Mexicowanderer, I am not sure I understand your post --- what should I do to cure them?? Drain them down by 5 amps and then recharge?
I am sure that these batteries were not factory-cured -- they are ordinary stock Napa group 31s, not a premium brand.
You mentioned dendrites -- I never drained the old batteries past 12.1 volts, and I always put them onto a Batteryminder, which has an automatic desulphation pulse system. Is there anything else I should do to avoid dendrites?
Pianotuna, I agree that solar would be the way to go. But since I don't yet have that, I always recharge them fully at home before every use. I assume that this is roughly equivalent to having solar do the same job?
I should also mention that when we are on longer trips, we usually spend one night every ten days or so in an RV park in order to do laundry and restock groceries. At that time, I hook up my spare battery to a regular two stage charger -- 10 amp/2 amp -- to top it off. And of course, I rotate the batteries so that I don't use the same one every time as my main battery.
And someone mentioned that my being concerned about this is possibly excessive/obsessive. (A different word was used, but you catch my drift.) Guilty as charged (no pun intended). I am trying to squeeze as much performance and life out of these batteries as I can -- they are not premium batteries, but they are not cheap, either.
