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ODYSSEY
®
Battery Reconditioning Charge Procedure
Scope:
Lead-acid batteries can develop reduced delivered capacity / performance after
prolonged periods of storage, especially if the batteries were not periodically boost
charged or left on a float / maintenance charger during the time of storage. The cause
of this reduced capacity is the development of sulfation of some of the oxide on the
plates. Sulfated oxide is discharged oxide and can be challenging to covert back to
charged oxide known as lead-dioxide. Left unconverted, this discharged lead sulfate
can develop even more hardened sulfate and could be non-reversible.
Action Procedure:
To hopefully reestablish full deliverable capacity, the following procedure is offered as a
“reconditioning charge cycle procedure.”
1. Dis
charge the battery using the vehicle head lights or connecting some electrical
load to the battery and discharge to 10.0V under load measured with a hand-held
digital volt meter. Once 10.0V is achieved, disconnect the electrical load or turn
off the headlights or other electrical system or device.
2. Begin recharging with an approved charger as listed and with appropriate
amperage for the capacity of the battery, minimum 40%amperage of the 10 hour
capacity rating of the battery. Utilizing chargers that achieve 14.7V during charge
and 13.6V in float are ideal. Monitor the batteries terminal voltage with the
charger operating to assure 15.0V is not exceeded at any time. Charge the
battery until the charging amperage seems to be near zero amps and if the
charger has a 13.6V float, float charge for 8-10 hours.
3. If the battery gets hot to the touch (exceeds 125⁰F), stop charging and allow to
cool. Once cool, begin charging again until charge complete.
4. Charging times can be 6-10 hours depending on the charger amperage rating to
the amp-hour rating of the battery. As an example, a 10 amp charger on an
ODYSSEY PC925 would take approximately 7-8 hours to fully recharge.
5. Performing more than one discharge and recharge cycle is beneficial to
increasing restored capacity.
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ent starting and charging parts we offer.