I mentioned somewhere in the forum, and a couple of weeks ago or so, that I'd finally made up my mind what I was going to replace my broken CTEK battery charger with. There were several contenders but, after a lot of researching on line I plumped for the Ring RSC906 smart charger. https://shop.ringautomotive.com/rsc906-6a-smart-battery-charger-maintainer.html I'm slightly disappointed that the CTEK has failed. It's never been abused and, although I've had it for a number of years it's not seen very arduous use. The CTEK brand is held in high regard but is also pretty expensive so I was reluctant to "splash the cash" when the new charger is going to see definitely less use than the one it's replacing. I bought direct from Ring themselves and it cost me £40. It was extremely well packed and arrived in pristine condition.
I've now charged both my shop batteries - ones I keep for emergency jump starts or continuity when I wish to remove a vehicle battery from another vehicle. Due to being laid up with my hip operation and Mrs J being very unwell we've not been using either the Panda or Skoda so I've also used it on both of them with complete success. The charger is safe to use without disconnecting the battery from the vehicle and I can confirm the nearly new Skoda is very happy with it.
The charger itself is a substantial and robust unit with a bit of "heft" to it. It's not all that heavy but has a nice "quality" feel to it. Using it is simplicity itself. On the front is an LCD display screen with just one button under it. To use it you connect the charger leads to the battery (positive lead to battery positive and negative lead to vehicle earth, not battery negative, which is now generally the accepted way to connect to modern vehicles for charging or jump starting). Then you plug the charger 3 pin plug into the mains and switch on. The display comes up immediately with existing battery voltage. You then toggle through the available outputs by pressing the button repeatedly until the output you require is displayed - on the 906 these amount to a choice of 6 and 12 volt outputs for just about any battery you might expect to find on a modern vehicle including Lithium LiFePO4. When the output you desire is displayed you just leave it alone and after a few seconds the charger defaults to this selection and starts charging. It goes through a 9 point program of checking - stuff like sulphation etc - and then either carries out a desulphation if needed or goes straight into it's charging program automatically. It displays how the charge is progressing on a bar scale on the right of the display so you know how it's getting on and defaults to "maintenance" charge when completed (so no overcharge damage can be caused whilst also displaying FUL on the display. Couldn't be simpler.
There are other models in the 900 model range with differing outputs to suit your needs. I chose the 906 as it has an adequate 6 amp max output and can handle 6 and 12 volt batteries. I will mostly use it on 12 volt batteries but I also run into the occasional 6 volt jobbie on my horticultural stuff and maybe the very occasional older vehicle - last one was a Morris 8. If you're thinking about a modern charger then you could do worse than take a look at this one.
I've now charged both my shop batteries - ones I keep for emergency jump starts or continuity when I wish to remove a vehicle battery from another vehicle. Due to being laid up with my hip operation and Mrs J being very unwell we've not been using either the Panda or Skoda so I've also used it on both of them with complete success. The charger is safe to use without disconnecting the battery from the vehicle and I can confirm the nearly new Skoda is very happy with it.
The charger itself is a substantial and robust unit with a bit of "heft" to it. It's not all that heavy but has a nice "quality" feel to it. Using it is simplicity itself. On the front is an LCD display screen with just one button under it. To use it you connect the charger leads to the battery (positive lead to battery positive and negative lead to vehicle earth, not battery negative, which is now generally the accepted way to connect to modern vehicles for charging or jump starting). Then you plug the charger 3 pin plug into the mains and switch on. The display comes up immediately with existing battery voltage. You then toggle through the available outputs by pressing the button repeatedly until the output you require is displayed - on the 906 these amount to a choice of 6 and 12 volt outputs for just about any battery you might expect to find on a modern vehicle including Lithium LiFePO4. When the output you desire is displayed you just leave it alone and after a few seconds the charger defaults to this selection and starts charging. It goes through a 9 point program of checking - stuff like sulphation etc - and then either carries out a desulphation if needed or goes straight into it's charging program automatically. It displays how the charge is progressing on a bar scale on the right of the display so you know how it's getting on and defaults to "maintenance" charge when completed (so no overcharge damage can be caused whilst also displaying FUL on the display. Couldn't be simpler.
There are other models in the 900 model range with differing outputs to suit your needs. I chose the 906 as it has an adequate 6 amp max output and can handle 6 and 12 volt batteries. I will mostly use it on 12 volt batteries but I also run into the occasional 6 volt jobbie on my horticultural stuff and maybe the very occasional older vehicle - last one was a Morris 8. If you're thinking about a modern charger then you could do worse than take a look at this one.
