How to maintain your trailer tipper battery
, by O. V., 2 min reading time
Should you charge a tipper trailer battery with a high or low charging current (trickle charger)? What are the pros and cons of each? Read it here...
There is no such thing as charging too often, but charging too little is detrimental to the lifespan of the battery and also to your engine.
Save yourself the frustration by charging regularly!
Typical problems
8 out of 10 technical problems that we hear about, such as too little power to tip or irregular engine running, are related to batteries that are not recharged in time. Due to a battery voltage that is too low, a larger current flows through the carbon brushes of the engine, causing them to wear out prematurely. However, many of these problems can be prevented with good maintenance and regular recharging of the battery.
How to charge your battery?
There are two ways to charge the battery. Always make sure that the battery switch is turned on, otherwise you cannot charge.
High charging current
There are many different trickle chargers on the market, ranging from 50 EUR to 500 EUR. We recommend a model that can deliver a minimum of 6A to a maximum of 15A charging current. If a 90Ah battery is 'completely empty', it will be fully charged again in 4.5 hours at 10A.
Low charging current or trickle charger
There are also 5A chargers. These will not only take twice as long to charge, but will also be less able to 'de-sulfate' the battery.
⚠️ Daily use causes a layer of sulphate to deposit on the lead plates, which reduces electrical conductivity. ⚠️
By using a heavier charger, this sulphate layer is broken down and the lead plates are, as it were, cleaned, which only extends their lifespan.
Charging via the 13-pin plug of the trailer or not?
Conditions and use
- A battery is recharged depending on how much time one drives on the road. Some users drive only 10 minutes to a construction site, others maybe 1 hour.
- A battery is discharged depending on how many times it is tipped per day and how heavy the load is.
Charge on the go via your car
It should be noted that a constant power supply from the 13-pin plug is not an ideal power supply for charging a battery. Especially when compared to modern trickle chargers.
The trickle charger runs through a full program with different currents and voltages that regenerate the battery, giving it a longer life. This is not possible via the 13-pin plug.
We do not want to give users a false feeling that the battery will always be charged with such a solution, because this will certainly cause problems at some point.
Below is a graph of the charging cycle of a modern trickle charger:
