5000 and battery drama

hi all, was talking to a mate the other day and he is having trouble with his battery holding charge (this battery is not even a year old)??? and this being the second one since he bourght it about 4-5years ago the first one lasted about 3 years, the battery fully charged will only last about 4hrs 5 max??? i was wondering if its somthing in the 5000 having a moment im not sure so i told him i whould put it out there and see if anyone else has had this drama any help whould be great!cheers joe,

The battery is most likely stuffed and needs repacking, you can do it yourself if you know how, of the member Mechanic on here was and maybe still is doing them.

ML only give I think 6 months warranty? on the battery

I also think its not a good idea to leave them on charge once the light goes green I take them off the charger, and also don't have them on the ciggy charger when starting the car, take them off the ciggy charger and then re connect after the vehicle is running.

cheers dave

gday dave, cheers for the reply mate yeah we dont use the 12V charger unless doin extended trips and even then the honda gennie is the go same with the wall charger he charges untill the green light and then shes off got me stumped why he keeps smoking batterys??? i have had my 5000 for nearly 4years and my battery still gives me at least 12hrs run time buggers me why his has shat so early??? cheers joe,

Joe,
Each for there own but we have never used the the 240V chargers through the range from SD2000 onwards. (Someone gave me advice back then that if you charge on 240V and forget to take them off when the "green" stops flashing it will shorten life.) Have since met people who only ever use 240V and have not had problems?
Still running the original 2008 batteries in our 4500's.
Put them on 12V charge when we get back to the camp site and leave them all night. (Daves advice above about not starting vehicle with charger plugged into cig charger is sound advice.)
During extended periods of not detecting (unfortunately too many) I religiously put the GPX & Garmin radio/GPS batteries on 12V charge in my shed every 30 days. Have found that the batteries left idle for a month take approx one hour to come up to full charge again.
Do carry a spare we bought cheap and I fitted new 1650 batteries to it. (Thanks for the advice Boobook)
Your mate is doing something seriously wrong if his batteries are failing after such a short time.

hey mate, I also follow steps mentioned reguarding battery life I'm not sure what happened to the first battery but the second one he bought seems to be charging and running fine (for now ) cheers for the advice guys

If i remember rightly, the SD series 240 volt charger didn't have a regulator? in it to stop charging when the battery was full, so the safest way to go was 12 volt. I always take my 4500 battery out of its pack as it can get very hot if left in it when charging. I was told years ago to always stand a rechargeable battery upright when charging them. Never lay them down. Can't remember why, but i've never had a battery fail on me since then. xmas tree

xmas tree wrote: I was told years ago to always stand a rechargeable battery upright when charging them. Never lay them down. xmas tree

That myth stands along side of not charging/leaving 12V batteries standing on concrete floors.

Just fired up battery charger for upcoming trip w ith 5000. Think I must have missed green light as now it has flashing orange light. Connected it to the detector and was showing 8+ volts. Left it turned on overnight, back to 7.1 volts, put on charger, 3 hours and got orange flashing, no green.
Looks like trip into the Towers.

The manual says "The first phase of charging has timed out. If this continues to occur each time the battery is charged the battery is no longer functioning correctly."
I have had this happen to me and I just disconnected it for a short time and then tried charging it, and all worked fine. The battery electronics determined that it had been charging for a long enough time period and the voltage wasn't to specs, hence the flashing orange light. Worth a try to save a drive. Cheers.

Thanks, Qld Sandy , will try and reconnect and let you know.
Bellman

Called in to minelab store at Charters. Peter said battery on way out. Bought new one. He said to keep using old cell so I did. Charges to +8 volts but down to 7.4 after 5 hours.

Bellman wrote:Just fired up battery charger for upcoming trip w ith 5000. Think I must have missed green light as now it has flashing orange light. Connected it to the detector and was showing 8+ volts. Left it turned on overnight, back to 7.1 volts, put on charger, 3 hours and got orange flashing, no green.
Looks like trip into the Towers.

After a couple of years running our 4500's one of the batteries began playing up as you describe. I rang Berndt & Petra who owned Reeds Prospecting at the time and Petra suggested I try something before laying down good money for a new battery.
Her advice was and it cured the problem and one other time since.
"Connect detector to battery and coil as per going out for a swing. Lay it down on the floor and leave it over night. Needless to say by morning the battery was lifeless. Removed battery and once again hooked it up to the 12V charger and left it charging. It went through the normal start up procedure and at a latter time when I checked we had a solid green. Problem solved. When this occurred one other time this procedure fixed the problem"

thats handy to no mate