Battery Desulfation

[gbaumgratz]

Has anyone toyed with this? With all the batteries that I use and the required replacement every few years I started doing more than browsing over the holidays and studied a few of the methods touted by those in the wind and solar energy arena in an attempt to keep their batteries going. Of course, batteries with shorted cells (mostly uncommon compared to sulfation) are not candidates and cannot be fixed. Seems as though there are two ways that most are doing this.

First a chemical removal process using tetrasodium EDTA in most severe cases by dumping the electrolyte, filling with a solution of EDTA, soaking, dumping, and repeating until the reaction no longer occurs indicating that the desulfation has been completed.

Second is through an high frequency/high voltage electronic pulsing that basically breaks the crystalline bonds of the lead sulfate over time.

Anyway, I have a couple of batteries that are nearing the end of their life that are rather expensive to replace so I think I will do a little experimentation. Nothing lost I suppose. Just wondered if anyone had done reading or experimenting with this before and eanted to share any results? I've got one battery filled with the solution currently that will sit all night to see what happens. I'll report back with any results. I'll be building a pulser as well to try out on another battery as well.

For anyone interested in reading that hasn't done so already, here's one link:
http://www.alton-moore.net/batteries.html

[Smithers]

I have a really crazy battery charger that does all of the desulfation stuff. I assume it does a good job as all my batteries are working great. I use the Battery Tender on all my 12v and 6v motorcycle batteries but when I need the super charge I pull out the Inteli-Power charger made by these guys: http://progressivedyn.com/prod_detai...ge_wizard.html

I know some of my regular cheap style batteries are around 4-5 years old and still kickin so I'm happy with my charging and maintenance devices.