Winter storage/battery removal

mimie · 10-19-2022, 11:43 AM

About to take my 2019 17B (which has a solar panel) to local indoor storage for the winter. Have removed batteries.
Is there anything more I need to do re electrical switches/settings, etc, either now or when I reconnect batteries next spring?

HABBERDABBER · 10-19-2022, 12:59 PM

Turn everything off is the best I can think of. No battery, no juice to run or ruin anything. Best to have all items off and your 12V battery switch off when you reconnect the battery.
Plop a trickle charger on your battery once a month for a day or so to keep it up, or some chargers, you can just leave on continuously. Come Spring, check your electrolyte level in the battery if it's a standard lead acid and top off with distilled water.

mimie · 10-19-2022, 01:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HABBERDABBER

Turn everything off is the best I can think of. No battery, no juice to run or ruin anything. Best to have all items off and your 12V battery switch off when you reconnect the battery.
Plop a trickle charger on your battery once a month for a day or so to keep it up, or some chargers, you can just leave on continuously. Come Spring, check your electrolyte level in the battery if it's a standard lead acid and top off with distilled water.

Perfect - thanks for the guidance. Time to get a trickle charger, I guess!

Camp@Home · 10-19-2022, 04:47 PM

cheap & effective at Harbor Freight.

mimie · 10-19-2022, 05:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Camp@Home

cheap & effective at Harbor Freight.

Good to know, thanks!

AKCamper · 10-20-2022, 01:48 PM

Really don’t need to remove the batteries. If fully charged won’t go dead or freeze if disconnected. Save your back

mimie · 10-20-2022, 02:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AKCamper

Really don’t need to remove the batteries. If fully charged won’t go dead or freeze if disconnected. Save your back

Appreciate the comment. Am removing batteries for security. Storing trailer at local fairgrounds (inside one of the barns) and a buddy who stores his pontoon boat there every winter suggested that I remove batteries.

So - yeah, had to brace myself picking them up out of their holders. Done, now. Thinking I’ll store them in my barn with trickle charger, rather than lugging them down to my basement. They ARE heavy!

HABBERDABBER · 10-20-2022, 05:11 PM

Schlepping the batteries up & out is a chore, for sure, and find some hapless helper to ease the task, but get a handcart for moving them around once they're out. They have collapsible, folding versions for $30 bucks or less. It's what I use. Or go for broke, and buy a $50 unfolding version. Your chiropractor will miss you, and his income, and so it goes. The big box home stores have a selection of the hand carts.

mimie · 10-20-2022, 05:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HABBERDABBER

….get a handcart for moving them around once they're out. They have collapsible, folding versions for $30 bucks or less. It's what I use. Or go for broke, and buy a $50 unfolding version. Your chiropractor will miss you, and his income, and so it goes. The big box home stores have a selection of the hand carts.

Thanks for suggestion. I managed to get them out, then into my two-wheeled wheelbarrow. Not much fun picking them up, for sure.

Might shift them onto one of those low, 4-wheel dollies. Then can move them around in the barn with less of a struggle.

Iowa Dave · 10-20-2022, 05:50 PM

My 40 HP outboard motor is on a stand that I built for it out of big lumber. I set it up in two of those Harbor Freight Dollie’s and I can roll it around my shop if I need to pretty easily. They are pretty good for the money. There are two sizes I believe.
Iowa Dave

mimie · 10-20-2022, 07:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iowa Dave

My 40 HP outboard motor is on a stand that I built for it out of big lumber. I set it up in two of those Harbor Freight Dollie’s and I can roll it around my shop if I need to pretty easily. They are pretty good for the money. There are two sizes I believe.
Iowa Dave

So pleasing to cobble together “solutions” like that!

HABBERDABBER · 10-20-2022, 08:54 PM

Cobble is a passe' word, in some quarters. Jerry rigged is ancient. Jury rigged too.
It's now "hacking" some solution.
It's tough to stay hip, modern, current, in the know. I know. I ain't.

