Reviving a battery

Home Power magazine's been around for a decade or more
and is reasonably well thought of. They appear to still endorse
EDTA in specific applications.

http://www.homepower.com/magazine/downloads_batteries.cfm?search=edta

Whether there's a good scientific study out there or not I don't know,
but they generally know their stuff when it comes to off-grid
systems and battery banks. I'd tend to regard them as a reasonably
credible source.

Incidentally, it's also possible to replace the plates completely.
Whether this is still legal or not under current environmental
regs I'm not sure, but in the past you could find shops specializing
in the remanufacture of auto batteries. Some special purpose
batteries were also built with plate replacement designed in.

It definitely ain't rocket science. Depends on the costs and economics.
Like I said, if you're betting a few bucks and an afternoon's work
against a few thousand bucks replacement cost and you don't happen
to be a fortune 500 company, it's probably worth a shot. If instead of
a homebuilt cabin, you've got a large data center depending on the
battery bank or you're talking about a $60 automotive battery, the
economics are a little different. and it's silly to fart around with
it.

People screw up occasionally, and if the consequences are expensive
it's sometimes worth the recovery effort. The one use of EDTA I
really recall reading about was a solar guy called in to fix a totally
discharged battery bank. He claimed it worked well. Perhaps he
could have gotten equally good results just by flushing and replacing
the acid. Perhaps not.

 

The cost of running my car works out at about 40p (say 75 US cents) per
mile.

It doesn't take long before the cost of trundling round in search of a
bargain becomes the expensive option.

Obviously, if Sears and Chapparal were close by and the battery was
expensive, then there's a saving to be made, but I will frequently buy
something from a shop, knowingI can get it cheaper elsewhere, simply
because of the extra expense in securing that 'bargain'.

And that doesn't take into account the hassle factor.

I'm also slightly startled that batteries last such a short time with
your bikes. Can't remember who it was said that keeping batteries
charged keeps them happy, but it's true. The battery in my 400 Four is
six years old. The one in my Ducati is nine years old....

 

I saved $50 by driving 120 miles roundtrip to Chapparal and back. They
would have charged me about $10 to ship it out by UPS, so it only cost
be about $2.00 more in gasoline to drive over there and pick it up, as
opposed to waiting for UPS to deliver it *sometime* in the next week or
so.

I refuse to support "brick and mortar" $tealer$hip$.

I had a maintenance free battery last me 8 years. I trickle charge
batteries when I remember to do so, but I don't live to eke out another
two years out of a battery that only cost $50.

If Sears hadn't tried to charge me $100 for the same battery I could
get for $50, I
wouldn't have driven to another county.

 

Ah, so you "spent a quarter of the effort finding the best price for
replacement battery" as I advised that you should do. Got it.

The mystery of it all, though, is what a rider is doing -driving- to Sears
or Chaparral in the first place? Oh, I get it, you -drive your car- to
Chaparral, then drive it home with the battery, change the battery in
the garage, then precariously balancing the old battery on the tank of
your bike, you ride back to Chaparral to dispose of the old battery!

Ted

 

Yes, old time telco batteries were designed this way. With -solid-
lead plates. There's still a lot of CO's that use them, believe it or
not. With solid plates you can do a lot of things, like pulling
the plate assemblies and wire brushing off the sulfation. Of course
the downside is the battery is about 5 times larger and a lot of times
heavier and you need more of them. That's why all the batteries today
are lead sponge plates. When they sulfate the plates can't be mechanically
cleaned.

Hell, it's not like it's that difficult to make a battery. If your a real
off-grid survivalist type you could probably run around to a bunch of tire
shops and haul off their buckets of used tire weights, run around to a
bunch of fast food places and haul off a bunch of their plastic pickle
buckets that they would toss out, and melt down the lead and make
your own plates and batteries. And if you made enough of them and
had the room for them you could pull all kinds of funny games to keep
them going forever, or until the EPA stumbles across what your doing and
freaks out and lists your property as a Superfund site, that is. ;-)

He was probably laughing his way to the bank and didn't use EDTA at all
If the battery bank had stood discharged for only a day or so, all he would
have
needed to do is rewire the bank in parallel, charge it for a couple hours,
this
would get enough internal resistance in the bank so it could be wired back
again,
then charged normally without burning up the charger. I'm sure his bill to
the battery owner was substantial. ;-)

Ted

 

Heh. That's the difference between US and UK petrol (OK, gasoline)
prices.

120 miles would cost me £12 in fuel alone, for a saving on the battery
of about £30. That doesn't take into account other car overhead costs.
The journey would take me at least two hours as well. I value my time
rather more highly than a few pounds per hour.

To be honest, it doesn't appear to make much sense at US fuel prices.

Ah. Well, that's an interesting viewpoint and one that isn't always
sensible.

 

Some of us riders have more than one vehicle, yannow.

Nope. Chaparral didn't charge a recycling fee.

The old maintenance-free battery actually was used as a convenient
doorstop to keep an iron gate from swinging in the wind until the old
lady got tired of looking at it and disposed of it...

