Pulse Charger Controller

check wikipedia. they'll know. or google

What battery type?

is there any solution for reduce battery desulphation.and increses battery life

This is an answer to your post with regard to Lead Acid batteries only......

Yes, many companies market such devices and for the hobbyist, there are practical circuits to build. But none of these are chargers, but can be combined with a charger if needed....

Many Lead Acid battery chargers seriously damage batteries when used (sulphation is part of the problem caused by over discharging and waiting too long to recharge)......

Batteries must be carefully/correctly charged, used, discharged and recharged...for a long useful life....

I do an extensive amount of work on yachts that are used for full time cruising and therefore are "living on 12 volts" As a Marine Engineering Tech and a sailor that has lived on 12 volts for the past 8 years I have seen and replaced or repaired many different battery types, and charging systems, using voltage regulators, battery splitters, isolators, solar and wind charging systems, you name it. I have removed charge pulse controllers off of many boats. Personally I think they are gimmicks. The reason for the removal is that they have caused the destruction of the batteries. One case that was using 12 6VDC gel batteries in series and parallel supplying 1320 amp hours @ 12VDC used a pulse charge controller to maintain the batteries while the boat was left un-attended at a marina or boat yard. When the owner returned to the boat at which time was located in Grenada the gel batteries were bulged or ruptured. The "pulse charge controller" was a recent ad on and the batteries were 5 years old. The "pulse charge controller" was removed as suspect and new batteries installed. The problem never returned. I use the exact same Gel batteries. They are 8 years old and still in top condition.

The key to deep cycle battery longevity is to have a battery monitoring system that will allow you to monitor the battery status in amp/hrs used. The batteries should be no more than 50% discharged before recharging . For example if the battery bank is 1320 amp/hrs they should be charged when the amp/hrs consumed reaches -660 amp/hrs. This reduces short cycling (frequent charge & discharging) and over draining the batteries. Monitoring voltage is not a reliable gauge of the battery status. A high amp output charging system is also needed ( this reduces the time it takes to charge the battery bank which may mean running a generator or engine driven alternator consuming valuable fuel or energy) The charging system must be designed and set for the exact chemistry of the battery banks i.e.; lead acid, gel or AGM batteries. Do not mix battery chemistries in the same bank. Improper charge rates especially under charging with low amp output charging system will eventually cause the batteries to sulfate. All battery chemistries will sulfate. If maintained promptly the sulfated batteries can be restored by equalizing to de-sulphate. All batteries chemistries can be equalized regardless of what the manufacture may recommend. Manufactures of AGM and Gel batteries for liability reasons tell you not to equalize because the batteries are sealed and a rise in temperature caused by the increased equalizing charge voltage (16VDC on a 12 volt system) can cause the battery to explode. In all cases the battery temperature should be closely monitored for the entire equalization period. (4 hours or more).

An excellent reference on equalization and battery husbandry is "Boatowner's Mechanical and Electrical Manual" by Nigel Calder.

You would be the "go to' guy in the field for finding the right equipment for boating reliability. Keeping it simple is the way to go on the high seas.

It sounds like the pulse chargers and the people who installed them were not very smart. They did not consider the boater's unique environment when selecting the equipment. If they had, there would have been no problem. It is good to take such technology away from them.

Personally I would steer clear of using some electronics in the tropical boater's harsh environment.

About 25 years ago a fellow made "Look at the gages reminders" for boats using a component that was not forgiving of load dump transients. I added a suppression circuit to his design and all was well.

His problem was with the same component used with old VWs under-the-dash electronic fuel pump pressure controller that I had seen several years before.

Jon

go to the website www.craftskills.biz/pulse-charger.htm

l

Good website.

Read this: http://www.powerdesignersusa.com/pdf/Tech%20Brief%20Negative%20Pulse%20Charging%20Techniques%20Myths%20&%20Facts%20-%20Final.pdf

kvsubramanyam; Excellent source of information as it was research by a non-manufacturer of the Pulse devices. The other links are bios as they are claims from the manufacture of the devices. As I stated at the beginning of this thread from my experience in the industry " I think they are gimmicks" Regardless of what environment these device are installed. Ship board installations are in clean dry spaces. So simply stating that this technology did not work on the yachts because of the harsh environment is not valid.

I thought that these discussions are supposed to be intellectual from knowledgeable individuals; simply posting a web site of a products manufacture is not a discussion and is meaningless as it is bios information designed to sell.

Empirical data, testing and experience is the only valid knowledge base.

As State by kvsubramanyam link

Nasser Kutkut, Ph.D. - PowerDesigners, LLC - Madison, WI

"There has been no scientific conclusive evidence to any of their claimed benefits as compared to standard constant current charging schemes."

