# Do my leisure batteries need replacing?



## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

The Banner leisure batteries in our van are probably the original ones as supplied by Rapido back in 2010, probably even 2009 when the van was actually built.

So they could be 6 or 7 years old.

Over the years we've never had any problems and when the van is at home we have an EHU attached.

We haven't used the van this year apart from a few small runs so for some reason today (I've never checked them before) I thought I'd check the batteries and when I unscrewed one of the cell plugs I found no water in it, or none that I could see.

Undid the rest and they were all similar.

I've always thought that when the battery uses fluid then it's on its way out.

Is this true or do I just top up with distilled water.

Richard


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## pippin (Nov 15, 2007)

Just top up with distilled water (but not too much), bung 'em on charge and see what 'appens.


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## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

I've now taken them off EHU and will measure voltage tomorrow and see what I get.

Richard


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## gaspode (May 9, 2005)

Scrap them, you've had your moneys worth and sooner or later they'll let you down.


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## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

Hi gaspode,

You're probably right. 

Does leaving them on continuous charge whilst on EHU cause them or the vehicle battery any problems?

I guess the standard Rapido charger is not very sophisticated in respect of charge maintenance.

Richard


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## peedee (May 10, 2005)

I am surprised that if that is the first time you have checked them I 6 or 7 years they are still working at all. No harm in toping them up and putting them on charge to see what they are like but at 6/7 years old they have done pretty well especially if you have used them off hook frequently.
peedee


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## Pudsey_Bear (Sep 25, 2008)

They're a cheap replaceable item two x 125ah for £150, why mess with the old ones


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## dovtrams (Aug 18, 2009)

My MH is the same age, and at last year's hab check, the engineer advised that I change the original battery. It is used every week and on EHU at home. I took his advice as getting 7 years out of a battery can't be bad given their relatively low cost ie about £12 a year.

Good luck

dave


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## gaspode (May 9, 2005)

RichardD said:


> I guess the standard Rapido charger is not very sophisticated in respect of charge maintenance.
> 
> Richard


I suspect you're right, I've had the dry cell problem a couple of times so they must be over-cooking, might be the solar of course that's cooking them?
I don't like keeping leisure batteries for more than 4 or 5 years, the performance drops off anyway and for about £90 each you can have good quality new ones. It's a snip if you want reliability.

I fitted one of these earlier this year - quite impressed with it so far.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/271968276710?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT


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## BillCreer (Jan 23, 2010)

The problem with old batteries is that they do discharge themselves quite quickly even when not in use. If you leave them permanently attached to a charger then the charger will switch to charging when it sees the voltage drop and it is this constant switching that eventually will break the charger and the older the battery the more frequent the switching. I was told this by the guy who repairs Elektroblocks.


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## Sprinta (Sep 15, 2010)

Not a leisure battery but I thought I'd share this with you all anyway

I decided to get my golf clubs out of the garage to dust them off as I intend to take the game up again after a lengthy layoff I.e. 9 years!

I found and cleaned up my Powakaddy and decided to invest in a new battery from work. Being a little bit bored I stuck the old battery on the charger and left it overnight. The next day it was registering as fully charged on the meter, and hooking it up to the cart, well I was surprised that it actually worked

Now I'm getting curious, and so I took it into work but our discharge tester isn't suitable for a golf caddy battery as it needs to know the CCA firstly. So I took it to a battery specialist and they checked it and pronounced it perfect. It was a Denka battery, taken over by Varta a and sadly no longer produced

Anyway, everyone was astonished that the battery is still perfect - it has not been used or charged for at least 9 years. It is a simple sealed lead acid battery.


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## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

gaspode said:


> I fitted one of these earlier this year - quite impressed with it so far.
> http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/271968276710?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT


I have been looking at the Varta LFD90 after reading this : -

http://www.aandncaravanservices.co.uk/battery-technology.php

No one seems to be offering the Bosch L5

Do you have any comparisons between the H3 and the LFD90? Does it use the same PowerFrame technology as the LFD?

