Charging Issue with Vintage Car Battery: Ammeter Shows 0A, Voltage at 14.5-15V, Potential Sulfation

Hi. I have the following problem with a relatively new battery - not all year round. When you try to charge it with a rectifier, the ammeter does not swing and shows 0 A, with the voltage at the terminals showing 14.5-15 V. The battery before starting the charging test had 0 V at the terminals.

The battery was mounted in an old vintage car, garaged in winter. The car was fired and once every 2 weeks for the so-called "burnouts". After a 4-week break, the battery died, so I took it to recharge it, but unfortunately I have a problem as above.

Is it possible that he could sulfate so quickly? Unfortunately, I am not able to check the sulfation status because due to the battery's design and not other, the user does not have access to the holes through which the liquid can be refilled.

What kind of charger do you have?

Parallel connect a second battery with relatively good performance and charge two together.

I think so. I do it every day. Perhaps the rectifier does not take action because it "sees" nothing at the ends. Anyway, even those who do not have to 'see' before they break through the water a bit, it will take even 1 day.

georgesgr wrote:

Any battery discharged below 10V is only suitable for scrap.

And again an unconfirmed myth, but ...

Doolek wrote:

When you try to charge it with a rectifier, the ammeter does not swing and shows 0 A, with the voltage at the terminals showing 14.5-15 V. The battery before starting the charging test had 0 V at the terminals.

in this case it is probably right that for scrap, not because of discharge, but because of a break in the battery.

georgesgr wrote:

For some it is a myth, for others it is many years of experience.

I didn't get it from the ceiling, but from 40 years of adventure with cars. During this time, I, of course, accidentally discharged the old and new batteries several times, but immediately charged, they served for a long time. Therefore, I consider such statements unjustified, because this thread does not cost you to charge the battery and check it. I am also not saying that after such a discharge the battery has exactly the same capacity as before it was discharged.

Hello all. I suggest connecting the battery (without the second parallel) to the charger and waiting for about 5-6 hours. If the ammeter is still zero, the battery must be disposed of. If the current increases, further charging can be attempted. Greetings.

750kV wrote:

Hello all. I suggest connecting the battery (without the second parallel) to the charger and waiting for about 5-6 hours. If the ammeter is still zero, the battery must be disposed of. If the current increases, further charging can be attempted. Greetings.

As long as the charger is not too "intelligent" and will turn on the charge. First check the electrolyte level.

georgesgr wrote:

Any battery discharged below 10V is only suitable for scrap.
This one was discharged to zero ...

Not true, a few years ago my trunk light switch fell off, the car was left in the open for a week, the battery was discharged to zero, after charging it served another three or four years. The second case, an opened trunk in the garage, two days, battery discharged to zero, serves me already in the second winter (at -25 degrees it turns without any problems). I have placed the battery with 7 -8 V many times, it has probably served me for about 9 years, used occasionally, frequent self-discharge, it is already raining, but the season will last longer.

Is the terminal voltage the same as the battery posts? It seems to me a banal, faulty connection. The battery that started the engine before is unlikely to lose its conductivity so suddenly.

I think I have too little imagination to understand such a state that the battery that started the engine a few days earlier now does not completely take away the power from the power supply. Was it absolutely dry?

Doolek wrote:

Before starting the charging test, the battery had 0 V at the terminals.

In my opinion, the battery is damaged. He has a gap between the links. This causes that you get 0V on the terminals and 14-15V (after connecting the rectifier - the current will not flow and hence the result 0A.
Unfortunately, such a battery can only be replaced.
Greetings!

Thanks a lot for the suggestions.

Quote:

What kind of charger do you have?

The charger is Bester 12V / 8A (20-90 Ah) and works fine with other batteries.

Quote:

Hello all. I suggest connecting the battery (without the second parallel) to the charger and waiting for about 5-6 hours. If the ammeter is still zero, the battery must be disposed of. If the current increases, further charging can be attempted.

I can try, but I'm afraid if the temperature will get too high when trying to force the charging for these few hours.

Quote:

In my opinion, the battery is damaged. He has a gap between the links. This causes that you get 0V on the terminals and 14-15V (after connecting the rectifier - the current will not flow and hence the result 0A.
Unfortunately, such a battery can only be replaced.

When I try to charge for a few minutes, disconnect the terminals and connect the voltmeter, the voltage decreases over time from about 10 V to zero, therefore I wonder if the problem is actually an open circuit. Secondly, from where the break would suddenly appear, if the car and the battery had no chance to be mechanically damaged.

