I purchased a RediPulse charger/maintainer for my car which I don't drive
much anymore. Leaving the charger hooked up for more than a month, I've
noticed that it doesn't do a good job of bringing the voltage up from say 7
to 12 volts very quickly at all - the way a battery quick charger would.
And that even leaving it hooked up for about 1-2 weeks, it won't keep the
battery completely charged. I have a year-old Optima red-top battery.
After talking to Pulsetech, they explained that parasitic voltage drain
might make keeping the battery fully charged unavoidable. I can buy that,
but I have a 98 VW GTI, not a newish car with lots of doodads, and I can
sometimes get a week out of the battery w/out a charger on it anyway (that
was in warmer weather though...). So I'm a bit disappointed to find that I
may still need to 'jump' the battery to get the car started if I need to
drive it.
The charger is working fine, indicator light is on, and it's putting out the
required voltage.
Are there any ways to reduce any of this parasitic voltage loss or track
down which devices might be the worst? I could pull some fuses, but that
would be a pain to plug back in considering where the fuse panel is. I
don't even leave the security system armed, no interior lights are on,
basically just the basic LCD clock and odometer are on.
Any thoughts?
Thanks,
PJ
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