Two Steps to Revive Car Batteries
Uses for Dead Batteries and Sealed Lead Acid Batteries
Many “dead” car batteries are actually perfectly good batteries. They just can no longer provide the hundreds of amps needed to start a car.
Many “dead” sealed lead acid batteries are actually un-dead batteries that can no longer reliably provide a couple of hundred watts of power needed to keep a computer running in a power outage.
A couple of years ago, I decided to add another small solar panel to the collection I have on my roof. I have a 5-, and 10-watt.
This new one is a 20-watt — dedicated to providing emergency power for lighting, a small fan, and other miscellaneous small low voltage devices.
For this setup, I needed a battery since it would need to be able to provide power 24 hours a day. I decided an un-dead car battery would be perfect since the largest load it would need to power for an extended period of time would be less than one half an amp.
There is quite a difference between 200 – 600 amps and a half an amp. The battery pictured was one I replaced when it would no longer start my car.
Step 1: Charging the Battery
I could have used a linear regulator to charge the battery with the solar panel. The cost of a linear regulator is typically less than a dollar.
Linear Regulator Definition: This is an electronic system used to keep the voltage stable. Learn more about it here.
I decided to go with a charge controller instead because they more efficiently use the available power to charge the battery. You get more run time at night when you use a charge controller.
Step 2: The Test Fan
I did some extensive testing to make sure I knew how well the system would work in an extended power outage. I ran the fan for several weeks, 24 hours a day a couple of summers ago.
The system worked fine. Since then I have been running LED lighting out on the patio 24 hours a day for about two years.
The fan pictured is a 10” 12 volt, 5 watts, a 2-speed fan that was on clearance at Walmart. They still sell them, but it was the end of the season. I have three or four of them.
The LED board has 16 led lights. The battery is not even hardly trying to power this tiny 1-watt load.
To a survivalist, most things have some form of survival uses from soda cans to dead batteries. So just keep old car batteries in your stash and learn how to revive a dead car battery.
You only need to take these tips to revive car batteries and get something out of them once more!
Source: Survival Life
