Battery Best Practices

[cheesepuffgd]

1) My team takes all of our batteries from the last 3 years to competitions
2) My team takes a "battery cart" that has 4 chargers connected to a single wall outlet
3) My team puts each battery through a cycle of discharges over decreasing loads using the incandescent lightbulbs also on the battery cart. this conditions the battery and can restore some lost capacity. The battery cart is fully automated with an Arduino microcontroller and can condition 2 batteries at once. for electrical schematics and datasheets and eventually source code for the Arduino, search "team 955 battery cart" on google and select the first option.
4) besides charge them?
5) don't store batteries partially discharged for long periods of time.