Iowa Dave · 10-20-2022, 10:08 PM

My kids are pretty much up on the current lingo, three of them interact with young people daily. In addition I have a 15 year old grandson. Sometimes I get cryptic messages and they don’t realize I don’t know the reference they are making. So once in a while I use stuff out of my childhood to baffle them. My son is an Eagle Scout. Last night we were hanging a hoist in the garage he name a couple knots and then be tied them. We had three navy men in our troop so I did not get into knots, and lashings but I did know ropes from being city arborist and removing hundreds of dead, diseased and dying American Elms. My kids, fortunately, do not have to earn their living like their old man did.
Iowa Dave

**John in Santa Cruz** · 10-20-2022, 11:24 PM

a good smart charger like a Noco Genius, or a CTek, or even a Deltran Battery Tender (*) can be left connected all winter, or whatever, and will keep the battery happy, waking up periodically to run it through a recharge cycle and holding the voltage at a safe 13.2V once the battery is fully charged.

(*) the Battery tender is only useful to keep the already battery happy, while the Noco or CTeks will charge it AND keep it happy. All these will survive a power outage and when the power returns automatically revert to tender mode.

mimie · 10-21-2022, 09:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HABBERDABBER

Cobble is a passe' word, in some quarters. Jerry rigged is ancient. Jury rigged too.
It's now "hacking" some solution.
It's tough to stay hip, modern, current, in the know. I know. I ain't.

Right with ya, there. And honestly, with a handle like Habberdabber, I’m not surprised you understand the older jargon!
Personally, I like throwing in some vintage words (and concepts!) now and then. Makes me feel at home.

Perry Butler · 10-21-2022, 09:48 AM

Because of my back, one of my priorities is the batteries stay in the camper location until they fail. I've never moved a battery out of the camper and yet we live in Minnesota where temperatures can get as low as -40F.

Every fall I disconnect a battery cable to store a camper, tractor, lawn mower, etc. In four decades of disconnecting I've never had a good battery fail despite numerous times experiencing -40F a few of times a decade. The only times it will fail is if the battery is at end of life anyway, and that was rare, but without suprise.

I don't use a battery tender, because it's not needed if the battery is healthy, or it will be well over 7 months before it's used. A simple google search will give similar advice.

Nearly two years ago, when I was researching batteries, Battleborn told me lithium batteries can be ruined by storing in -20 F situations, much less -40 F. If one has a lithium battery in Minnesota or other cold areas, I'd make sure the battery was stored in a warm environment. One winter, a couple of our flashlight 18650 lithium batteries that were accidently stored in our Casita failed the next spring.

EDIT:

On Battleborn's How to Winterize and Store your Batteries web page the 7th paragraph states:

Quote:

If you store your batteries in subzero weather (-15 degrees Fahrenheit or less), it can potentially crack the ABS plastic and lead to a greater loss of charge. When temperatures get further towards the extremes of cold and hot, they can self-discharge a bit more than the average 3% monthly loss.

If you live in an area where the temps can get lower than -15 degrees Fahrenheit you had better bring your lithium batteries inside.

Food for thought,

Perry

**John in Santa Cruz** · 10-21-2022, 06:05 PM

good thing lithiums are half the weight for twice the capacity.

that said, the low here this last 12 months was 31.1F... What, me worry?

MVA · 10-21-2022, 07:07 PM

I have one Battleborn 100 A-hr battery. I charge it per manufacturer spec to 100% and then remove it from the trailer. BB battery management system does apparently shuts down charging at 32F (?) and discharging at 0F (?) to protect the battery (as I recall the temperature limits). That being said, it only takes 5 minutes to pull the battery and put it in the house in a closet for the winter.

2 cents

**John in Santa Cruz** · 10-22-2022, 02:34 AM

Fwiw, everything I have seen says Lithium batteries should be long term stored at 20-80% charge. Some say 30-70%.

MVA · 10-22-2022, 10:24 AM

Depending on manufacturer, but BB site clearly state: "With our LiFePO4 batteries, we recommend disconnecting all potential power draws from the battery and letting them sit with a full charge, or at least a 50% charge minimum. On a full charge, our batteries have been proven to last at least a year in proper storage conditions with a 2–3% depletion each month. If left at a half charge, the batteries have the potential to not last as long in storage."

https://battlebornbatteries.com/faq-...our-batteries/

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