How To Recondition Batteries – Rejuvenate, Restore Old, Dead Car Batteries

Can You Learn How To Recondition Batteries At Home?

When your old battery stops doing its job properly, most people will just discard it and throw it away and buy a new one. But what if you could learn how to recondition batteries and get more life out of them? With a little bit of knowledge, you can discover how to recondition car batteries at home and restore a car battery back to new! You can save a lot of money not having to buy another expensive new battery. And when you can get more life out of your batteries, you are also helping the enviroment! So it's a great hack to learning how to rejuvenate a car battery. 

How To Recondition A Car Battery

Reconditioning a car battery is not that hard and you just need a few things and some general knowledge, and you can rejuvenate your old car battery back to it's old glory!

How To Recondition Car Batteries At Home

So, instead of buying a new battery, you can learn the skills necessary on how to restore a car battery.

Here are a few Battery reconditioning hacks that you can do at home, check out the video below:

How To Recondition Old Batteries

Yes, it is possible to recondition old batteries. Here is an explaination of what can happen with old batteries

Generally, when a battery stops producing voltage , it is because the lead in the cells dissolved because of electrolysis ; and the wear caused by sulfuric acid to lead. Sometimes the sediment from the lead waste, which accumulates in the lower part of the battery, also prevents a good electrolysis from occurring; Thus, the battery is placed with a low voltage and amp output.

The first thing is to inspect the battery

 First, look on the top of the battery; in each group of cells they have a cap or lid .

Remove all plugs or caps from the top of the battery and check the acid level. The acid level of the battery has to be above the lead cells, at least one centimeter.

If you notice that the cells have a low level of acid, buy a bottle of sulfuric acid for batteries. You have to ask for batteries; Since it is mixed with a quantity of water, it needs to make a good electrolysis reaction. If you add sulfuric acid alone the chemical reaction will not work properly and the energy production will be low.

The video below tells you the easiest, step by step way of how to recondition old batteries

How To Recondition Dead Batteries

When a battery is long discharged, or very old, etc ... it is said that it has " sulfated" because basically, salts of lead and sulfur (sulfate-of-lead) are formed that adheres to the sponge plate of the negative blocking the chemical reactions. Normally, this battery is lost forever and replaced by a new one….

With a little cunning (and especially now that lead is worth three times more), old batteries even if they are not lead or gel (NiCD or Lithium ions) can still extend their useful life but how? We are going to see two methods, the first being useful only for lead batteries or Pb gel and the second method suitable for all types of batteries (Pb, Pb Gel , NiCd, Li +, etc)

The second method as we will see is the most effective and safe! It can even be useful in case of emergency to recover combinations of alkaline domestic batteries!

METHOD 1: ADD DISTILLED WATER (GEL OR LEAD BATTERIES)

Well the point is that modern lead-acid batteries or gel batteries the electrolyte is gelled and absorbed in the insulators between the plates, which instead of being rigid, are a kind of synthetic cloth, they are "maintenance free" batteries As time goes by, they dry out, just like when the car's batteries ran out of water. So the trick is to remove the rubber plugs under the lid that we already removed and replenish liquid (it can be two and up to three caps, according to the manufacturer)

To try to repair the battery you will need:

• 3 cm syringe
• Voltmeter or multimeter
• Battery charger or power supply
• The crocodile cables "used with the power supply"
• Distilled water
• For safety glasses and chemical gloves

Attention ! Do not touch the water that may come out of the battery as it is acidic that being so corrosive could cause very serious burns.

The method is valid to try to repair gel batteries, composed of acid and lead simply by adding distilled water in their cells to reactivate their original charge but it is also functional for sealed lead-acid batteries. The method works in 90% of the cases but in case of recovering it the battery will work between 50% ~ 70% of the capacity it had.

STEPS TO FOLLOW:

1. In the sealed battery we will find a cover on the top of the battery: simply remove it a little flat screwdriver until the end where we will find 3 holes covered by rubber covers. Now we have to remove this capsule too.
2. Now let's measure volts of this battery. For example it can be a reading of 0.76 volts, which means that the battery is completely dry from the inside
3. Now what we need at this stage is to fill the battery with distilled water to activate the acid again, so we have to refill it with a syringe little by little or until the water comes out of all the holes and measure the tension: yes is found to have increased in mVolts, that's good, so don't worry
4. After filling the battery with the water we need to make sure it mixes with dry acid inside the battery to reactivate it again
5. You should use any charger suitable for the battery voltage and connect it to the terminals
6. Now, wait 5 minutes until you see the bubbles come out of the holes. If there are no bubbles or they come from any of the 3 holes you can reverse negative and positive and wait 1 ~ 3 min maximum (THIS IS VERY DANGEROUS WHY YOU SHOULD BE PROTECTED AND THEREFORE YOU MUST NOT LEAVE IT ONLY OR OVERCOME THE MAXIMUM TIME OF 3 MINUTES )
7. If they leave the holes too fast as boiling cut off the power immediately and reconnect negative and positive right again
8. When the process is regularized (bubbles come out of all the holes) the process is over so you can take the unconsumed water from the top of 3 holes with a syringe and stop charging the battery
9. Do not cover the holes until the battery voltage recovers (you should check it every hour)
10. When the fabric dries, you can cover all the holes by replacing all the plugs removed in point 1
11. Congratulations your battery is working again!

