New group 29 battery with low specific gravity

How many volts is your charger putting out? The sg will probaly come up but it may take days if the voltage is only 13.6 or so. You will get a faster charge at 14.4 to 14.8 and you may also need to top charge at 15 plus volts to drive the SG up. There is a good thread by landyacht about his gp 31 battery that is a good read.

You need a charger that will stay on the job for a few days, not an "automatic" that shuts itself off after a few hours. Your trailer's converter is one. Leave it on that charger for a few days and then check SG again.

You could really use a "manual charger" that gets the battery up to 15v for an "overcharge" but you need to unplug it yourself when it gets the battery voltage up there. Then leave it on the converter for a few days and then check the SG.

However if you have only those two chargers, try it with converter first before rushing out to buy anything.

The thread by land yacht is titled "My screwy 31"

Thanks for the inputs. I've seen one of those threads and much of it was over my head. I'll look for the other.

My charger also has a manual button and it puts out 14.5 volts. It sounds like I need to do that until it comes up, instead of the auto deep cycle.

Is there a time I should set it to that or do I need to watch the specific gravity and stop when it's at 1.265 or higher?

One of the threads talked about "boiling" which I think is when it's bubbling while charging... is that something I need to be concerned about?

No it is supposed to bubble while charging once it gets closer to being "full" Yes, let her rip on the manual mode and spot check the SG till it stops rising. You can shut it off for overnight and start again in the morning. It is cumulative.

hook it up to the old sears charger and let er rip overnight, as in 12 hrs. retest.

after further reading your old sears charger ain't as old as I thought!

Thanks BFL13. One of the threads talked about 14.4 volts, I guess that's some kind of sweet spot. I've got it going and I'll check it hourly or so. Good to know it's cumulative.

Red, I've had the charger longer than my wife, I think 1986... the wife didn't show up for a year or so after that. ;-)

Take it back. It has a one year warranty and they won't try to check it before giving you a new one.
Dave

Most all the 2 stage maintainer chargers now days will finish the charge at 15+ volts. But even 14.6 will do the job just fine.

The average person does not check SG, and was probably your mistake, and if you had not done so, there wouldn't be a problem.....now would there. If you fully charge it at 14.6-15+ volts, the SG will take care of itself. If after doing so, and its performance is not up to par, then is the time to check SG,......or preferably just return it.

When I first got a specific gravity tester, I got a bunch of low readings on several batteries that I thought were fully charged, including the TV starting battery. It took a while to learn to use the tester. I really did need to do several cycles of fill empty refill the tester and then check for bubbles sticking to the float. Even with that getting a repeatable readig is not easy.