why are bike batteries so easy to kill?

My younger son has a scooter that he had in shop for 1.5 weeks... it comes back with dead battery - not sure it is salvageable as yet...

Why are they finicky / easy to kill?

Yeshua's dad

 

There's not a whole lot of surface area to the plates inside the Battery. When the Battery is dormant for a long period without the Specific Gravity of the Fluid maintained to keep the plates in a state where they can chemically react as they should; they deteriorate and lose the the ability to chemically create and store energy.

Small Battery's need to stay charged or be maintained at a Specific Gravity that allows the chemical actions to continue. Once they fall below that level for a length of time the process to maintain "A working Specific Gravity" is lessened and a vicious cycle that reduces the overall effectiveness of the needed chemical reaction is further reduced until the battery becomes unable to be charged and not able to store enough energy to satisfy the current demands to power much of anything.

Although it does not require a great deal of charging current to maintain the the Specific Gravity; attaching a charger to the battery is often very inconvenient do to their locations and moderate difficulty imposed on attaching charging leads to the Battery Terminals.

A very few manufacturers supply "Pigtails" to facilitate battery charging.
To few.
So the battery gets left uncharged instead of receiving a maintenance boost.

And the cycle to destroy that battery; and sell you a new one ... begins!

 

In the past i have used a trickle charger to keep my battery's active. These plug right into your wall and take the battery from 5% up to 100% and down again the whole time their plugged in. Its been working good for me so far.

 

Yeah, what Rick said. I lost a perfectly good camcorder battery that way, by letting it sit idle for too long. Probably a grunch of bike batteries before that.

 

I keep both of my bikes on smart chargers and the batteries last for years.

I use an EverStart 1.5 amp charger and a Black & Decker 1 - 2 amp charger.

Both came with pigtails that I installed on the bike batteries. All I have to do is lift the seat on my Seca to plug in the chager.

They are about $18 each at Wal-mart and worth every penny.

 

For Replacement batteries I suggest: House Alarm (or other unknown to me electronic uses) Sealed Lead /Acid Batteries from an Electronics supply house.
These are Gel Cells and come in a very extensive variety of sizes/capacities. Mine is an exact fit, size and amperage. They run approx $15 and have proven to outlast "standard' Moto batteries by at least 2 to 1.

 

I put all my batteries that are seasonally out of service on maintainers. I just replaced the battery on the lawn tractor, 8 years old!

 

I have tried the Pigtail method and the "Take it out and bring it inside on a charger method".

My problem is the Shop isn't heated. So when it gets cold the Battery gets cold; too.

That knocks for a loop.
I'm pretty much used to not getting more than 2-seasons out of a battery.
It's one of the costs to living in New England.

 

I was told that the battery loses 1% of its charge each day . and that i n 3 to 4 months the battery will be dead if you do not use it.

i was also told that in times of non use put the battery on a 1 amp trickle charge, if you do this you shouldn't have to buy a battery for a few years.

but my idea is to get a solar charger

http://www.batterystuff.com/solar-chargers/SP60-12.html