We’re looking at buying some new batteries this year and we’re interested in peoples experience with the different brands. Any recommendations of one over another to use? We’re mainly interested in ones which will last longer (in terms of age, not game time).
The lifetime of the battery is extremely (almost entirely) dependent upon how you care for them. All other factors (including brand) combined are trivial in comparison.
- Always keep them fully charged (except during a match, of course).
- The faster the charge the harder it is on the battery. 2A is an ideal rate, but in competition you may need to charge faster than that.
Where most teams fail is #1, particularly during the summer. As a data point, I have a 38 Ah gel cell battery that still starts my riding lawn tractor despite being over 20 years old. It doesn’t have all 38 Ah any more, but by taking excellent care of it, I have managed to keep it going far in excess of expected life.
When we were a low resource team, we learned to make sure batteries are consistently charged, cycled through, and load tested to prolong batteries. We just retired two batteries from 2009 to a test-only designation.
If you are looking to purchase new batteries, last I checked if you call MK-Battery and mention you’re an FRC team and give the part number in the game manual for the battery, and you should be able to get them for $32.50. We’re going to get 2 or 3 of them this year before Palmetto.