battery charger

[John_Mc]

HAVE THE NOCO GENIUS 10 BUT YET TO USE IT being old school. Both my very old automatic chargers went dead after many years of great use so bought this one. Not sure about using it though, new tech stuff is often mind boggling at my age and no directions in the box. maybe can find a tutorial online seeing how to do it. My oldies were so easy, set the voltage switch to 12v, hook up cables and plug it in and walk away, leave connected all winter on my tractors.

User guide for Noco Genius 10

https://no.co/media/wysiwyg/downloads/User_Guides/Genius/genius10na_user_guide_4.9.2024a.pdf

 

[boatmoter]

I am currently using a 20 year old,at least, Centech battery charger. I only use it on 2 amp for the tractor, zero-turn(monthly or so to top off), and vehicles as needed. I dropped it when hooking up to the tractor and the indicator needle fell off but it still charges fine, the light going from red to green when battery is fully charged. A vehicle battery went dead the other day(door left ajar) and it has been hooked to the charger for three days, though it is only plugged in during the day so I can keep an eye on it. Light on charger has not changed to green, tho the interior light of the vehicle does come on so I believe it is receiving the charge. I am thinking of getting a newer model charger but just read that the newer models will not charge a fully empty battery as it may not detect the battery when connected. Thoughts? I know this forum likes battery tenders/minders but as I like to keep an eye on any charging and do not leave anything connected if I am not nearby, I have not gotten one. A tender will not charge a dead vehicle battery, will it?

Im old school too. my analog chargers als took a dump. I bought one and their not bad to learn, pretty easy. just make sure you choose conventional on the setting if your battery is a conventional (regular liquid acid battery), or AGM if your battery is a AGM battery, a lot of cars and new marine have AGM batteries now. my 2016 malibu takes a AGM battery.

 

[RayIN]

I bought a cheapie off Amazon. It's fully-automatic, you cannot manually select battery voltage, cycle time, battery type. Just hook it up, plug into a 120VAC receptacle, and it does the rest.
Pretty cool IMO. It had a "battery repair" function that does need to be manually selected, pulse-charger as known here in the USA.
My lawn mower battery was not performing well, so I set the charger to battery repair. Next morning the charger was off and displayed "done".
Disconnected the charger and put it away, then tried to start the mower; it fired off almost immediately. Before running that function I had just charged the battery but the mower would not start.
Best $25 I ever spent on Amazon.
EDIT: this is the charger I bought.

 

[grsthegreat]

HAVE THE NOCO GENIUS 10 BUT YET TO USE IT being old school. Both my very old automatic chargers went dead after many years of great use so bought this one. Not sure about using it though, new tech stuff is often mind boggling at my age and no directions in the box. maybe can find a tutorial online seeing how to do it. My oldies were so easy, set the voltage switch to 12v, hook up cables and plug it in and walk away, leave connected all winter on my tractors.

Very easy to use…. Just hook it up and press button until battery type flashes

 

[Ricn]

Thanks for the tips, be trying them soon!

 

[mrmikey]

I bought a cheapie off Amazon. It's fully-automatic, you cannot manually select battery voltage, cycle time, battery type. Just hook it up, plug into a 120VAC receptacle, and it does the rest.

I had one too, it was great....'till it wasn't, lasted about a year.

 

[Ricn]

I had one too, it was great....'till it wasn't, lasted about a year.

Not good. Hope this one lasts, they seem to have good reviews but always the lemon; made in china I suppose.

 

[denchen]

For many years I used to own a small pleasure boat. To keep the batteries toped up, I had a solar panel on the cabin top. The solar panel went to a cheap caravan (RV) voltage regulator then to the batteries, For the years I had that boat, I never did have any problems with the batteries. The solar panel was about 15 inches square, that I bought off our local port, it came off a navigation buoy. Even during the long winter months, the batteries were kept full.

 

[Ricn]

Not enough sun where I live, long winters.

 

[Too many Kubotas]

Good panels don't need direct sunlight, and have built in controls.

My Sun Energise ones (10-25W versions) work great, although I do have to wipe the snow off of them every now and then.

