Need a charger....!

Lucero said:
I see Bennie's point, It's difficult to just pin this on cold and short journeys. Typically, if a battery has dropped a cell because of the cold, no amount of topping up / recharging will ever see it fully come back to life. If your battery has dropped because you left the interior light on (for example) then that's a different scenario all together and a good charge / jump / run will see it right.
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Just need to identify if its a dodgy sell for example or it is fubar, but not sure how. Some of those chargers have diagnostics? So thought trying that would be better to start with instead of a new battery straight off which will probably die again due to short trips
 
mikeh501 said:
bought a ctek5 over the weekend and its a nice bit of kit.
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I had looked at those. It seems the 3.6 models top end is a little close to my battery requirement so looked at the 5. It's 65quid tho so wanted some advice before committing

Dogbreath said:
BTW, I wasn't joking about the Lidl charger, they sell a proper smart charger which is excellent value.
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Cheers, will check it out
 
Got a ctek 10 a few weeks ago to top up the charge on the M3.

Fantastic piece of kit! I'm sure the 5 is equally capable. Wouldn't look for anything or anywhere else. All the car makers rebadge them and sell them, they are that good.
 
You don't need a CTEK, you are putting charge back into a discharged battery, not flying to the moon.

The Lidel one is fine, a £15 12v@6A jobbie from ebay is also fine.
Save your money for a new battery (if required)


If you have masses of disposable income, buy a CTEK, that is why they exist.
 
Recently came back from a week away car wouldn't start.
Thought battery was knackered and started looking for a new one.
Realised I had left my Bluetooth OBD doodah plugged in.
£8 on a set of jump leads, 2mins, job done, been fine since.
 
bitslice said:
You don't need a CTEK, you are putting charge back into a discharged battery, not flying to the moon.

The Lidel one is fine, a £15 12v@6A jobbie from ebay is also fine.
Save your money for a new battery (if required)


If you have masses of disposable income, buy a CTEK, that is why they exist.
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I get where you're coming from but reading other threads on the cteks they have conditioning type program's? I've done some digging at it seems the charger I use for my model helicopter batteries has a setting suitable for a car battery, I may try that first but need to make a cable up first.
 
Reality Bites said:
I get where you're coming from but reading other threads on the cteks they have conditioning type program's?
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Yes, if you have a car sitting there doing nothing for weeks on end, then an intelligent charger is ideal, a normal charger left on too long will overcharge the battery.

If you just have a flat one, anything that can supply 13.8 volts for a few hours is all that you need. Just turn it off when it is done.

Clever ones are really for people overwintering their classics or motor home people.
Get one if you have the money, it's really not worth it for eeking out the best lifetime from a £60 battery, but it may be worth it for the sheer convenience :)
 
Halfords chargers are very good for regular charging (I have one myself as a backup) but the ctek msx5.0 for only an extra £10-15 will do a better job of long term maintenance charging i.e. like keeping the car in the garage over winter. The Halfords charger isn't really meant for this task.

Reality Bites said:
I get where you're coming from but reading other threads on the cteks they have conditioning type program's?
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Yes, further to the long term maintenance programs these Ctek msx chargers are rather good at resurrecting supposedly 'dead' batteries too i.e. ones that have been left in a discharged state for lengthy periods & have turned into a sulphated mess internally.

For the sake of a few extra £ I'd get a ctek msx5.0
 
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Reality Bites said:
I had looked at those. It seems the 3.6 models top end is a little close to my battery requirement so looked at the 5. It's 65quid tho so wanted some advice before committing



Cheers, will check it out
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must be a big battery. i intend using it to keep my dual battery setup land rover defender charged with it given it doesnt go out that often. the batteries together are nearly 160ah and 2000CCA. much bigger than a car.

in any case the CTEK is a sturdy looking quality bit of kit. cant vouch for its performance just yet, but i expect it will be good.

i think i paid about £53 delivered off eblag. i looked at the larger ones but didnt need the power source features etc, which would be useful if the car was stuffed with electronics as you can power those items whilst swapping out the battery.
 
i think i'm going to try the helicopter charger i have to put some power back in it, but need to work out if mine is currently dead or just flat from lack of use.

My worry of just replacing the battery is that i'm now going to be doing very short runs so not good on the battery anyway. investing in a maintenance type charger would be required anyway so why not try it first.

The battery is quite big and If i read the spec right from what halfrauds suggest, i need a 74AH battery and the CTEK 3.6 goes to 75?
 
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