My Screwy 31
First off let me say I am not stressing over this. It's just a battery, it is only money, it is meeting my overnight needs, but it is displaying strange behavior, and I am curious as to why. So th...
Forum Discussion
landyacht318 wrote:
Hey thanks for all the links and info and input.
While I'll be occasionally busting out the turkey baster Hydro, and reprogramming the solar to do mid to upper 15's eq cycle, that is about as much effort/nursing as I will be putting into this 31. I don't have a load tester capable of Mex's regimen.
It does appear that only one EQ charge every 30 cycles is too few though. That 15.3v recommended US battery 'finishing' charge keeps echoing in the background. I just do not want to forget to turn a switch and expose the $$$ AGM to that voltage. Nice to have that option though.
Since achieving 1.280 I have not taken more than 18 A/h from the battery overnight as I've been house sitting multiple pets while some neighbors are out spring breaking. Plenty of sun the next day. 14.6v has been reached by 10 am. It has not dropped below 12.4v under fridge and fan loads and is 12.6v every time I have bothered to look at other times overnight. I don't really have any basis for comparison for this reduced overnight load after this latest EQ cycle.
I think next eq cycle will be 16 rather than 15.5. I will try to dip the hydro and see how quickly the SG declines despite 4+ hours of 14.5+ per day and report back.
My previous sets of 2 27 Crowns would have required more water by this point.
If you're using the 31 LA open cell every day and drawing it down a bit, folks around here recommend the 16v treatment, completely disconnected from everything else, once every 12-14 days. Due to Mexwanders comment about the design of the group 31 being somewhat problematic, I'd tend to do it more frequently, perhaps every 10 days. Or not... depends what your time is worth, and your discretionary income to buy new batteries more frequently, or less.
