Now, the trick is to give the battery a temporary and artificial surface charge with another battery - and preferably a car with a functioning battery and jumper cables. Be careful not to get the corrosion on your clothes or you will have holes in them, and also make sure to wear eye protection! You can also use a paste of baking soda and water to help with anything that is stubborn. After that, we will hook the smart charger to the battery again.Īlso, clean up any corrosion with a wire brush. After the battery has charged, we will add more water so that it comes up about 1/8″ below the fill line. I recommend adding the water with a plastic syringe used for children’s medicine to prevent spilling. If you don’t, add only distilled water and add just enough to come up about 1/8″ above the plates. If you have a flooded battery and can remove the cap to expose the fill holes for the individual cells, make sure that you have enough liquid covering the lead plates inside. Verify that your terminals aren’t corroded and preventing the smart charger from making a proper connection. Your battery has enough electrolyte to at least cover the lead plates (for flooded lead-acid batteries, not sealed)
I wish I had the 5-amp model, but it wasn’t sold at the store that I bought this at. A gentle solid charge that won’t overcharge and “boil” your battery. My personal favorite out of all of the chargers I’ve tested. Anything below 9-volts will result in the smart charger acting like a paperweight and giving you an error light.
#Car battery indicator not working full#
Only when that surface charge is recognized will it begin to pump in a current to bring the battery to a full charge.įor chargers like a Deltran Battery Tender, seen here on Amazon, the minimum is 9-volts (for a 12-volt battery) or 1.5-volts per cell. When you hook up the leads to the battery, the smart charger attempts to sense an initial surface charge so that it recognizes that it is indeed connected to a battery.
While these are nice, and the pros definitely outweigh the cons, there comes the frustration when your smart charger won’t recognize a legitimate battery.
#Car battery indicator not working how to#
How to Make a Smart Charger to Recognize a Dead BatteryĪs I mentioned above, smart chargers are built with several safety features to prevent you from shocking something that isn’t a battery, from frying your charger by touching the leads together, and to prevent you from charging a battery when the incorrect leads are connected to the incorrect battery terminals.