 

[Ricn]

Really like this thread. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I had bought the NOCO 10 off Amazon and to day i connected it up to my John Deere Gator that has the diesel engine. The battery is old, should be replaced, and just barely turns the engine over. the NOCO 10 showed the first light, the one to the left, after 10 seconds the next light come on then the next until only the light on the far right is bright. I figure this is the highest charge but not sure, the unit came with no instructions at all so decided to just wing it and watch..

 

[John_Mc]

the unit came with no instructions at all so decided to just wing it and watch..

Link to User Guide for Noco Genius10

 

[Ricn]

Thanks John for the link. I now have it on my pc.

 

[DieselMonk]

For value and what you can do with the charger, nothing beats the Noco Genius 10 or bigger. I’ve got many different chargers, but this one has its own place on my garage bench and is my go to. I hardly ever use the other ones. As for a maintainer, nothing beats the BatteryMINDER.
Ctek is good, but not THAT good. This is my personal experience collected over the last 18 years meddling around with batteries.

Stay away from the small Noco chargers as they do fail, unless you know how to fix em. So far I had repaired two of those small ones.

 

[John_Mc]

For value and what you can do with the charger, nothing beats the Noco Genius 10 or bigger. I’ve got many different chargers, but this one has its own place on my garage bench and is my go to. I hardly ever use the other ones. As for a maintainer, nothing beats the BatteryMINDER.
Ctek is good, but not THAT good. This is my personal experience collected over the last 18 years meddling around with batteries.

A word of warning: you do not want to use a large charger on motorcycle or ATV batteries. Those smaller batteries do best if charged at something like 1 or 2 amps. (Battery MINDer's larger chargers have a user-selectable 2, 4, or 8 amp max charge rate. Noco's chargers do not.)

Stay away from the small Noco chargers as they do fail, unless you know how to fix em. So far I had repaired two of those small ones.

What problems did you see with the smaller Noco chargers? I've had a Noco Genius 2 charger/maintainer on my wife's AGM motorcycle battery for about 4 years and it's still working well. That's the oldest Noco charger I own.

I have a 1.3 amp BatteryMINDER charger/maintainer that is over 20 years old and still working fine. It lacks some of the features of their newer chargers, but it still works.

(We do have a whole-house surge suppressor that protects our house and garage. Electronic gizmos have tended to last a lot longer since we added that.)

 

[Too many Kubotas]

As for a maintainer, nothing beats the BatteryMINDER.

That's what I used to think, too, and while I still use about 10 BatteryMINDers, the newer PulseTech maintainers are at least as good.

And I learned to stay away from NOCO after a small one ruined a battery for me.

 

[DieselMonk]

That's what I used to think, too, and while I still use about 10 BatteryMINDers, the newer PulseTech maintainers are at least as good.

And I learned to stay away from NOCO after a small one ruined a battery for me.

We’ve got two PulseTechs. While this is true what you are saying, none of the bigger Noco nor BatteryMinders broke yet. Neither did the old Ctek’s I have. However I had to fix the TOPswitch PWM in the input stage twice in a PulseTech. The power input design inside the PulseTech is not that great. Other than that it is a good maintainer. I actually keep spare TOPswitch PWM’s in stock just because of that.

 

[DieselMonk]

A word of warning: you do not want to use a large charger on motorcycle or ATV batteries. Those smaller batteries do best if charged at something like 1 or 2 amps. (Battery MINDer's larger chargers have a user-selectable 2, 4, or 8 amp max charge rate. Noco's chargers do not.)


What problems did you see with the smaller Noco chargers? I've had a Noco Genius 2 charger/maintainer on my wife's AGM motorcycle battery for about 4 years and it's still working well. That's the oldest Noco charger I own.

I have a 1.3 amp BatteryMINDER charger/maintainer that is over 20 years old and still working fine. It lacks some of the features of their newer chargers, but it still works.

(We do have a whole-house surge suppressor that protects our house and garage. Electronic gizmos have tended to last a lot longer since we added that.)

