Re: (ET) Heat Generation from charging

[David C Robie <mycroftxx1 juno com>]

Sounds as if your batteries have a high intrnal resistance from being
old, or the charger is not charging them fully.  
    'Old' batteries can recover somewhat after a few charges if their
problem is sulfation.  

Here is what I would do to solve your problem.  No rocket science or even
technical education necessary;

1)   Use a regular automotive charger to charge them '12 volts at a
time'.   most of these automotive chargers have automatic shut off when
charged or at least automatic taper down to 'maintenence charge'.   

2) When they are all cxharged up that way,  measure them with a
voltmeter.  Record your readings (number the batteries to make this
easier)

3)  Try the tractor again.  See if your symptom of 'short life and drop
of voltmeter readings are gone or at least lessened a lot.  But at any
rate (no pun intended) you should put a good bit of time on the tractor
to run em down a good bit.

4)  Recharge tractor with the tractors charger.   See what happens to
your measured readings this time.  Do they come up to at or near the
previous try with the 12 volts at a time charge?  If not, trouble is
usually the capacitor inthe charger being open.  See previous mention of
this by checking the thread of this website.

Burning smell could be due to leaves and debris in  the charger,  and
heat could be clogged up airflow that keeps it cool.  These chargers are
built  pretty hefty and this writer has never heard of a shorted charge
transformer winding.  If you had one or a shorted rectifier she would
likely blow your house fuse or circuit breaker.

When batts are real low it is normal to feel heat at the charger's plug,
she draws a lot of current with low batts.  When the batts are up, there
will be no heat felt.  Us old timers at this feel the plug to determine
how far along the charge is.   A real low pack can blow a 15A circuit
breaker.  If it does, just reset it a couple times and the pack will get
high enough not to do it any more.   To keep it from happening, recharge
earlier, ie with less use on her.  These will run pretty good with a real
low pack, fooling you into thinking the batt is at half charge whenit's
actually at 1/4 or so.  You can't trust the voltmeter except as an
indication, by it's excessive drop under load,  that a charge is needed.

Often, the problem of 'low range, Edrop on the voltmeter'  is caused by a
single battery being no good in comparison to the rest of the pack.  The 
way to find this easily is to measure every battery and you will find one
that is much lower than the rest of em.  One of my tractors just had this
problem, after a workout  all except one were over 6.10 the bad one was
about 5.5.  Replacing it cut the Edrop and she did hills in second tranny
gear that needed a shift to first before.

To get that Edrop down (a little is normal except with real decent new
batteries) be sure that all battery jumpers are clean and tight.  A bad
one will usually get warm (or even 'ouch' hot) after a workout.  Always
wire brush all terminals and the inside of the jumpers and cables when
you replace batteries.

Good luck with that much needed hi tech development of the future that
was built in the distant past.

Dave
Weymouth MA







On Tue, 29 Aug 2006 08:31:23 -0500 "Dan Childress" <daniel csuol com>
writes:
> Seems to be allot of heat being created from the timer/charging area. 
>  Slight odor also.  Is this normal? E-14.  "fuel gauge" shows almost 
> full charge. However, when in use it drops very quickly and the 
> mower and tractor slows down.  Upon when stopped gauge shows almost 
> full charge again.  Any Help.
> Dan