Marinette Boat Forum

Any older battery should be replaced immediately after it's life ends. Mine was swelling and getting hot. Just barely in time from a disaster.

All batteries fail. Menards has a spring sale on marine batteries. They also offer a battery tester I am going to buy today. One of my two boat batteries won't go into float mode. The two in my diesel truck won't start the engine in this cold weather unless I keep the block heater hooked up. The battery on my collector car is inside the cab and has to have vent tubes to carry battery gas out side. Darn thing is expensive and will run down when the car is just setting. The battery on my other stored summer car is ok. I need another two marine batteries when I float my 28' this season. What I will do is move the two old ones from from my 32' to the 28' project boat and pick up two brand new ones from Menards for the 32'. That will bring the total batteries I need to manage to eight. That should justify the new tester. Here is a tip -- when you buy a new electronically controlled charger keep the old Shumacher as a standby. The new chargers try and read the voltage from the battery before starting a charging cycle. If the battery is fully discharged it won't do anything.

One thing I've learned the hard way is that every battery needs its own dedicated charger. Charging two batteries with one charger causes one of them to fail over time. Not sure why, but I've seen it happen too many times.

Jeff (Five batteries and five chargers)