Richard


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## BillCreer (Jan 23, 2010)

After reading the same article two years ago I bought a couple of the 110 F18 and they have been fine. I you double click on the battery you might want it gives you full details including the exact size.

http://www.justcarbatteries.co.uk/c...eries/varta-silver-dynamic-car-batteries.html


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## Sprinta (Sep 15, 2010)

Varta and Bosch are the same manufacturer. Just badge engineering


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## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

Think I will go with a pair of Varta H3's, there're cheaper and they are 100Ah rather than the LFD being 90Ah.

Can also use as a vehicle battery if the current has a problem.

Richard


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## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

In the end I did stick with the LFD90's. Great price from Battery Megastore and next day delivery.

Not just wanting to dump the Banners, I decide to checkout them out. They took about 4 litres of de-ionised water between them!!

Put them on my CTEK charger in 'recond' mode and left them for a day or so. Took them off charge and checked the voltages on both the next day and they recorded 12.15 volts.

So definitely past their best. Good job I did do a check as we're just off to Portugal.

Richard


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## H1-GBV (Feb 28, 2006)

My big grey Rapido charger went "bang" a few years back and I replaced it with a CTEK model under the bottom of the wardrobe (freeing up a bit of space above the Truma!). It has proved to be excellent and my original (2002) leisure battery [100Ah] and my replacement leisure battery (2007, 90Ah) seem to work in tandem quite happily.

I KNOW this is all against the recommended way of working but it has never failed me yet (I bought the replacement because the "low voltage" light came on with the heater running: I used it by itself for a couple of years but was always taught "don't throw things away: you never know when they'll come in handy"). PERHAPS I ought to bite the bullet and replace both of them but another mantra was "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".

Gordon


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## gaspode (May 9, 2005)

RichardD said:


> Put them on my CTEK charger in 'recond' mode and left them for a day or so. Took them off charge and checked the voltages on both the next day and they recorded 12.15 volts.
> 
> So definitely past their best. Good job I did do a check as we're just off to Portugal.
> 
> Richard


That's not just "past their best" it's completely stuffed.
I'm surprised you hadn't noticed a long time ago.


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## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

gaspode said:


> That's not just "past their best" it's completely stuffed.
> I'm surprised you hadn't noticed a long time ago.


Haven't been out in the van this year, so it's been on EHU since our last trip in November.

Would you recommend replacing the Rapido charger with a CTEK one?

Richard


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## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

Just been reading up on the charger fitted to my Rapido and it has a 4 stage charging modes with the final one being 'standby' which comes in to operation 10 hours after stage 3 is complete and doesn't come back on until the leisure batteries drop below 13 volts. So should be OK to leave on constant EHU.

The only problem I can see is that the CBE controller only allows a max. of 2A charge to the vehicle battery. 

But I guess this is not a problem unless the battery is pretty flat. But we did have one trip where we were we used Aires for 7 days with no EHU and the the van only had about a 30 minute run between the 3 Aires so had no opportunity to charge up, plus the fact that the Fiat has a built-in constant drain of about 120mA (got this eventually confirmed by Fiat after spending a week investigating) Was pretty sluggish on the 8th day so have tended to have only 3 or 4 days without EHU since.

Richard


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## Pudsey_Bear (Sep 25, 2008)

I'd be inclined to fit the Ctek if it causes no problems to the rest of the hab electrics, 2 amps is pitiful, on the self build, as we wild camp only I fitted a tiny Ctek 5 amp charger based on it either being on EHU at home and arriving home fully charged and it having a 100w solar panel, even though I had 375ah of LBs to keep happy it never was a problem, on the self build sites you rarely read of any LB problems, they seem to be more common on vans built by "professionals" for some reason.


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## RichardD (Sep 14, 2009)

I do have an Efoy but this only charges the LB's, probably would fit a solar panel to cover the drain on the VB if we were to be off grid for any length of time.

Richard


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## gaspode (May 9, 2005)

RichardD said:


> Would you recommend replacing the Rapido charger with a CTEK one?
> 
> Richard


No, the CBE should be fine if the batteries are OK.


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