They are available and incomparable to common cyclable car jar 24, 27, 29, and golf car batteries.
Comparing any other flooded battery to an R & S is much like comparing a Yugo to a Rolls Royce.
Or a genuine Trace (now magnum) inverter to a Heart Interface or Xantrex.
I have WASTED more than two hundred dollars in fuel and countless hours of my time battling with retards over dead cells. The R & S batteries cost more but enough with the Ginsu knives, bring out the Henckel!
I REALLY tried to make these fit my budget. I even lowered my desired amp hours by ~400 or so to make them work but no joy. They're just too much money.
Ahh heck scott, I took a group 29 in, with a cell showing 1.100 to Wal-Mart and a pimple faced kid grabs a $19.95 100 amp resistive analog "load tester" clips it on, flips the switch for three seconds and pronounces "It's in the green; it's still good". World War III followed. The assistant manager finally waddled up.
I open my Halliburton case, grab my Francis Freas lab hydrometer and 800 amp adjustable carbon pile load tester. The manager freaked and the kid ran. I walked out with a new battery.
I call Optima battery in Colorado and identify myself as a battery design engineer. I am trying to condition a set of 16 group 31 Optimas. They hand me over to that whom claims to be an engineer. After a half hour of dancing in circles with the young man who had no idea who peukert was, and thought Kirchhoff's circuit laws had something to do with not driving on Sunday, I blew up.
They finally transferred me to a "real" engineer and we had a most enlightening talk for a half hour. I was then able to meticulously craft a top charge regimen for the 31's and regained around 27% in amp hour capacity out of a bank of batteries on a Swan sloop on the hook in Mexico. When he hung up I could hear several other hangups. Someone was checking to see if their engineer was giving away the family jewels. BTW "Optima" is a Johnson Controls Company and all of their batteries are manufactured in Monterrey, Mexico.
I do not suffer fools at all, never mind lightly. It comes with getting old, crankier, and having had it "My Way" for many years in my own company. That's what impressed me about TRACE. They knew what they were doing and the beancounters did not seem to rule the roost. At least not until Xantrex bought Trace.
They are only 318 lbs each, so his pin wt will hardly go up at all! And his wallet will be lighter to compensate for that. Buy DW a new Palomino to replace Old Paint and she won't mind the new batteries.
2003 Chev 2500HD Gas, 2003 Komfort 26FS 5er
See Profile for Equipment List
mena661 wrote: I REALLY tried to make these fit my budget. I even lowered my desired amp hours by ~400 or so to make them work but no joy. They're just too much money.
Though my father is very happy with his S-460s, the L-16 did him good service too. Your L-16s may not be Surrettes. But I think they're construction is in a different class from most of what Mex is talking about. I wouldn't say that for everything Trojan, though.
And remember that Mex is in a different situation. You and I can just trip on down to Wally's or Costco to replace our crappy, cheap batteries in minutes. For us the savings may be worth it. Not quite the case for ol' Mex.
Cheers,
Kendall
1986 Winnebago Chieftain 22RC
Our Camper (with no payments)
As long as we are spending his money we might as well save him a few bucks and he can get these L-16 size, same as what he has now only not so embarrassing:
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