battery tender terminal

Sure you can! Hal

 

Ours has a regular lead-acid battery (not sure but think that's the only OEM battery type), and I periodically hook up a CTEK 3300 charger, at the engine compartment fuse box terminal. No problems.

 

The Prius battery is an AGM type, so it looks like you are covered.

 

Why does the battery need to be charged unless there is a charging problem with either the car or the battery?

 

I guess in a perfect world, the short answer would be: it doesn't.

But, several reasons I can think of for keeping a charger around, particularly a maintenance type, ie: one capable of being hooked up long term, if needed:

1. For periodic top-up your battery, above and beyond what the car will do.

2. Some intelligent chargers run a "desulphating" cycle at the start of charging. What that is is a little beyond me, LOL, but it sounds good. They can also give a rudimentary display of your battery's state-of-charge.

3. They are more-or-less the only way to restore a battery that's been seriously discharged, by accidental lights left on, for example. I don't think the car's built-in charging was designed to handle this.

 

I guess in a perfect world, the short answer would be: it doesn't.

But, there are several reasons I can think of for keeping a charger around, in particular a maintenance type, ie: one capable of being hooked up long term, if needed:

1. For periodic top-up your battery, above and beyond what the car will do.

2. Some intelligent chargers run a "desulphating" cycle at the start of charging. What that is is a little beyond me, LOL, but it sounds good. They can also give a rudimentary display of your battery's state-of-charge.

3. They are more-or-less the only way to restore a battery that's been seriously discharged, by accidental lights left on, for example. I don't think the car's built-in charging was designed to handle this.

4. If you're not going to be driving for several weeks, hooking up to a maintenance charger is cheap insurance.

 

hope I am not thread hacking
I have a Genius 7200 (7amp) battery charger which gradually cuts amperage as charge is absorbed by battery Is it okay to use this kind of charger as opposed to a trickle charger also do I need to disconnect battery when charging .
Thanks

 

Just looking through my 2014 Prius c Owner's Manual, page 501 says to keep the charging rate at 3.5 amps or less. (if you have the pdf search for "charging rate"). I see Genius makes a 3.5 amp model as well, maybe spring for a new charger?

I'm using a couple of CTEK chargers, the Multi US 3300 (3.3 amp) and the Multi US 4.3 (4.3 amp). Our regular 2010 Prius is rated 4.2 amp max charging rate.

Typically now I'm hooking up the 4.3, whenever the car's not going to be used for a few days, and just leave it on. After it goes through a charging session it sits mostly idle, occasionally giving the battery a little uptick. I've installed CTEK's supplied quick connect at the under-the-hood fuse box, so I don't have to pop the lid, and it's more secure.

 

Newbie question.
If......the vehicle will sit unused for more than a month (some would say 2 weeks), it is a good thing to keep the 12 V battery fully charged.

If you do a search on here for "battery", you will get about a million hits; half of them will be about this very subject.

 

No, no and no.
All battery chargers do that. Unless that model clams to be "fully automatic", it would not be good for long term connection.
Neither is a cheap trickle charger. It needs to be a fully automatic tender type charger for long term use.
No you do not have to disconnect the battery to charge it.

 

Thanks

 

It could be the Genius charger falls into that category. Still, it's a little overpowered, well above the spec'd max charge rate.

 

Both of these chargers are great. You cant go wrong with either one. I have the Ctek as it does the small 12v batteries like motorbikes as well as the larger car batteries. Like others have said the desulfer settings really can make you battery last longer.