06-12-2006, 09:04 PM
kd: I'm sure you're correct, but we're comparing apples to oranges.
A car battery, or starting battery on a boat, almost never gets completely discharged. Most of 'em will last for many years. Its the daily draining from full charge to near-dead, over and over again, that dictates the life of a battery. They have so many "life cycles" and that's it. The red tops aren't even deep cycles, and are not intended to be discharged. AGM batteries, in general, will take more discharge cycles than standard lead batteries, but not the two blue top and one red top Optimas I bought. As a starting battery, they are fine. I have one in my boat now, third year, and it works like new, but it gets charged every time I start the outboard motor, and never once has gone dead. It will last many more years because of that.
For deep-cycle trolling-motor applications, I don't recommend Optimas, though I've had reasonable life with other AGM's. That's from experience, and I draw a battery dead over 200 times a year with a trolling motor, and have for 20 years. As I had said eariler though, for deep cycle, charge-and-drain applications, most AGM's don't last twice as long as the Wal Mart specials, but they do cost twice as much.
Cheers to you too!
[signature]
A car battery, or starting battery on a boat, almost never gets completely discharged. Most of 'em will last for many years. Its the daily draining from full charge to near-dead, over and over again, that dictates the life of a battery. They have so many "life cycles" and that's it. The red tops aren't even deep cycles, and are not intended to be discharged. AGM batteries, in general, will take more discharge cycles than standard lead batteries, but not the two blue top and one red top Optimas I bought. As a starting battery, they are fine. I have one in my boat now, third year, and it works like new, but it gets charged every time I start the outboard motor, and never once has gone dead. It will last many more years because of that.
For deep-cycle trolling-motor applications, I don't recommend Optimas, though I've had reasonable life with other AGM's. That's from experience, and I draw a battery dead over 200 times a year with a trolling motor, and have for 20 years. As I had said eariler though, for deep cycle, charge-and-drain applications, most AGM's don't last twice as long as the Wal Mart specials, but they do cost twice as much.
Cheers to you too!
[signature]