battery choice
Hi, I am in analysis paralysis. I will be purchasing AGM jars. Here are my two choices: AGM L-16 Surrette 400 amp-hour six volt with 0.145 plates cost $520 plus tax and shipping Four are n...
Forum Discussion
Hammer them - voltage set point established. Fourteen point four volts, and que sera sera with the amperage.
More of an issue -by far- is the minimum recommended bulk charging amperage for a absorbed glass mat battery. The OEM has that data and I strongly recommend contacting them and then following their minimum charging rule. No chintzing. This is why I have encouraged purchasing the battery bank with the frwest, thickest plates. Now is NOT the time to weight CCA. Four L-16's with the lowest CCA would have the capability of making even a 3,000 watt inverter catch fire. Forget CCA.
I have encountered numerous brands of AGM battery that are junk. What Lifeline offers, and Rolls and Trojan, is not junk. But on a bank of this size, if I had to pay 300 dollars Canadian to get fewer, thicker plates, with a lower CCA and same weight I would do it in a heartbeat. AGM is a different universe when it comes to CCA. But with heavy cycling AGMs need periodic conditioning. Meaning sacrificing a few thousandths positive plate.
Toss in the following - it is reality...
AGM batteries from reputable OEM are significantly less prone to manufacturing defects. That figure is percentile oriented. But one point that cannot be denied or ignored is the one of probabilities...there is no way to cheat the law of total unit percentage of failure. Thirty-six cells WILL have a higher chance of one or more failing than twelve cells. And before you get your arguments in gear, absorb the fact that AGM L16 batteries are easier to assemble than car jar AGM batteries. Grid misalignment, paste uniformity, and cell connectors are more reliably assembled in an L16. Flat-out, more care is taken with industrial cells than with car jar cells. I chose Lifeline, because I am stuck with car jar size. But Concorde is a prime supplier of AGM batteries of similar ilk to the military. Vendors who fail to supply reasonably reliable mil-spec product are soon banished. In all cases with all types of batteries the industrial battery sizes get more attention and care than a car jar battery. Concorde is the only car jar AGM company that I am aware of that makes an exception to this.
Rolls & Surrette would never represent an inferior product. The only wish I have would be that their L16 have a .175" positive plate. But they don't, so be it. I would want, change that to insist, an investment of that magnitude have a durability lifetime of ten to twenty years.
More of an issue -by far- is the minimum recommended bulk charging amperage for a absorbed glass mat battery. The OEM has that data and I strongly recommend contacting them and then following their minimum charging rule. No chintzing. This is why I have encouraged purchasing the battery bank with the frwest, thickest plates. Now is NOT the time to weight CCA. Four L-16's with the lowest CCA would have the capability of making even a 3,000 watt inverter catch fire. Forget CCA.
I have encountered numerous brands of AGM battery that are junk. What Lifeline offers, and Rolls and Trojan, is not junk. But on a bank of this size, if I had to pay 300 dollars Canadian to get fewer, thicker plates, with a lower CCA and same weight I would do it in a heartbeat. AGM is a different universe when it comes to CCA. But with heavy cycling AGMs need periodic conditioning. Meaning sacrificing a few thousandths positive plate.
Toss in the following - it is reality...
AGM batteries from reputable OEM are significantly less prone to manufacturing defects. That figure is percentile oriented. But one point that cannot be denied or ignored is the one of probabilities...there is no way to cheat the law of total unit percentage of failure. Thirty-six cells WILL have a higher chance of one or more failing than twelve cells. And before you get your arguments in gear, absorb the fact that AGM L16 batteries are easier to assemble than car jar AGM batteries. Grid misalignment, paste uniformity, and cell connectors are more reliably assembled in an L16. Flat-out, more care is taken with industrial cells than with car jar cells. I chose Lifeline, because I am stuck with car jar size. But Concorde is a prime supplier of AGM batteries of similar ilk to the military. Vendors who fail to supply reasonably reliable mil-spec product are soon banished. In all cases with all types of batteries the industrial battery sizes get more attention and care than a car jar battery. Concorde is the only car jar AGM company that I am aware of that makes an exception to this.
Rolls & Surrette would never represent an inferior product. The only wish I have would be that their L16 have a .175" positive plate. But they don't, so be it. I would want, change that to insist, an investment of that magnitude have a durability lifetime of ten to twenty years.
