Battery maintainer

[Wingover]

Curious if anyone has a trickle charger for the 24v battery that is solar powered and connected through the cigarette lighter?  Plane will be outside for a few months and looking to keep the battery charged.

[Fly Boomer]

17 minutes ago, Wingover said:

Curious if anyone has a trickle charger for the 24v battery that is solar powered and connected through the cigarette lighter?  Plane will be outside for a few months and looking to keep the battery charged.

That's a tough situation.  I take it you won't be near the airplane or able to fly it periodically?  I just bought a pair of batteries, and I would be reluctant to plug something in that pushes juice into the batteries whenever the sun shines.

[Kelpro999]

55 minutes ago, Wingover said:

Curious if anyone has a trickle charger for the 24v battery that is solar powered and connected through the cigarette lighter?  Plane will be outside for a few months and looking to keep the battery charged.

Is that outlet even connected with master switch off?

[Fritz1]

The first thing you will need is a charge plug to access the battery in the cabin. There are so called airframe interface kits that go with the battery minder, they use Anderson plugs which are legal to install. There are 24V solar boat chargers, the cutoff voltage and temperature profile should adapted to the specific battery used in the aircraft. Will require some research

[Marc_B]

If it's gonna be dormant for a month or two, what about just removing the battery and keeping it at home on a Battery Minder?  Or at the airport with a hangar neighbor?

[Rick Junkin]

VDC, the BatteryMinder people, make a 12/24V solar charger. I plan to buy one at KOSH this year. It doesn’t work through the aux power socket but it’s a quality option.

https://www.batteryminders.com/products/

Bottom of the page.

Cheers,
Rick

[JoeM]

My plane sits outside so I bought a solar BatteryMinder to match my Concorde 12v and connected it to the battery with Anderson connectors. I use the connectors to power my poor mans Air Conditioner (converted igloo cooler) when it's not connected to the solar charger. It has kept my new Concorde well charged for over a year so far. Of course, this requires an A&P to sign off.  

 

[Wingover]

Thanks for all the answers.  I guess it was late and I posted this in the "Pre-J" instead of "modern".  The plane sometimes sits for two weeks and I wasn't sure if it's better to keep the battery above certain voltage to extend it's life.  Not sure how much it drains in two weeks.

[Pinecone]

Solar Battery Minders for Aviation.  Models for Concorde, Gill, and Odessey.

BatteryMINDers by Voltage: Solar Batteries

[Fly Boomer]

7 hours ago, Wingover said:

Thanks for all the answers.  I guess it was late and I posted this in the "Pre-J" instead of "modern".  The plane sometimes sits for two weeks and I wasn't sure if it's better to keep the battery above certain voltage to extend it's life.  Not sure how much it drains in two weeks.

If it goes down noticeably in two weeks, something is wrong.

[Wingover]

Okay, new to me plane so can't tell so far but wasn't sure what is normal in terms of battery when letting a plane sit unused