Tank Slap - Motorcycle Forum

How often do you charge your battery ?? Mines on a trickle charge all of the time

As per my other thread, looks like my battery is fried .... have I over charged it ?

I used a trickle charger on my last bike to top up occasionally, but that had an alarm.

Since I have had this bike, no alarm, I have never put it on charge. I checked recently after it had not moved for a month but the trickle charger still wasnt needed.

Is yours a sealed battery or one that needs topping up with water, Spudda?

I have been told that those that need topping up will fry with trickle chargers on all the time.

Personally i don't leave mine charging all the time as i don't think any battery should need charging all the time.

Sealed Duke

Over winter I never even had it on charge (have an alarm) then thought I'd better charge it ready for none icy roads weather. I charged it once over night and started using the bike. Since then I've started using the bike everyday so I don't bother charging it.

No idea then, Spudda.

But i still don't see why a battery needs to be on charge all the time.

Fwiw I have a couple of Optimates, and use them all the time. On the bikes I don't use I have the batteries daisy-chained on an Optimate to maintain them & avoid them becoming sulphated.
They seem to last very well, no side effects & no failures.
What type of trickle charger are you using mate,.?

I never put the battery on trickle charge, just disconnect it and take it off when the bike goes away in winter - then when it's ready to go back on the road I just charge before putting it back on the bike.

StMarks wrote: What type of trickle charger are you using mate,.?

Its the Oximiser

Optimate here, interestingly I bought a battery from a company on Ebay a few years back and they enclosed a sheet of paper regarding use of trickle chargers. Essentially they claimed that modern trickle chargers of the Optimate style "wore" a battery out with the constant charge/discharge, and consequently anyone using one of these chargers on a battery supplied by them would invalidate the battery warranty, how they expected to find out I don't know, and I'm fairly sure trading standards may not agree with statements like that, however I only mention it as I'd never heard of this before or since. Anyone else?

I have got an optimate 4 charger that I used for the zx10 and always had it plugged in,never had a problem in the 3 years I had it..