New T105 battery questions

[Utahsailor]

New battery bank with 10 T105 batteries is installed, afloat and fully charged. How often do you check water levels? I an thinking of starting with 1 per week. How often do you equalize and for how long?

Thanks, Don

[colemj]

While it is good to initially check water levels, you will find that they only need watering every few months. I probably check ours every 2 months and have put water in them every 4 months. They are 5yrs old now and seem to need some water every 2 months.

You don't need to equalize them at all unless you have cells that are at different specific gravities, or have not been charging them regularly and they have sulfated a bit. For that, you equalize them until the cells have similar specific gravities. This can take from 1hr to 8hrs depending on the battery condition.

Mark

[zboss]

'Trojans' are the key to your question.

Trojans prefer to be charged hard (higher than other battery voltages) and we find that we need to check the water monthly if we motor a lot. We have hydrocaps and they help but regularly watering them using a system such as the trojan hydrolink is just as good of a solution.

[sy_gilana]

We record our readings and battery maintenance in a Maintenance logbook.
Here you can spot any trend shifts. The "bathtub-curve" of early failure is important to monitor so you can find a bad cell before your warranty runs out.

We check water every month, and record per cell any variance.
We check Sg, temperature, and per battery voltage and record every reading.
We re-tighten every terminal 3 monthly.
We wipe down the surface with an Alkaline water rinse 3 monthly.

Our house bank is 12 T105's. I refitted a Catamaran recently and put in 20 T105s with a central watering system.

You must spot a change before that bad cell has the effect of raising the resistance in its bank, and that will make you cook the other ones dry.

[ontherocks83]

Here is a link to Trojan's website with specs on your battery for charging voltages. Not sure if you are running a 12v or 24v system but you can look up what your charger should be set to for bulk, float, and equalize

http://www.trojanbattery.com/pdf/dat...ata_Sheets.pdf

[colemj]

Originally Posted by sy_gilana

.Our house bank is 12 T105's. I refitted a Catamaran recently and put in 20 T105s with a central watering system.

Holy cow!!!!

Mark

[BlackcatNC43]

Had 6 of those T-105 for 5 years after I bought the boat, and they were 2-3 years old already... So they lasted 8 years...
I water them every month or two. Never had any issues With checking once a month.
Those 6 T-105 used less than a gallon of deionized water in the last 5 years. I charge them with "intelligent" chargers: alternator, inverter and solar: all have 3 steps charging.

While charging, I can sometimes hear them bubling or boiling. Does not seems to evaporate the water so quickly that you would think, though.

Hope it helps,
Black Cat

[barnakiel]

I check monthly and equalize according to voltage variations as per Trojan website.

I water about once every 3 months. It is a boat at the dock, on shore power charger. Float voltage 99% of the time.

b.