Halfords Leisure Battery

rustynutz

My leisure battery was completely discharged when I initially left the motorhome parked up for the winter, I discovered the fan for the central heating system must have been left on by one of the kids, it runs extremely quite as I never heard it.

Anyway despite numerous attempts to charge it the minute any load was put on it (even a single halogen bulb) it quickly went flat dropping from 13v to under 4 volts. The battery was a halfords one, presumably bought by the previous owner as I bought the van with the battery in it last summer, there was a date of 01 2015 on it which put it outside the 2 year guarantee.

So in I walk to my local halfords, with the old battery (so they could test it and then dispose of it) with €150 in my pocket ...... and out I walk 5 minutes later with a brand new leisure 115AH battery AND my €150 still in my pocket, they tested the battery, said "oh yeah, its f@@cked, we'll change it out for ya"

Delighted isn't the word for it, as my wallet was still recovering form last week when I had to shell out over 300 notes to pass the DOE! so moral of the story, buy your leisure battery from Halfords for a no quibble guarantee (even if you personally didn't buy the battery and it is in fact outside the two year period ). I believe they are a Yuasa battery anyway so should be good quality.

crabbypaddy

Hope they don't get in trouble for taking it back. Its 100% your fault if you left it discharged which causes irreversible sulfation.

rustynutz

crabbypaddy wrote: »

Hope they don't get in trouble for taking it back. Its 100% your fault if you left it discharged which causes irreversible sulfation.

What is the situation with leisure batteries? I thought they were designed to be completely discharged (unlike starter batteries) will completely discharging them even once cause irreversible damage?

crabbypaddy

rustynutz wrote: »

What is the situation with leisure batteries? I thought they were designed to be completely discharged (unlike starter batteries) will completely discharging them even once cause irreversible damage?

Yes. And leaving it in a discharged state produces irreversible sulfation over time, the longer you leave it the more damage is caused.

A lead acid should never be allowed to go below 1.75v per cell and if it does you should recharge it immediately and fully preferably with an equalisation cycle.

Even the best deep cycle batteries are recommended to be cycled to 50% or less and 80% is the absolute maximum.

The deeper you cycle your batteries the shorter the life. Leisure batteries aren't real deep cycle or semi traction batteries.

gctest50

You can make / get little yokes that disconnect the battery before it goes too flat to recover

Low voltage disconnect

It's usually set too low to be useful (11V or less) if it was selectable I'd choose 11.8V threshold.

kelbal

I got that same 115Ah one in Halfords 3 years ago, still going strong, delighted with it