Technical Battery Chargers: My favorite died: Suggestions?

Have a few acquired through the owner not needing them.....but my go to has been an old Diehard brand I got at Sears to replace the Sears that expired. It's been a great one and has the "percentage charged" which always hope is 100%....if they aren't charging up to that - I know that battery is going away.

 

I too, would like to get a new battery charger. Does anyone still make 'manual' chargers? You know, 2, 6, 10-12 amps? Manually set the charge at the 2amp or 6amp, or the 10amp charge rate, and it will stay at that charge until the battery is fully charged then automatically shut off. Can't seem to find one.

 

If you don't have anything against Harbor Freight, I got one that has 2, 10, & 50 amps for starting. There is a voltmeter and also a red light when it's charging and a green one at 12 volts. I tossed the instruction book so I don't know about automatic shut-off.

 

Several years ago I bought an ***ociated 9090 from NAPA. It’s been a great charger. I also use a battery tender to just keep the charge in the battery during long idle times

 

I'd look on e-Bay for a Schumacher or some old brand..

 

Probably not, iron core transformers went bye-bye for just about everything cuz they cost more than miniaturized chips & microprocessor circuitry and the rest of it. Yard sales are the best bet.

 

Y'all DO NOT want to hear this, but I have an 80 year old car collector friend who usually has 17-21 cars at any given time. He is totally happy with the el-Cheapo HF $10 maintainer that he buys when on sale for $5.
When I told him about CTEK/NOCO, he said, "Hell, those are the price of a battery!"
Of course his cars do not have computers which is another matter.

EXAMPLE: I had a car that sat in an unheated Nevada airplane hanger for 50 weeks every year. Battery lasted 8 years.​

 

I've no doubt they work OK. The question is whether or not to trust a $5 slave labor produced piece of electronics not to wig out and maybe zap the battery while unattended and burn your $50,000 workshop to the ground. Do you feel lucky?

 

Wow. A $K50 workshop! Jack E/NJ

 

OK, $500,000, then. I wouldn't want you rich fellas to feel left out.

 

still use my circa-1975 "wizard" 6/12 volt trickle charger from western auto!

 

Had a few Schumacher's smart models but they seem to die after a few years.
HF has a small compact art charger that does both 2 and 10 AMPs (I think) with an option for AGM batteries along with 6 and 12 volts as well.
It also includes a second wire set to use as a trickle charger.

I keep a 2/10/50 old style Sears or HF around as well.

 

UPDATE: I've purchased a Genius1 ($30) and a CTEK MUS 4.3 POLAR ($80) both from Amazon Prime.

CTEK MUS 4.3 POLAR

The CTEK is a disappointment when it comes to charge voltage for AGM. The Mode LED on the unit for Snowflake (<32F) also has AGM indicated - this is the ONLY AGM Mode indicated - there is NO normal and cold temp Mode for AGM.

The spec for my POLAR Snowflake is 15.0v. But they will not say the words that it is good for AGM because I'm sure it is too high. Their non-POLAR units specify 14.7 for the Snowflake/AGM or AGM (with no Snowflake mode offered at all) mode.

It is very confusing because the manual for some models that have the SF/AGM Mode have it listed in the manual and state it is for the full size Optima battery. While mine which has the same AF/AGM Mode, the manual refers to it as only a SF cold weather mode and no mention of AGM or how to charge an AGM battery.

The only place AGM is mentioned in the manual is when they say it charges all types (Wet, AGM, Gel, Ca-Ca, etc.)

The normal charge spec for all models is 14.4v.

PRO:

• Their 8 LEDs indicating the charge step is worth it's weight in gold - you get a clear picture of what is going on which allows diagnosis of battery or charger if something is off.
• The newest of the 4.3/5.0 amp units has full temperature compensation - I believe this is the Test variant. The others do not.

CON:

• I think CTEK units do not offer the various ideal charge voltages for the various types of batteries. Perhaps there are so many of them, the best police is simply to offer the lowest voltage of all (GEL I think) and call it a day.

NOCO GENIUS1:

Haven't had time to test the G1 but here is my opinion so far.

PRO:

• Although the ultimate Black Box, it does specifically allow user specification of Wet, AGM, and Lithium 12v batteries.
• Fully temperature compensated - no need for a "Snowflake" mode.

CON:

• You never know what charge step it's at, so it is difficult to verify it is operating correctly.
• Mine produced spatter near the vents of 3 cells on my $48 WalMart battery. This never happened during normal usage of the car. So I suspect there could be something off.