Yet another CTEK Battery tender question

It's difficult to be certain. Either your OE battery tender is not fully compatible with the Optima 34R or its already ending its usefull life.

I highly recommend the NOCO Genious 3500:

Amazon.com: NOCO Genius G3500 6V/12V 3.5 Amp Smart Battery Charger and Maintainer: Automotive

See my post here:

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/360-430/467811-diy-battery-replacement.html

 

That's what I mean...its a simple system, there's the battery, and the tender.

So if the battery is new, then the only other part in play is the Tender.

Dan

 

For optima or odyssey batteries you have to put it into the snowflake mode the ctek 3300 has that. The Ferrari charger looks to be a ctek 3300 with just one mode. On the factory battery you'd use the car mode, so I'm guessing the default only single mode is on the Ferrari charger is the car mode. The ctek 3300 has 3 modes - motorcycle, car, and snowflake.

 

Same deal with mine. I just ordered a new tender.

 

I'm no expert, but hey, it's the internet so I feel qualified to chime in:
I believe 11.9 is low for a resting voltage and does indicate a less than 1/2 charged battery, so I'm not surprised the 1/2 or Full LEDs are not on. The Ferrari badged charger is a rebranded Ctek 800 which is truly a trickle charger with a charging current of 0.8 Amps. The Ctek 3300 has additional modes including one for AGM batteries and a charging current of up to 3.3 Amps. For your AGM Optima battery, it seems that a Ctek 3300 would be a better charger for you. The connector used on the Ferrari charger is not proprietary. I purchased one from Newark.com.

 

I've been using a CTEK 3300 for the past 5 years on my 430 (and previously my 355) and just recently (2 weeks ago) bought a new CTEK MUS 4.3 from an Fchatter that has a bunch of new ones for sale at a great price ... $58 shipped. I intend to use the 4.3 for my 430 and the 3300 for my boat battery. I believe he still has a lot more for sale.

Here's his ad. Go to the bottom of this thread and you can see that he's still selling the 4.3.

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/other-parts-collectibles/438686-ctek-battery-chargers-discounted-prices.html

 

^^^ new batteries do come charged. Including Optima. I've used a Red Top on my race car and have a smaller dry cell Odyssey lightweight battery in my GT2 which also came charged, the AGM are the same way. All of them come charged and respond well to ctek charges. for the ones I just mentioned use Snowflake mode on the Ctek 3300 or 4.3 and for factory/stock batteries use the 'Car' mode on the 3300/4.3 chargers. These will maintain your battery indefinitely and charge it when low, you can even charge a dead battery with these...and you never run the risk of over charging with these smarter chargers!

 

You are absolutely correct. All batteries now come precharged especially AGM batteries.

Drive your car for an hour to the grocery store and it will be fully charged.

I am anal so when my Optima AGM battery arrived I hooked it up to my battery charger before I installed it to my 360 and in 1 hour charger said its fully charged and I measured 14.7 volts.

Optima = excellent battery. I highly recommend.

Dan

 

Looks to me the OEM tender here is the 800 version of the Ctek (0.8 amps). That cannot do AGM batteries. I don't think the factory Scud battery was AGM. The 3300 can output up to 3.3A. And it has the snowflake mode which is appropriate for the AGM battery. The 7002 model is a better choice still as it has better conditioning modes. It can also output up to 7A. Not sure about the other tender but if it works for you then that's a good move.

 

See this post: http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/141102598-post12.html for where to order the connector and how to connect it to a standard c-tek battery tender, so that it maintains the no-start with tender connected feature (using the stock tender socket on the car)! Read further posts in the thread by the poster for additional details. I just ordered and received the parts from Mouser, about $15: stock connector onto a c-tek tender for use on the stock tender socket on my 612. Do it at your own risk, etc.

 

You are most welcome.

I think you did the right thing. Just order the NOCO battery tender that we know works great with the Optima and be done with it. Issue solved. Your time is worth a lot more trying to figure things out.......

Let me know if I can help.

Dan

 

Very nice information here. I guess they went with the light weight option for the Scud battery. Fascinating stuff. And great information on the battery tenders.

 

You are most welcome! Glad We can help.

Merry Christmas to you and your entire family.

Dan.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

My ctek battery charger has a button to cycle between Motorcycle, Car, and Winter mode... without pressing the button the amber light stays on and it does not charge the battery. FWIW, I have never had a problem with my unit and it was only like $40 on ebay.

 

Thanks for the info David.

Which CTEK battery charger model do you have?

Dan

 

Hey Dan,

This is what I have... CTEK 3300 .


Ctek Power Multi US 3300 Smart Charger Battery Charger 56 158 | eBay

 

To find the charger is the easy part. What about the male plug that goes into the car socket?

 

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