(ET) Battery Testers and Desulfators

["Eric & Tracie Miller" <ewmiller erols com>]

In responds to Steve's questions,

 Testing 6 volt batteries at 75 amps has nothing to do with "reserve
capacity".  The Batteries are the primary and "only" source of electrical
power in an EV, ET or golf car and so they can not be the   reserve source
of electrical power also. The origin of why a 75 amp draw is used to 
measure
the 6 volt batteries is that 75 amps is the average amperage a 36 volt golf
car will draw from the batteries. Using the 75 amp draw best simulates a
golf car's performance and so can tell you how many "holes" the golf car 
can
go.

   As far as battery testers and cycle testers there seems to some 
confusion
here. A cycle tester will discharge a battery at a predetermined amperage
and measures the elapsed time. The battery is then charged and the whole
process is repeated. A cycle tester will give you the number of cycles a
battery is good for. What Steve is looking for is a discharge tester. This
is the tester I spoke of in my previous posting and is not a cycle tester.
The discharge tester I have is made by Lester who also builds battery
chargers and it was not expensive. Since I do enough battery work it was
worth the while to have one. I don't recommend everyone going out and 
buying
one but it would pay for local EV clubs to have one for the whole chapter 
to
use. It can discharge 36 volt battery packs at 75 amps and dicharge a 48
volt system at 56 amps. The tester automaticaly keeps track of the elapsed
time of the test for you so you can just turn on the tester and come back
when it is done. Once the tester is done you can turn it back on and check
the  voltage of each battery while they are under a load to find any weak
ones. You can also down load the data from the discharge tester and do a
print out of it. These discharge testers can be purchased through golf car
dealers or Lester.
  On to desulfators. Can we say sulfation occurs in idle batteries and not
so much in batteries that are used and recharged daily? This being true
would tell us that having a desulfator on an electric car that is driven
almost daily would not make a big difference in extending the battery's 
life
or returning it to it's original capacity. But if we were to install a
desulfator on an electric vehicle that is not used daily were sulfation is
more likely to occur (like an Elec-trak) would we be more inclined to see a
difference by regaining some of the battery's lost capacity? My opinion 
here
would be if the vehicle is used and recharged often, (daily), it would not
be worth the expense since sulfation is not a major problem here. Now if 
you
have a electric vehicle that sits idle for long periods of time where
sulfation can occur and you are concerned with keeping the batteries up to
capacity a desulfator may be ideal for you. I have heard people with
desulfators on their cars say they noticed no difference. But I have heard
from some one that a desulfator helped return some of the lost capacity in
his ET batteries. It kind of makes sense, how about any of  you?

                                        Eric