If you want to know more details of this process consult

this instructable

How To Recondition Lead Acid Batteries

How to repair an old battery of your car, lead and acid Yes, you can successfully learn how to recondition lead acid batteries. That's right, the battery of your car works with lead electrodes and aqueous solution (electrolyte - H2SO4-), 10% sulfuric acid.

If you have a lead/acid automotive battery or other battery that is not working properly, you can repair it yourself. Lead-acid batteries deteriorate more often because sulfur builds up in the lead plates of the battery, corroding and blocking the flow of electric current. You can use a common household chemical, magnesium sulfate (Epsom or English salts -Mg SO4-7H2O-) can be found in pharmacies or stores.

To repair a lead-acid battery. If you follow the proper procedure, the magnesium sulfate will remove the sulfur and the battery will return to normal operation.

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Be very careful with this step........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ Heat one and a half liters of distilled water to 150 degrees F (65.55 degrees Celcius) and add 7 or 8 ounces (200 - 250 gr approx.) of Epsom salts. Stir until the Epsom salts or English salt dissolve completely.

Remove the battery caps and carefully drain the water from the battery. If you have a sealed (low-maintenance) battery, look for access points (also called shadow plugs). Insert a funnel and pour in enough Epsom salt solution to fill the cell. Repeat until each cell is filled.

Replace the battery caps.

4. Shake the battery vigorously for one minute to make sure the solution spreads through each cell.

5. Place the battery in a charger and let it charge slowly for 24 hours. To completely repair a lead-acid battery, you will need to fully charge it several times over the next few days. This is done by running it in the car.

  Why do the battery cells sulfate?

Here is a bit more technical jargon of why batteries become dead.

Lead Sulfate

During the download, the loading processes are reversed. Lead (IV) oxide is reduced to lead (II) sulfate while lead is oxidized to also give lead (II) sulfate. The exchanged electrons are used in the form of electric current by an external circuit. It is therefore a switching (combination in a controlled manner).

The elementary processes that occur are the following:

PbO2 + 2 H2SO4 + 2 e- -> 2 H2O + PbSO4 + SO42-

Pb + SO42- -> PbSO4 + 2 e-

In the discharge the concentration of sulfuric acid decreases because lead sulfate is created and the amount of water released in the reaction increases. Since the concentrated sulfuric acid has a density greater than the diluted sulfuric acid, the density of the acid can serve as an indicator for the state of charge of the device.

However, this process cannot be repeated indefinitely because, when lead sulphate forms very large crystals, they no longer respond well to the indicated processes, thereby losing the reversibility characteristic, which is said to have been sulphated and it is necessary to replace it.

Fastcharge or slow charge?

The charging or recharging action is vital to ensure that you have a battery always ready for service. Here our drummer tip:
The dilemma often arises about what is best for a battery recharge operation: Fast or slow? There are certain myths, such as the fact that fast charging allows saving energy.

But: What is fast charge or slow charge?

Charging is the process that allows us to have a battery ready and operational for use. The charging speed will be fast if we can obtain a charged battery up to 75% of its capacity in a time of say an hour, an hour and a half. And it will be slow if the charging period to get that same 75% exceeds four hours.

Now, not only the amount of current that the charger injects into the battery will determine how fast or slow the process is. It also counts the size of the battery that is charged and its relation to the current delivered by the charger. For example, 20 amps of current is a fast charge for a 35 Ah battery (Amp-hours), but these same 20 amps would be a slow charge for a 200 Ah battery.

A slow charge operation means that the charger starts its recharging process at a current range in amps that at most equals 1/10 of the battery's Ah capacity. Example for one of 100 Ah, the slow charge starts at a current of 10 amps, or even less.

A 'Fast Charge' may be the alternative in emergencies, but if possible it should be avoided since heat is generated inside the battery, and excessive heat without control is always harmful. In addition, a fast charge fails to "fill" 100% to a battery, the charge must be completed by the electrical circuit of the vehicle where the battery is installed.

Conclusion: If possible, always charge your battery in slow mode.

In Brief: For 12.5V batteries, charge at maximum 2.5 - 3.5 A for 8, 16 or 24 hours. , depending on each case.

In summary. The charge of the acid battery (sealed or filler) is in 3 stages.
- Stage 1: Constant current load. From 5-8 hours, the battery is charged at 70% capacity.

- Stage 2: Top Load: 7-10 Hours. To recover the remaining 30%.

- Stage 3: Floating Load. To compensate for self-discharge and keep the battery at full charge. If the charger does not have this floating charge characteristic, the maximum charging time of a closed acid battery should not exceed 48 Hrs. to avoid leakage due to overload, because sealed batteries are less tolerant of overload than filler batteries.

How To Recondition A Battery At Home PDF

So, for the easiest follow along methods on how to recondition batteries, you'll learn the best hacks and methods of how to rejuvenate your old car batteries visit the link below to watch the video: