I see the other thread about boosters to get you going which is something I may have to deal with in the future however I have a need right now.
I’ve got to do a software update on my bike and have the stuff on a flash drive ready to go. The instructions from the dealer say it could take a couple of hours and the ignition needs to be on the whole time. They recommend hooking up a charger to keep the power up for the duration.
So I have a Halfords charger that I’ve used for my van and cars over the years but this is probably a bit too heavy duty and it’s not adjustable, might cook the battery.
I want a charger that can do the trickle thing and a full charge of a flat battery…Optimate is a name that comes to mind as a trickle charger but can it do the full charge? Or should I be looking elsewhere?
I also have (an older version of) that, it looks the same but with a blue trim.
My battery was pretty low after not being used since lockdown that the bike would not even turn on. Put it on the charger overnight and all was good.
Recover, bulk charge, and maintain on the top of the display are the stages it goes through, depending on the battery state as it slows down to a trickle the closer it gets.
The load (the bikes battery) will determine how much power the charger feeds it, it’ll only cause problems if the voltage is wrong (but cars and vans are not ally 12v too)
I researched battery maintainers/chargers last year when I realised I had the issue with my Bike Trac .
The overwhelming recommendation was for Optimate ones, like this.
I have an SAE connector permanently attached to my battery which I can reach without undoing anything. I also use the same connector to charge my phone.
If you don’t have £90 to throw at it intelligent trickle chargers can be had for as little as £10. I have a £4.99 trickle charger my son got me for Christmas 10 years ago. Exactly what it does I’m not too clear on, it has a red LED that randomly comes on and goes off and charges at 300mA and has safely charged a dozen batteries or more albeit it takes 30 hours to fully charge a completely flat 8Ah battery.
