Battery load tester?
Anyone have experience with these? Best ones for a reasonable price? Thanks DICK
Forum Discussion
Take a group 27 R battery with 600 CCA rating at 25c. To obtain the BCI by substitution, a 300 ampere load would have to be placed on this one single battery for 15 seconds. With an adjustable load tester the load must be adjusted constantly to maintain a 300 ampere load.
Your starter motor does not consume 300 amperes. It's load varies at it heats up. So a test is a moot issue unless you like best-guesswork results.
A hydrometer is by far the cheapest and most reliable of the three test protocols. I hydrometer tested a battery six months ago and found two cells with smoky fluid. It soundly passed an impedance test. our months later it utterly failed. It was sudden. No drains and the battery tested 4.2 volts. The two smoky cells tested low on the hydrometer, the conductance of plate alloy in solution pulled the wool over the eyes of the impedance meter.
Your starter motor does not consume 300 amperes. It's load varies at it heats up. So a test is a moot issue unless you like best-guesswork results.
A hydrometer is by far the cheapest and most reliable of the three test protocols. I hydrometer tested a battery six months ago and found two cells with smoky fluid. It soundly passed an impedance test. our months later it utterly failed. It was sudden. No drains and the battery tested 4.2 volts. The two smoky cells tested low on the hydrometer, the conductance of plate alloy in solution pulled the wool over the eyes of the impedance meter.
