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What’s The Best Car Battery Maintainer For The Money?
When looking for a battery maintainer for your vehicle there are a lot of different battery maintainers to choose from. This guide is designed to help you understand the different features of all the different models to help you have a better understanding of which one you think you should go with. So then who makes the best car battery maintainer? Keep reading to see my recommendations.
What Is A Car Battery Maintainer?
A battery maintainer like the name suggests maintains your vehicle batteries so that they remain at a full charge while they are not in use. It’s no secret that lead-acid batteries the type used in car and motorcycle batteries loses its charge over time if you do not use the vehicle.
A car battery maintainer is designed to keep your vehicle battery fully charged while it’s not in use. It does this by reading the voltage that the battery is putting out and then sending power to the battery if it is below a certain threshold.
Once the battery reaches a certain voltage the battery maintainer would then stop charging the battery until the voltage dropped again.
My Car Battery Maintainer Recommendations
Battery Tender Black 12 Volt 1.25 Amp Battery Maintainer
Once the battery started to drop in voltage it would start charging it again. This makes maintaining your car battery easy as you can just attach the car battery maintainer to your car battery and not have to worry about it overcharging the battery.
This car battery maintainer also comes with different connection methods such as alligator clips and o-ring terminals so that you can secure the battery maintainer to your battery. This car battery maintainer is suitable for automobiles, motorcycles, ATVs, boats, and lawnmowers.
To check out the current prices of this Battery Tender car battery maintainer on Amazon click here.
NOCO Genius G1100 6V/12V 1.1 Amp Battery Trickle Charger Maintainer
It will charge cars, boats, motorcycles, RVs, or really any other vehicle. It can also charge lithium-ion batteries which no other battery maintainer on this list claims it can do.
This NOCO car battery maintainer is designed to be a smart battery maintainer so it can tell when your battery is fully charged and prevent overcharging. This car battery maintainer can also charge 6-volt and 12-volt batteries.
It also comes with built-in safety features that make it spark proof and reverse polarity protection. These features would prevent you from accidentally swapping your leads or creating a spark by touching the two leads together as the battery maintainer would be able to sense there is a problem and not send any power to the leads.
It also comes with a 5-year warranty. This is my favorite one out of all my recommendations because of the features and the warranty. If you are interested in checking out the current prices of this NOCO car battery maintainer on Amazon click here.
MOTOPOWER MP00205A 12V 800mA Fully Automatic Battery Maintainer
It is an 800mA battery maintainer so it does not put out as many amps as the other battery maintainers on this list.
It should still do a good job of charging your vehicle’s batteries it may just take a bit longer to do that. If the amount of time it takes to charge your vehicles is not a factor for you then this would be the car battery maintainer you would probably want to go with.
It can still charge automobiles, motorcycles, RVs, and lawnmowers like the other models on the list. It is also a smart charger so it can turn off when it senses your battery is fully charged.
It has built-in safety features such as overload protection and fuse protection. It comes with a one-year limited warranty. To check out the current prices on Amazon of this MOTOPOWER car battery maintainer click here.
BLACK+DECKER 2 Amp Waterproof Automatic Battery Maintainer
This means that it can be used on boats or outdoors without any worry about it getting damaged by water, ice, or snow.
It has an IP67 rating that means it’s completely water and dustproof that can withstand direct water or rain. This would be the ideal battery maintainer that you would want to go with if you planned on using your battery charger in an outdoor area for an extended period of time.
It has a 2 amp output so it should be pretty capable of charging your battery in a short amount of time. It also has built-in safety features to protect against overheating, short-circuiting, and reverse polarity. It also comes with a one year warranty.
It can be used on any 12-volt battery, it does not look like it has capabilities for 6 volts, however. To check out the current prices of this Black and Decker car battery maintainer on Amazon click here.
Optima Digital 400 12V Performance Maintainer and Battery Charger
With them being on the higher end they are also going to cost a bit more than normal batteries that you would purchase.
This battery maintainer is no different and is going to cost a bit more than the others on this list. With the higher cost, you also get more features, if you have an optimum battery you would probably want to go with this battery charger as it has specific modes for their different types of batteries.
This Optima battery maintainer features an LCD screen to give you a digital readout of what it’s currently doing. It also features anti-spark technology to keep you from accidentally causing a spark by touching the two leads together.
Overall this is going to be the highest costing option on this list but is going to be designed to have higher-end features than the other models. If you are interested in checking out the current prices of this Optima car battery maintainer on Amazon click here.
What Are the Differences Between A Car Battery Maintainer And A Trickle Charger?
A car battery maintainer and trickle charger are essentially the same things. In the past, a trickle charger was used as the term for a battery charger that would charge your vehicle battery but was not smart enough to stop charging the battery once it reached a certain voltage.
With these types of chargers, you have to be careful that you do not leave the charger on the battery for too long otherwise you can fry the battery by overcharging it.
If you need to replace your car battery you may be surprised as to how much they cost. You may be interested in checking out my other article about how much it cost to replace a car battery if you want more information on the costs.
With most modern battery chargers and trickle chargers, they are going to have the built-in functionality to stop charging the battery once it reaches a certain voltage.
So essentially the two terms battery maintainer and trickle charger can be used interchangeably, just make sure that whatever battery maintainer or trickle charger that you go with has a built-in voltage detector and is smart enough to stop charging your vehicle’s battery once it’s reached a certain percentage.
Why Should You Use A Car Battery Maintainer?
If you have a lot of vehicles or if you have vehicles that you do not use in the wintertime then it is a good idea to use a battery maintainer on them while they are being stored.
In cars and trucks, they will have an alternator that charges your battery when you turn on your engine, in motorcycles the same function is handled by the motorcycles stator.
If you do not turn on your vehicle for a long time then the alternator or stator can’t do its job of charging the battery which can lead to the battery losing its charge and potentially dying.
If you do not maintain the battery while it is in storage then it may dip to a very low voltage and not be able to be charged again. This is common on motorcycles where most people only use them in the summertime.
In the spring they will go to ride their motorcycle and their battery will be dead and will need to be replaced. If you hook up a battery maintainer to the battery throughout the winter then this will not be an issue come next spring.
The same concept would be applied to other vehicles such as farm equipment or any vehicles that have a battery that will not be used for a long time. If you are going to be storing any vehicle for longer than a couple of months it would probably be a good idea to attach a battery maintainer to the battery just to ensure you don’t have issues with the battery when you want to take the vehicle out of storage.
It would be nice to have the problems of Jay Leno with over 100 different vehicles he has a real problem of maintaining his vehicles batteries when he doesn’t use them. He has to have multiple car battery maintainers to be able to charge all of his vehicles, a first world problem worth having.
How To Use A Car Battery Maintainer
Using a car battery maintainer is pretty simple, you would just plug the battery maintainer into a wall outlet and then attach the two battery leads to your car battery.
There will be two battery leads on the battery maintainer, one red and one black, you would want to make sure that you align both colors on the leads to the colors on your battery.
The red lead should be connected to the red connector on your battery, the black lead should be connected to the black connector on your battery.
As long as you go with a smart battery maintainer or trickle charger then that is all you would need to do.
Just hook up the battery maintainer and make sure that is set up properly for whatever vehicle you are using it for. There may be different settings for cars, trucks, motorcycles, or boats depending on which model of battery maintainer you go with.
If you go with an old-style trickle charger that cannot sense when the voltage of the battery then you would want to make sure that you monitor the voltage with a multimeter so that you are not overcharging your battery.
Most automotive batteries should read 12.6 volts when fully charged.
What Car Battery Maintainer Do You Own?
I ended up going with this Stanley Fatmax battery maintainer because of its ease of use and because it was designed to be used for cars and motorcycles. I needed a battery maintainer for my motorcycle while it was not in use and this one fit the bill as far as features and price.
This Stanley Fatmax battery maintainer comes with a few different ways that you can use to charge your vehicle. It comes with the standard battery clamps that you can clamp to your vehicle’s battery terminals. It also comes with O-rings that you can use to attach to your battery terminals to make a more secure connection.
Another connection method with this battery maintainer is a DC plug if you have a car or truck and you don’t want to mess with connecting this battery maintainer directly to the battery you can connect a DC plug to your vehicles accessory outlet and charge it that way.
This is a smart style car battery maintainer so it is designed to be hooked up to your vehicle battery and left, you don’t need to worry about it overcharging your battery as it can sense when it gets up to 12 volts of charge.
STANLEY FATMAX BC8S 8 Amp Battery Charger with 2 Amp Maintainer
In Conclusion
There are a lot of different battery maintainers on the market to choose from. Depending on how fast you want to be able to charge your vehicle’s batteries you would want to make sure that you pay attention to the number of amps that the battery maintainer can output.
When looking for the best car battery maintainer for you hopefully this guide was able to provide you more information to make a smart buying decision.