The smaller Noco chargers (specially the 2A version) dies and takes the battery with it. There is a diode that shorts out. This can happen even within the warranty period. These came across my table a few times. A whole house suppressor is good, doesn’t mean things can’t go wrong. The PulseTech’s are in a house with a whole house surge suppressor and it still blew after a lightning storm. Proper whole house grounding is most important! A single ground rod is good, but multiple ground plates are much better!
I have the first version Ctek for over 15 years 24/7/365 running, good maintainer, but that is about it. The BatteryMinder is on my house generator, it is about 7 years old now working great! Also got an Optimate and a few others.
The Noco 10 is fine with small batteries. Whiles you can’t manually select amperage it does this automatically. It measures internal battery resistance, so it knows what to put in. One of the best chargers for the money. As long as you got BatteryMinders for maintaining and the Noco 10 on the garage bench, your batteries last the longest and only fail due to old age.

 

[Too many Kubotas]

We’ve got two PulseTechs. While this is true what you are saying, none of the bigger Noco nor BatteryMinders broke yet. Neither did the old Ctek’s I have. However I had to fix the TOPswitch PWM in the input stage twice in a PulseTech.

Haven't had a BatteryMINDer or PulseTech go bad yet, just the one little NOCO.
Started using the B-minders in the 90s, and many of them have been in use just about 24/7 since.

Maybe eight years ago I got the first modern PulseTech, then two of the newest ones introduced about a year ago. The first one is hooked to my Ram 3500 at least 95 % of the time - it's not driven often.

The smaller Noco chargers (specially the 2A version) dies and takes the battery with it. There is a diode that shorts out. This can happen even within the warranty period.
I have the first version Ctek for over 15 years 24/7/365 running, good maintainer, but that is about it.

My little NOCO killed a battery the first time I used the darn thing. Took out one of a pair of matched H8 batteries. My CTEK is probably 25 years old, but I rarely use it.

Another way to keep batteries happy are the PulseTech desulfators. Started using them recently, have used Canadus for decades. Big difference in price.

 

[DieselMonk]

Haven't had a BatteryMINDer or PulseTech go bad yet, just the one little NOCO.
Started using the B-minders in the 90s, and many of them have been in use just about 24/7 since.

Maybe eight years ago I got the first modern PulseTech, then two of the newest ones introduced about a year ago. The first one is hooked to my Ram 3500 at least 95 % of the time - it's not driven often.

My little NOCO killed a battery the first time I used the darn thing. Took out one of a pair of matched H8 batteries. My CTEK is probably 25 years old, but I rarely use it.

Another way to keep batteries happy are the PulseTech desulfators. Started using them recently, have used Canadus for decades. Big difference in price.

I should disclose that our two PulseTech’s are the Xtreme series with the pulser and we are using them as maintainers not so much as chargers. I am also feeding a H8 with it. If it wouldn’t be for the weak power input stage design, I’d give PulseTech the advantage over CTek. I also have the big CTek (7002?). However the Noco 10 is better.

Those little Noco Genius chargers are just trouble. Not sure if they fixed that problem now, but I did have a small Noco Genius 2 on the bench. Killed the battery and itself. It was 7 months old. I fixed it faster than him sending it back for a warranty exchange. Had another one that was about 1.5 years old. Same thing. I put a more beefy part inside and it is still working.

Motormaster and Schumacher battery chargers are utter garbage. Also kill the battery and itself. Not worth a penny.

Optimate is pretty good for charging, but not so good as to maintaining.

BatteryTender: well whilst they look the same between old and new, they are not the same inside. The older ones have a transformer, the newer one is a switch mode power supply and a hunk of metal bolted inside to give it the same weight the old ones had!
It has an STM8 chip inside (don’t bother trying to read it, it’s locked!) Also a lot of broken ones I fixed or not fixed.
It is okish… right between the Noco 2 and Motormaster and Schumacher chargers.

About desulfating:
The bigger Noco, Pulsetech Xtreme, BatteryMinder are excellent if given enough time. Problem is you gotta measure that with a calendar.
I pair Ctek with a homebrew small desulfator (kick back) and it works the same as the others. You need a calendar. Some batteries it isn’t a problem because they are parked a lot.

Why the whole jazz? Because I get at least double or triple the battery life than without it. Otherwise I go broke buying batteries every 2-3 years for ever machine or toy. Piles up fast!