If she improperly recycled it, it wasn't MY fault.

 

<VBG>

I use an old Honda tail-light assembly for exactly the same purpose,
with my side gate. )

 

Yup - but usually the only reason I get the minivan out is when
I'm hauling around the kids on some family outing. I'd stick the
older one on the back of the bike but my wife's head would
probably explode so I haven't even dared suggesting it.

So, does the gate swing again?

Ted

 

As told by the guy who wrote the article, this was an attack of
midwinter cabin fever, where the couple had an argument and
both stormed out of the place leaving the lights on until the
battery bank died. He was called in much later.

As I said, this stuff has been touted for a decade or so by people
who work with batteries pretty regularly.

At the time we replaced a battery bank, I considered trying it but
finally decided I wasn't up for a couple days of farting around with
lots of gallons of battery acid.

If I'd had more time than money and acess to some expertise I
might have given it a shot.

I'd really love to see some methodical testing. To date,
all I've seen is anecdotal evidence, but all of it positive.

 

I'd googled a bit and actually found the original 1991 article
which I was recalling.

http://tinyurl.com/z9f72

Whether the science is correct or not, the observations and
notes seem reasonably good.

 

Okay, I have exhumed the battery and am going to try a couple of th
"tricks" that have been listed. I am trying to help out a neighbor tha
does not use her bike often. I have since found out that the switch wa
left in the "park" position and the battery has not sat dead for a lon
time, so it may not be very sulfated.

It will not take a lot of time and effort to try to revive it and i
would not be simple to get a new one. It is a 2 hour round trip driv
to the nearest available new battery. Either that, or mail order on
and wait and pay the shipping charges and hope not to have some of th
problems that can happen with purchasing one that way. Beyond that,
am interested in doing it as somewhat of an experiment just to see i
it works. There is some satisfaction in working on things and trying t
make them work again. Before the bike was used again, the battery can b
tested to make sure it will be okay so that it won't be a problem awa
from home.

Just for the sake of the discussion;
I have revived a battery by dumping out the old acid and putting in ne
-something that is not supposed to be done. It was done many years ag
and I don't remember how long it lasted. Acid was cheap and I alway
had some anyway.
I was told a long time ago that taking an oil can and putting a squir
of oil into each cell can revive a tired battery. I do not know if i
works.
JC Whitney used to sell something called X-12 or something like tha
for putting life back into a battery. Never tried it.

Thanks much for the information

 

You could probably use B-12 Chemtool to DO the neutering process all by
itself !

 

Well, a couple points here:

The Trojan L-16W that they used, which is no longer manufactured, was
a large deep-cycle battery. The current deep cycle Trojan battery that
replaced it, as near as I can tell, does not use liquid electrolyte it uses
a gel. While I can't find anything regarding the internal construction of
the old battery I feel convinced that it had solid lead plates, not sponge
plates like in a car or MC battery. The reason being is that in a deep
cycle
battery your not looking for high current, short life, but rather low
current,
long life. Whether a acid-dissolve scheme that worked on a large, solid
lead plate will work on a much smaller spongy lead plate is a big question
I think.

Chemically I think there's some differences, battery manufacturers
found out a few years ago that adding small amounts of a trace chemical,
I think it is calcium, almost brings the normal water decomposition to a
halt
in a vehicle battery. Meaning that you don't need to keep checking and
adding water anymore as long as you don't fully discharge or fast charge
the battery.

Interestingly, it appears a surprising number of the home power people
are using custom-built deep cycle batteries, at least based on my googling
around. I wonder if this is because the newer batteries, while perhaps
having benefits such as little maintainence (having to monitor and add
water all the time) and smaller size, are now being manufactured such
that they are not as durable if abused. I also kind of wonder if perhaps
the battery manufacturers themselves have done testing on battery
rejuvenation, and are subtly redesigning their batteries to make it much
more difficult to rejuvenate them. For example, reducing the area under
the plates to the bottom of the case so as to reduce the amount of material
that can slough off and drop to the bottom of the cell before the cell
shorts out, making the plates thinner, going to AGM and gel batteries
to defeat dump-and-replace rejuvenation schemes, etc.

The other thing that I will mention about batteries, whether it has any
bearing on it or not, is that it does not appear that anyone is
manufacturing
a battery that can easily be disassembled. You would think that for
the home power market, where the buyers have large storage area
available, typically invest heavily in the batteries, are not concerned
with weight, that if a company came out with a solid plate battery that
could be used then 10 years after use, taken apart and the lead plates
either replaced or cleaned of sulfation, either mechanically or chemically,
and the electrolyte replaced, and the battery case cleaned out, then
everything put back together and worked great, that the home power
people would be beating a path to the doors of that company.

Ted

 

You could well be right about the differences in plate construction.
Any off-grid system would always use a deep cycle bank too.
We used to run a 4x4 bank of L16s for a 1400 AH x 24V bank.
Got about 10 years out of them and replaced them at the point
where they were starting to degrade.

