Never Look For Your Battery Charger Again
By Eric Dykstra
If you want a dependable, long-lived battery, you’ve got to keep it charged — and that goes double for vehicles that see infrequent use, like boats, lawn tractors, and your babied classic car. Schumacher designed this on-board charger to be mounted inside your vehicle, close to the battery, so a topped-off battery is always just an extension cord away.
The SE-1-12S measures 2 x 8 x 9 inches and weighs about two pounds, so you can probably find room for it in all but the most cramped spaces. Like other trickle-type chargers, after it fully charges the battery it shuts off to prevent damage — it then periodically checks the voltage and applies juice as needed.
At about $30 it’s cheap reliable insurance against a dead battery.
SE-1-12S [Schumacher]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?] [B0000AXTUY] [What's This?]
July 22nd, 2008 at 2:05 pm
I prefer the Battery Tender version of onboard charger. Most battery manufacturers recommend/offer multistage chargers over simple on-off style chargers.
hXXp://toolmonger.com/2008/04/15/all-weather-battery-tending/#comments
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July 22nd, 2008 at 2:23 pm
These work great….. Had a few and love them for boats…
July 22nd, 2008 at 4:13 pm
Here we go again.
These chargers work great. I have a ten year old WestCo Marine AGM battery on the Craftsman-branded version and it’s still going strong. It’s in a car that sits all Winter and only runs a couple times a month in the Summer.
All that hoo-ha about “multistage” chargers is true; they will make a battery last longer. But if you start with a charged battery (you just ran the car, right?) and don’t need it to last 30 years, the on/off chargers will do just as well in my professional opinion and personal experience.
July 23rd, 2008 at 1:41 pm
Is this better than installing some pigtails and running to an external charger? It’s still a simple plug away from being connected, but you can charge multiple batteries with a single charger.
July 23rd, 2008 at 2:40 pm
Tony:
I assume you mean charge multiple batteries one-at-a-time, right?
I actually do that. I have pigtails on all of my cars that I use these chargers on. that way I can swap chargers around as I rotate through the herd. I use a pigtail with alligator clips for batteries not in a car. The current Sears version includes a short pigtail and alligator clips.
For the pigtails (in-fact, all my DC power systems), I’ve standardized on the Anderson PowerPoles. They are great little genderless power connectors.
July 24th, 2008 at 10:02 pm
I’ve got one of these installed on my 49′ Chevy and it’s awesome. I’m searching for the electrical short but in the mean time I never have a dead battery. Highly recommended.