Dear Masterblaster,

I am working for a LA battery manufacturing unit as maintenance head. I am also very much interested in new development of energy efficient charger design etc that I undertake during my personal time. But most people who try to put sincere end up without success because of commercial reasons.

For example: one of customer requirement for 60000Ah battery is like this: He wants read discharger current xxxxx.x Amps with 0.1 % resolution. With the required resolution the meter need not have so many digits at all!

What I mean to say is good inventions fail because some companies do not want that technology as their profits will be less.

Theoretically:
Any charger or charging system may have an equal potential for gathering the information from sensors that is needed to monitor voltage, resistance, temperature, specific gravity, and other parameters, depending on whether or not the manufacturer decides the cost is worth the benefit for that unit.

Constant current chargers are often switched from a high initial current circuit to a "trickle" charge (very low current) upon reaching a certain level of some value, typically the voltage. Voltage is NOT a dependable (or more accurately, not a "complete") indication of the true level of charge or condition of the battery, but it is the easiest parameter to measure and will typically stand in as a general substitute for more precise and accurate indications, such as specific gravity.

A charger with the correctly monitored parameters and correctly controlled output of DC current that is pulsed, rather than constant current, can be modulated to match the battery conditions. All pulsed chargers do not take advantage of this, but the potential is there to follow the battery (or battery bank) curve of charge acceptance.

Ideally, any charger will limit initial current, rather than simply set the output voltage and allow a deeply discharged battery to suck maximum current available, which results in overheating and other issues. It will then reduce the current as the charge level rises to maintain an "optimum" charging curve that prevents overcharging to prevent damage to the battery cells and off-gassing of oxygen and hydrogen.

Optimally, some of the large sulfate deposits would break loose from the cell plate surfaces and return to solution, as this sulfate coating buildup is typically what causes end-of-life symptoms for any cell in the battery.
Constant-current charging typically does NOT do this, as the voltage is typically at or slightly above the rated voltage for the battery, which is insufficient to reduce existing sulfate deposits. The sulfate deposits, possibly even individual "crystals" are grown in this environment until that location gets deposits large enough that it simply cannot be "charged" back into usable physical and chemical condition to support an electrolyte potential charge and deliver it between terminals. The metal of the plate cannot "see" the electrolyte, and some of the molecules that were in solution are now crystallized solid deposits.

Now, if only we could chemically or electrically find a way to get those large deposits broken down and get those nasty Sulfur atoms back into an acid solution to keep our electrolyte molecules healthy, right? Even if we could just find a way to keep the inevitable sulfate deposits as tiny seed crystals, keep them evenly dispersed, and prevent them from growing or kick them back off the plates during each charging cycle. Hmmm.
I believe that's what is being attempted by providing high current over longer "equalization" cycles, which has some positive effect as higher temperature and maintained current maximizes the benefit - so long as no damage occurs.

This challenge would appear to be what continues to lead battery researchers to look at changes in metal alloys, electrolyte chemical compositions, and alternative plate surface textures and thicknesses, as well as keeping charger researchers busy looking at "what else" other than simply applying some higher voltage might do this more effectively and efficiently, without causing explosive gases to form...

Pulsed charging would then appear to be the solution that has the 'potential' to allow higher voltage, at lower amperage, to be used as a means of achieving a customized current delivery to the plates. ANY charger, pulsed or not, can be paired with better sensing of the parameters mentioned above to achieve "better" charging, but there is also a tendency for the pulsed chargers to actually come with all of this included to perform the monitoring of things like battery terminal temperature and average current in order to provide this better level of control, and thereby more effective and fuller charging cycles.

Of note, there is one other (probably patented) claim out there that I have seen that 'may' have some merit, even theoretically. 'What if' there were some way to identify a frequency, voltage, and minimum current that would cause some kind of resonance at the molecular level to increase the benefits of having this modulating-capable pulse-charging system? I believe that is what they are doing with the PulseTech system that attempts to match or tailor some kind of waveform or frequency that they believe does a 'better' job of matching what the sulfate molecules respond to, in order to reduce their size or change their crystallization in some way to allow the plates to recover and remain cleaner, thereby increasing all of the performance factors that rely on cleaner plates.
Note that some of their documented results will likely be the same as the documented results of any well-managed charger, particularly pulsed systems, as that is what they are doing.
Whether or not the particular selection of frequency and waveform adds some marginally better plate maintanence than others, that is their claim. I haven't personally seen any 3rd party proof of that, just evidence that a good pulse system that monitors the battery as it charges is much better than a 'dumb' current charger. Well, "of course," as 'smart' current-based chargers are also better than 'dumb' ones.

So what would be more interesting to me is the incremental increase in performance, not simply "better than the dumb constant current cheapo model." If you are looking for some commercial partner to study pulsed charger circuits of some kind, they may be a good place to start asking.