Richard Elliots Berlingo

[Richard Elliott]

Yes, fitted new auxiliary battery last week. No overnight loss of any consequence now and recharging to 100% regularly. I'm doing 25/35 miles between recharges which are about every two/three/four days. Even risked coming down the A38 Devon Expressway this morning to work. Less power used as its a steady downhill route and difficult not reaching 60mph!

I had an e-mail from someone in the Lincoln area who has another of the ex-Dudley Corporation Berlingo's. He tells me that they had five. He's got one, there's mine, he knows of another man a few miles North of him with one, there was one sold recently that appeared on e-Bay (but was sold privately) which only leaves one more unaccounted for. So keep an eye out for yellow vans with blue roofs!

Richard E

[ChrisB]

Nice one Richard ,

I did suspect your loss of energy was due to the DC-DC convertor deperately trying to maintain the Aux battery

We'll have to keep our eyes out for that last van then.

ChrisB

[Richard Elliott]

I would be interested to know how much water people are putting in at maintenance charge time. Having stocked up with plenty for a recent maintenance charge I was amazed to only use 4 litres - and this after a jam jar full came out of the overflows of the five drain pipes. Having read that it is good practice to do a maintenance charge twice as often as the service manual suggests I did the latest with 450 ah overcharge showing on the ev-lite and 2000 miles since the last maintenance charge. So, what have others experienced? Is this good/bad/indifferent?

Richard Elliott

[ChrisB]

Hi Richard , long time no chat, hows the blingo going.

First off it really shouldnt spew ANY electrolyte out of the overflows, this REALLY isnt good as this is what makes the battery work, loosing electrolyte like this will normally cause range issues and lower life expectancy of the cells

Sounds to me like someones watered them without doing a maint charge at some time before you got it

I use anything around 10-15 ltrs on this pack, and thats carrying out a maint charge/watering at around the 700Ah mark generally.
The word is that its better to water them more often than the recommended 850Ah but I think its really down to useage more than anything, if you live in an area where you have to work the batts hard then that might be true, where I am its very flat and I rarely have the eco meter much more than the mid yellow position its generally in the top of the green section for my travels so I dont expect to use much in the way of water.

Another chap I know he uses a little more than mine and tends to only do it once the light is on and uses about 15-18ltrs, interestingly mine can have a little spit/drip out of the overflows during the maint charge his does not , but then mine I know had been DIY watered so I was sort of expecting it to a degree on the first watering, but then it did similar on the second (700Ah or there abouts) so I'm not sure, first cycle only used a few ltrs due to the DIY watering that had taken place, the second used about 10ltrs.

One think I've started to do now is collect the overspill during watering as this does contain some electrolyte, not a lot but some, I've now got about 1/2 gallon of over spill sat about, currently not sure what to do with it.
But as its not like you can go down your local motorfactors to order new electrolyte I thought it might be prudent to save what overspill of very weak electrolyte just incase ????
Not sure if it would be a good idea to re-introduce it at the next watering or not, several schools of thought say its not as you can end up bunging up the pipes etc with crystals as the electrolyte drys in the tubes etc ??

ChrisB

[Richard Elliott]

If it doesn't overflow a bit then you can't tell its full. I followed exactly what Evan's instructions say and he reckons you have to let it overflow a bit and it should be plain water to start with. It certainly looked clear. Yes, the van is doing OK - a bit less range in the cold weather but still nearly 40 miles on a charge. There is no way to keep it out the red with the local hills I have to climb but then you can always put some back going the other way!!

Richard Elliott

[ChrisB]

Ah sorry miss read your post , I thought you meant you got a jam jar full of juice BEFORE you filled the batts

My fault.

Right so it didnt spew anything during the charge cycle then ??

If not , then I wouldnt worry too much and it gives you an idea you can leave it a little longer next time before watering I'd say.

I'm not too keen on over watering as it is inevitable that some Electrolyte is washed out during the over spill part of the filling and as in my other post each time this happens you end up with a lower density of electrolyte which cant be good I recon

ChrisB

[Richard Elliott]

No - nothing comes out during the charging cycle. I've got some electrolyte lurking in some old batteries. Could extract that (dodgy process!) and add some instead of plain water maybe?!!

Richard E

[ChrisB]

No - nothing comes out during the charging cycle. I've got some electrolyte lurking in some old batteries. Could extract that (dodgy process!) and add some instead of plain water maybe?!!

Richard E

Oh thats fine then, I miss read your post
NO I really wouldnt mess with the electrolyte unless you run into problems, still wouldnt advise it at all really.

ChrisB