There's a type of cap which does a pretty good job of recapturing
water as well. I used to do a top off once or twice a year.

Home power is a very small market compared to golf carts etc.
I don't think they'd worry much about it one way or the other.
For a golf cart type vehicle, there's a payoff for compactness.
I suspect too that remanufacture was probably killed off by
EPA and/or OSHA regs. Buildings full of lead scraps and
sulfuric acid might somehow fail to pass muster with the
inspectors.

I'm actually surprised if lead/acid is still the battery of choice
for off-grid. They're cheap, but not epsecially good performers.
Long term, I'd expect something more like the batteries used
in hybrids.

Still a relatively small market, though I suspect some utilities would
welcome a system which got them off the hook for long runs of
power line to small amounts of revenue. Years and years ago, we
participated in a PGE survey on the feasability of a PGE supplied
solar/genset/battery/inveter system for remote homes. Interestingly,
the largest objection of the homeowners was being unable to service
it themselves and having to depend on the power company response.

 

Ted Mittelstaedt schreef:

Good question. I don't have the answer. If any Dutchman reads this; Is
there any name in The Netherlands for EDTA? I still haven't got the
faintest idea what I should buy if I ever want to experiment with a
dead battery.

This is new to me.
I have the feeling that the interval between top-ups with distilled
water
did not change much ever since I topped up for the first time 45+ years
ago.

I can't imagine the additive to be calcium.
If (and only if) the additive is calcium, why can't I use tap water to
top up?
Plenty of calcium in it.

I don't think anybody in The Netherlands has such a home power
plant. We simply buy electricity from some company, and there are not
many outages, although it happens that in some village now there
is a baby boom because that village was out for two days (which is very
exceptional). The nights were cold, you know...

But your remarks above fall in the standard stories of manufacturers
that
can make better stuff but refuse to do it. (The light bulb that lasts
forever,
the engine that runs 5000 miles a gallon, the oil companies that pay
off an
inventor who invented a total new fuel that costs only 5 cents a cubic
mile,
etcetera).
I don't think the market works that way. If Yuasa finds a way to make
batteries
that last twice the normal time, they will make and market them.
Customers will
detect that these will last *on average* longer than other batteries,
and thus
Yuasa will get a bigger and bigger market share, because customers will
find: 'Yuasa's are better'.
Problem is that life span of a battery is not only defined by the
construction, but mainly depends on the user. Suppose Yuasa markets
batteries as: "Will last at least 5 year". And then somebody deep
discharges
it, tosses it in a shed for two years, and then tries to charge it with
a super
power fast charger. This won't do the name of Yuasa good.

I currently wear blue jeans that came in touch with that overflow tube
on my bike. No, I did not tell my wife. But it has three holes in one
leg,
even though I immediately rinsed it with plenty of water.
So I do not like the idea that my neighbors have led plates and bottles
of sulphuric acid lying around in their sheds. This is what would
happen
if batteries were DIY batteries.

Rob.

 

Ah, but it does. The 5000 mpg engine is baloney, of course, although
they have been getting some very impressive mileage figures at the
mpg contests. But, there's lots of truth to the light bulb story. You can,
in fact, buy extended life lightbulbs that only the difference is the
filament is thicker - but they cost a lot more. Some building maintaince
people order these for large buildings with difficult to reach bulbs - and
nowadays, LED light bulbs do last almost "forever" And we all know of
course that certain computer software manufacturers refuse to offer
better software - Microsoft and Linux, Apple and Windows, etc.

Well, probably some of them do have old batteries lying around that
are just as bad.

Ted

 

Ted Mittelstaedt schreef:

This discussion goes beyond the motorcycle.tech: Nevertheless:
a) You point to the key of market versus consumer. The
ever_lasting_light_bulb costs a lot more. Consumers won't buy
them.
b) Microsoft/windows is a different story. MS is a company that owns
almost the entire market, and thus can set it's own rules.
c) Apple recognised how MS works. And decided to act the same
(profitable) way. I have an ipod that constantly tries to buy mp3's
from the web, whether I like it or not. But this certainly goes
beond the motorcycles.tech.
d) Linux... Is not a company, so I fail to see what you refer to,
BTW: I run linux on my PC.

Correct. I have three (maybe four) dead batteries in my shed.
Regulations in The Netherlands are to dispose of them according
to environmental law. It means I have to bring them to a chemical
waste dump. Too much trouble if you don't own a car and the waste
dump is only open at early saturday morning, when I am still sleeping.
Come to think of it, I also have some gallons of used oil, plus a
couple of worn out tires that I have to bring to the waste dump
(according to law).


-- Probably not cheaper, but much more fun
Drive the bike at least 5 days a week, all seasons
You'll never need B12

Rob.

 

Here in the UK, where energy costs are higher, lots of people[1] buy
those energy-saving bulbs (6w the equivalent of 60w).

They cost more, but they are more economical to run and last a helluva
lot longer than conventional filament bulbs.

[1] Including me.