BATTERY CHARGERS?

[weggl]

You blokes out there no more than I do about battery charges, so here is the question.
My charger died so I purchased a new on a 10-amp variety. What voltage should it be across the outlet in an open circuit condition? This charger is 11.32 v, when hooked to the battery (a very large one, one that runs my boat trolling motor and will run for hours at 40 amps) the voltage is 12.2. I hooked it up to a battery that was somewhat flat and the volts were 12.49.
With the charger hooked to the large battery and the battery connected to the electrolyser the terminal voltage of the electrolyser is 11.5 v. the electrolyser with 26% SHO at this voltage is 5.2 amps.
So is this charger any good? What would the expected current be connected to a vehicle with the alternator running?
You can see that at the moment I do not have the luxury of a variable voltage supply.
Warren

[glenn_aircooled]

- I would expect the 10 Amp charger to put out more than that.
- The low initial open terminal V is quite fine I believe with these modern
battery chargers - as they have some sort of protection built in that
reduces output until connected to a battery.
- the different V 's from the charger is expected from different loads
but I really would expect more Amps out of it.
- in the car you will get somewhere about 13.8 V from the Alternator.
- this makes a difference to the Current draw - it will suck more in the car.

[weggl]

Thanks Glenn for the swift reply. Maybe I didn’t word it properly; the unit is set to run at 5 amps I think the charger will supply 10. It was the low voltage on open circuit I was concerned about. I wanted to get the unit up to around 13.5 volts so I could get a handle on what production would be close to a in car installation.
As I have not yet learnt how to post pics on the site yet I am restricted to emailing them to you.
I will send you tonight a drawing of how I ran a cable from each plate.
I have just finished a 6 cell unit plater 6â€

[chemelec]

[quote="weggl"]Thanks Glenn for the swift reply. Maybe I didn’t word it properly; the unit is set to run at 5 amps I think the charger will supply 10. It was the low voltage on open circuit I was concerned about. I wanted to get the unit up to around 13.5 volts so I could get a handle on what production would be close to a in car installation.
As I have not yet learnt how to post pics on the site yet I am restricted to emailing them to you.
I will send you tonight a drawing of how I ran a cable from each plate.
I have just finished a 6 cell unit plater 6â€