Plug in the rectifier, the temperature will not rise, because electricity is not flowing. And just watch. Sometimes I saved discharged batteries by connecting them to a 24V charger (constant current control required! Dangerous and stupid, but a few batteries got up)

This one will not get up, the internal resistance of the link is infinite!

Doolek wrote:

The battery was mounted in an old vintage car, garaged in winter. The car was fired and once every 2 weeks for the so-called "burns".

And it killed him: how many in such a car can a "bicycle dynamo" from the era installed there be charged? 10A? As long as he did not work on the "indicator light". How much has he worked? 10 minutes?

Doolek wrote:

After a 4-week break, the battery died, so I took it to recharge it

He lived so long ... So, as I thought, he hadn't been recharged yet, after these "burnouts".

And also:

gimak wrote:

During this time, I have, of course, accidentally discharged several times, both old and new, but in a minute charged, they served for a long time.

my emphasis.
And this is an explanation: the faster the energy replenishes, the more efficient it will recover; all because - never!
To sum up, already in the third post of the topic Mate Irekt he gave an answer that seemed to end the topic - and yet no ...

Doolek wrote:

When I try to charge for a few minutes, disconnect the terminals and connect the voltmeter, the voltage decreases over time from about 10 V to zero, therefore I wonder if the problem is actually an open circuit. Secondly, from where the break would suddenly appear, if the car and the battery had no chance to be mechanically damaged.

Internal corrosion of the plates and poles is usually the cause of the break, not necessarily a mechanical failure immediately. Yes, you have measured 10V, but you are unlikely to force the current flow - try to connect the light bulb and measure the current flowing through it. It will be negligible and the voltage will drop practically to 0V immediately. This is what proves the internal break in the main connections between the active plates (especially as it happened suddenly).
Thus, the battery is recyclable only - resuscitation, desulfurization, etc. will fail.

Could there be any more details on this charge? It all looks very suspicious to me. I am afraid that it will finish loading after a few minutes of trying. And the battery is actually deteriorating with every passing moment. After all, the confusion is with the annual battery. Unless it turns out that this year is just a vehicle plug.

For a trivial reason, a doctoral thesis is about to come out. The conductor in the battery is the electrolyte and if there is no density, it is not conductive and as long as it is battery. it will not 'fake' this density, it will not take electricity. That's why I suggested a parallel connection with a second relatively good battery.
By the way, I returned the advertised aku just a moment ago. with a voltage of 5V, which was supposed to be charged with a Lidl charger for 2 days, and I stayed at Stefpol 25 A from Saturday and made 670 A on a 680 sticker. Gentlemen, if you do not do it, do not fill your counter.
And I advise all mechanics to learn how to use the battery and include it in the basic maintenance activities of the car, and not just sending them to the point of sale with receipts from testers for which they still charge PLN 20. Shame.

Hello,

Quote:

And it killed him: how many in such a car can a "bicycle dynamo" from the era installed there be charged? 10A? As long as he did not work on the "indicator light". How much has he worked? 10 minutes?

The fact that this car is a historic monument does not necessarily mean a weak charging system. A brand new Bosch 80A alternator pulling out 54A at 1900 RPMS is installed.

Quote:

Could there be any more details on this charge? It all looks very suspicious to me. I am afraid that it will finish loading after a few minutes of trying. And the battery is actually deteriorating with every passing moment. After all, the confusion is with the annual battery. Unless it turns out that this year is just a vehicle plug.

The battery was precharged with the already mentioned Bester charger. The charging voltage remained at the level of 14.5-15 V, and the current gradually increased from 0.5 to 2.5 A. At present, the battery is charged with a pulse-charging rectifier. After landing, I will let you know how the battery will behave.

So the current was not zero after all. Still, the quality of the information is poor. What is it that was precharged? 5 minutes, an hour, ten hours? Admittedly, he doesn't know what this BESTER can do, but he is nominally correct. So, as should be judged, it was necessary to show patience and professionalism. If a colleague does not commit more nonsense, the battery will come to life. But I am afraid that the training runs of this monument with an 80 A alternator are short-lived. And it does not serve, as you can see, the battery or the engine.

Doolek wrote:

The fact that this car is a historic monument does not necessarily mean a weak charging system. A brand new Bosch 80A alternator pulling out 54A at 1900 RPMS is installed.

