Bob Tom <tigers@bserv.com> wrote:
: At 03:56 PM 8/11/05, you wrote:
:>Guys, I don't daily drive the Dakota anymore. So it can sit up
:>to two months. Jay W
: Under those circumstances, it might be better to remove the battery
: from the Dak and bring it inside. Put a slow charge on the battery
: once a month.
: I personally don't know if solar charging is enough to maintain
: your type of battery over a period of time.
Harbor Freight (www.harborfreight.com) currently has a solar
battery charger for sale for $10 (44768), so if you wanted to give the
solar route a try, it wouldn't cost you much if it doesn't work. They
also have trickle/float/maintenance chargers; one of which is currently
on sale for $7.50 (42292). Or, if you've got $49.99 or more worth
of stuff to buy from Harbor Freight, enter the coupon code 982-529-643
at checkout, and they will send you one of the 42292 chargers for free.
Like Bob said though, I don't know if either of the above will be
enough or not. I suspect that they would probably be OK as long as the
battery is fully charged before you hook them up. I have a Deltran
Battery Tender (www.batterytender.com) which is a pretty cool little
gadget - when you hook it up to a battery, it will charge the battery
at full power (which is only 1.25 amps, so it will not damage the
battery), then once the battery is charged it goes into a storage/float
mode to keep the battery charged. I originally got it for my bike; it
comes with a separate cord which you permanantly attach to the battery,
the other side has a two prong plug, you just plug the charger directly
into that instead of having to remove a bunch of stuff on the bike to
get to where you can put clamps on the battery terminals. (It also
comes with a cord with the same two prong plug but with clamps, so you
can use it either way.) When I notice the Cuda's battery is getting low,
I toss this on there, and a few weeks ago, I accidentally left a light on
in my '90 Dakota which completely drained the battery. I just hooked this
little guy up and it was fully charged a couple of days later. I
don't know if either of the Harbor Freight items above would have
enough oomph to do that, but they would probably be OK to maintain
an already fully charged battery.
--
-Jon-
.-- Jon Steiger --- jon@dakota-truck.net or jon@jonsteiger.com --.
| '70 Barracuda, '90 Dakota Convertible, '92 Ram 4x4, '96 Dakota |
| '96 Intruder, '96 Kolb FireFly, '99 Cherokee, '01 Ram 3500 |
`----------------------------------- http://www.jonsteiger.com --'
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