostly just sitting on float waiting to be used.

I have Mine mounted on the tongue.
no need for a box or venting.

I park in the shade and
My solar array is 100 ft away in the sun.

batteries last longer when kept cool.

With a fifth wheel, I can't picture how I'd mount batteries to the tongue. For a travel trailer with a ball hitch I can picture it, and since starting this project, having a travel trailer with a ball hitch would have made this easier.