The current consumption of the battery during charging with the alternator (and thus - after how many kilometers the battery will be charged) does not depend on the current of the alternator, but on the situation in the network (current flow, voltage drops), because the installation in the car must be considered as a network. In simple terms, it depends, of course, on the alternator's capabilities, but also on how many and what consumers it has to handle in addition to the battery.

matołek wrote:

By the way, I returned the advertised aku just a moment ago. with a voltage of 5V, which was supposed to be charged with a Lidl charger for 2 days,

According to the guidelines of CENTRA (and other manufacturers as well), the battery discharged to a voltage lower than 10V (absolute maximum discharge is 1.4V per cell, i.e. 8.4V - voltage measurement at the poles one hour after disconnecting the load) can be disposed of. Thus, a battery discharged to a voltage of 5V is by all rules (and common sense) scrap. Note that the 11.5V battery has only 10% of the rated charge!

matołek wrote:

Gentlemen, if you do not do it, do not fill your counter.

We do, we do, so I don't know, so don't be in a rush

^ToM^ wrote:

Thus, a battery discharged to a voltage of 5V is by all rules (and common sense) scrap. Note that the 11.5V battery has only 10% of the rated charge!

... and according to the warranty conditions of many distributors, eg Varta - 8V, it is a loss of warranty rights, but how to explain to the customer that the battery under the warranty is discharged. Even those 30 years ago had special battery carriers so that it would be convenient to carry it every few days for charging.

Quote:

So the current was not zero after all. Still, the quality of the information is poor. What is it that was precharged?

The battery was charged for 4 hours with the aforementioned Bester charger and the charging current during this time increased from a value close to 0 (the indicator on the charger has a not very precise scale, so I will not give the exact value) to 2.5 A. Unfortunately, but due to the trip I could not leave longer this charger and connected another one in which you can set the desulphation mode of the battery, and after charging it, it automatically switches to the maintenance mode. After a few days of charging, the charger showed that the charging was complete. The battery was exhausted momentarily when I tried to start the car. Therefore, I give up trying again due to lack of time and buy a new one. The old one goes to recycling.

Quote:

But I am afraid that the training runs of this monument with an 80 A alternator are short-lived. And it does not serve, as you can see, the battery or the engine.

I do not know on what basis my colleague concluded that I was damaging the engine, but I am not going to describe what the burning of the relic is, because it is not the topic of this thread. As for the quick discharge of the battery, the reason was a badly connected audio system installation.

I think that the topic can be considered closed because some people are starting to throw shits here ... m. The conclusion for the future is:
1. Check the voltage on the battery from time to time and charge it if necessary.
2. or connect the supporting rectifier.

Best regards and thanks for any suggestions.

Hello, what is the desulphurization rectifier, the exact model, how can I know, and here we are talking about STEF-POL 30A, which model is it exactly? I charged the 17-year-old 44Ah battery with the impulse charger, so for the tests it had a total of 0V and it has three days of 12V still the same, I have not discharged it with a light bulb yet, I only added distilled water to it.

And in another battery I still have only 7V and it is sulphated not used for a long time and I think to add 20 ml of perhydrol 30% to one cell, first pour out 20 ml of sulfuric acid on one cell. Then load it. Or pour perhydrol then pour out, pour in distilled water, charge with a pulse charger for 10 hours and then pour sulfuric acid?

kaiserman wrote:

Hello, what is the desulphurization rectifier, the exact model, how can I know, and here we are talking about STEF-POL 30A, which model is it exactly? I charged the 17-year-old 44Ah battery with the impulse charger, so for the tests it had a total of 0V and it has three days of 12V still the same, I have not discharged it with a light bulb yet, I only added distilled water to it.

And in another battery I still have only 7V and it is sulphated not used for a long time and I think to add 20 ml of perhydrol 30% to one cell, first pour out 20 ml of sulfuric acid on one cell. Then load it. Or pour perhydrol then pour out, pour in distilled water, charge with a pulse charger for 10 hours and then pour sulfuric acid?

you do not need to charge to 12v, you can charge to 14.4v it will be better and faster and you will know faster if it is dead.

matołek wrote:

The conductor in the battery is the electrolyte and if there is no density, it is not conductive and as long as it is battery. it will not 'fake' this density, it will not take electricity.

A big shortcut because every electrolyte is by definition conductive, even when it "has no density". The cause of not charging a deeply discharged battery is more complex.