How can i test and charge a 12 volt battery?

Question by Showtime: How can i test and charge a 12 volt battery?
Hello i recently received 2 12volt 34amp CSB battery (sealed lead battery) from a man who was getting rid of his Electric wheelchair thingy because the plastic was all broken and worn out but i took just the battery's...MY Question is: how can i test them to find out if they can be charged and if they will hold the charge.next how do i charge them
Well i sorta know that it would be easy to charge them with the provided power charger...i dont have it hence the reason i ask this question


Best answer:

Answer by Numbat
Er, like charge it? You should have got the charger for the system, there would have been one.

To test (after charging) needs a load test. A load could consist of several 12v light bulbs. You also need a meter of some sort. There are some very cheap digital multimeters available. Note digital, analog meters do not have sufficient scale accuracy. When discharging, do not allow the voltage across the battery to drop below 10v.

Capacity of the battery is calculated as discharge current vs time. I assume your batteries are 34 A/hr. I doubt you will get anywhere near that amount from yours.

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