![]() The symptoms are the same as a battery with sulfation. The same is true of a battery that isn’t used for a long period of time. In a battery that is consistently undercharged, the water and less concentrated acid has a tendency to stratify and rise to the top of the solution, separating from the more concentrated acid. In a perfect world, when batteries are fully recharged each day, the water is fully converted back to acid and the mixture remains homogeneous. Stratifi cation happens because the acid is heavier than water and settles to the bottom, or perhaps more accurately, the water floats to the top. If sulfation ever builds up enough to bridge the gap between any two lead plates, the plates will short and the battery will be a goner.Īnother problem that occurs with flooded batteries is stratification. This is called sulfation.Īs the amount of sulfation increases, the battery will begin to discharge more quickly and the battery voltage will increase much more quickly during the charging state than when the battery was new. As this cycle is repeated-discharge, followed by a partial recharge-more and more of the lead sulfate crystals build up, reducing the effective capacity of the battery. Once the crystals are hardened, the charging current can no longer convert the crystals back to sulfuric acid. Instead, batteries aren’t typically returned to a fully charged state, and some of the lead sulfate crystals remain on the lead plates, where they harden with time. The battery is fully charged when all the lead sulfate crystals and water molecules have been converted back into their two original components: sulfuric acid and lead dioxide. ![]() As the electrons leave the battery to power an LED reading lamp or a water pump, the lead sulfate crystals continue to accumulate on the plate, and the sulfuric acid becomes diluted with water.Ĭharging the battery reverses the process, forcing electrons back into the mix, and converting the lead sulfate crystals back into sulfuric acid. When a load is placed on a charged battery, the lead dioxide plate reacts with the acid, leaving a lead sulfate crystal on the plate, producing a hydrogen and an oxygen ion (which makes a water molecule) and releasing an electron. But the good news is that there is something you can do about it, a process called equalization.Īll lead acid batteries, whether flooded, AGM, or gel batteries, depend on a chemical reaction between sulfuric acid and lead to produce an electrical potential or voltage. That performance decline shows in batteries that appear to charge and discharge much more quickly than when they were new. The performance of traditional lead acid batteries will soon begin to decline if this cycle is repeated often enough. Sure, charging current from an engine-driven alternator or dedicated generator helps, but typically either is run only an hour or two each day, if that, which brings the batteries to only 80 to 90 percent of full charge. But the same batteries aboard boats that spend a lot of time disconnected from shorepower get discharged and then only partially recharged by solar panels and wind generators-they lead a hard life and often die prematurely. Lead acid house batteries aboard boats that spend most of their time in a slip and connected to shorepower-they’ve got it easy. ![]() Equalizing batteries can improve performance and extend their lifespan.
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