First, let me say that this charger performs flawlessly and deserves five stars when it is in charging mode. I have used it for three years and hundreds of successful charging cycles on a dozen different batteries of various sizes and types.
However, on two different occasions and with two different batteries (both brand new when hooked to the charger) I left them in "trickle charge" mode. The batteries were part of an emergency communications station that must to be ready at any time with full batteries. This charger burned up both batteries after three months of trickle charging. This mode is supposed to allow a battery to be hooked up indefinitely and maintain it at peak performance. Not destroy it. Other folks in the emergency communications service use other chargers and leave them in trickle mode for years. DO NOT use this charger for that kind of operation. Schumacher SSC-1000A SpeedCharge Battery Charger/Maintainer with 50-Amp Battery Clips
Battery chargers and I have never gotten along. I actually once sold, what turned out to be, a perfectly good old snow plow truck because I thought something serious was wrong with the engine. The charger showed the battery was good, so I figured it had to be the engine and it was too old and rusty to put more money into it. The guy came to pick it up, gave me $200...stuck a new battery in it, and drove it away. It was a bad charger not a bad battery.
Recently, using what I thought was a more reliable charger, I couldn't get my batteries to fully charge. Rather than blaming the batteries this time, I purchased the Schumacher. I read good things about the brand on the web and took the plunge. I couldn't be happier. This is a hi-tech charger with all the bells and whistles. It is "stupid proof" as well, and lets you know what is going on as it charges. I love it! I am now able to fully charge all my batteries, and the other charger went into the trash. I highly recommend this automatic speed charger.
Build Quality:
* Great build quality. Has the look and feel of a well engineered product, not some cheap stuff.
* I smiled when I lifted it first as it wasn't feather light and appeared to have decent enough weight to it - an indication of a decent power supply.
* This one seems to be rated for marine use and hence should be more resistant to corrosion.
* The connector cables are thick enough and the clamps have enough spring action/grip to them to securely lock on a battery terminal.
Design:
* Very user friendly with direct 1 touch access to most features.
* I liked the case design. Has a neat little pocket to store the power chord and the connecting cables. The chord and the cables do need to be tightly rolled up first before they can fit in the pocket.
* It's got a neat little handle that you can use to hang it up on the wall. Neat design if battery charging is something that you do more frequently and want to have the unit easily accessible, ready to use but out of the way off the floor.
Features:
Well, I haven't used it extensively enough (Used only twice since I got it a month back), but here are some features that were used (and so experienced) when I used the charger:
* Shows level of charge on a battery - both in percentage as well as volts. Big readout makes it easy to read all the numbers.
* Has user selectable 2/6/10 amp charging options - good for most batteries. Would have liked a 1 amp option as well (for smaller motorcycle batteries), but then that's a different product from Schumacher. The 2 amp option, though slightly higher than recommended, worked great for the motorcycle battery though. So this unit really allows charging a wide range of batteries- for motorcycles, cars, boats. Nice to have just one charger around rather then 1 for each type of vehicle/battery.
* The electronics worked just as mentioned. Once I selected the primary amp setting, everything else was handled automatically by the charger electronics. It switched to a trickle mode charge automatically once the battery was completely charged. Neat feature, keeps your batteries from being damaged by overcharging.
* Has a desulfation mode that desulfates a battery. Of the two instances when I used this charger, it kicked into this mode on my car battery which was completely drained and was left in the completely discharged state for quite some time that resulted in sulfation in the battery. This charger automatically detected this state of the battery and desulfated it first and then automatically switched to charging mode once the battery was desulfated and accepted charge. (I will be honest with you - I don't really know the chemistry and process behind this, but I have read that sulfation can render a battery useless)
* Has a cooling fan to keep the charger cool. Not exactly whisper quiet, but not something that's louder than expected (YMMV) for the application.
Reliability:
Have only owned it for a month and used it twice, so can't really comment on long term reliability. But it has worked perfectly on the two instances I had to use it including it's "automatic" features. So, for the price (I got it when it was about 50% of MSRP at Amazon), it's one awesome, feature-rich charger. - Smart Charger - Automotive - Automatic Battery Charger - Battery Chargers'
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