Your last generator Maintenance Run

[Patrick Herd]

I have the same 500A tester as GRS just locally branded, I find it really handy as an approximate assessment of battery health.

Reminds me of hunting out all the dead batteries in the off grid solar system just after buying our house: Going through with a battery tester after sundown and the system voltage was going up every time I took a bad battery out of circuit. Huston we have a problem.

 

[nikdfish]

Had the annual service done on the whole house 22kw this past week. No issues, but the transfer test revealed that the 1300VA ups on the entertainment center needed it's batteries replaced. It has been OK on recent power interruptions, so they must have just gone south. Got the replacements in this afternoon & did a hot swap without interrupting the wife's show.

 

[3930dave]

I bought one of these testers:

https://www.amazon.com/ANCEL-BA101-..._5?keywords=ANCEL+BA101&qid=1661217036&sr=8-5

Worked well for me, on the couple of batteries I've tested with it. Haven't been able to A/B it with something more $$$ yet.

Rgds, D.

 

[3930dave]

....did a hot swap without interrupting the wife's show.

Genius Move

Rgds, D.

 

[daugen]

Dave, that battery tester looks good, good reviews. Lot of Chinese clones out there.
I can only imagine what a Snap On load tester would cost.
might have to add one of these gizmos to the work bench.
I used to own a Radio Shack for a while back in 80's and I do like my gizmos and test instruments.
Always wish I had learned more how to use an oscilloscope.
But today it's all in the diagnostic software built in.
It offers you built in solutions, pass fails. Versus you having to know just what that squiggle on the scope meant.

52 years ago I took electronics 101 in college, affectionately known as Shocks For Jocks. I was no jock but had always liked following stereo equipment,
and later owned a Radio Shack franchise where I could sell anything I wanted. Sold a zillion battery testers, simply voltage driven not all that useful meters.
We all know you need to put a load on it.

maybe the 800 dollar lithium batteries do but I don't see much tech in "standard" batteries providing condition information.
Hard enough trying to figure out when they were made. My Makita batteries all have push button indicators showing four levels of charge.
I wonder if that is also only voltage driven or whether Makita has some load software built into its batteries when that button gets pushed.

as our population ages, more important to have good electric start gens with reliable batteries.

 

[ultrarunner]

One of the first things I bought was a commercial battery tester... money well spent.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Had the annual service done on the whole house 22kw this past week. No issues, but the transfer test revealed that the 1300VA ups on the entertainment center needed it's batteries replaced. It has been OK on recent power interruptions, so they must have just gone south. Got the replacements in this afternoon & did a hot swap without interrupting the wife's show.

I have 3 UpS units with bad batteries right now. Those batteries don’t last long.

 

[nikdfish]

I have 3 UpS units with bad batteries right now. Those batteries don’t last long.

This one was right at 4 years, I bought it in 2018. The originals (2) were 7ah & I replaced them with 9ah that have the same form factor.

I have a bunch of dead ones I kept around as weights for tensioning the pull points on wire antenna's suspended from trees around the house.

 

[grsthegreat]

problem with those ups devices...new batteries , good non noname Chinese batteries, cost more than a complete new unit.

 

[Patrick Herd]

Snip
maybe the 800 dollar lithium batteries do but I don't see much tech in "standard" batteries providing condition information.
Hard enough trying to figure out when they were made. My Makita batteries all have push button indicators showing four levels of charge.
I wonder if that is also only voltage driven or whether Makita has some load software built into its batteries when that button gets pushed.
Snip

The battery management electronics in cordless tool packs use upper and lower cell voltages for the full while charging and empty while discharging thresholds. For the level of charge in between they use coulomb counting which gives quite an accurate state of charge.

Using cell voltages combined with coulomb counting allows for variations in cell capacity due to age, temperature, and manufacturing tolerances.