Safely reduce battery maintenance! Well maybe sometimes…
I’m talking about Hydrocaps and Water Miser caps for your batteries.
First let’s talk about Water Misers. They retail for $4 to $8 for a pack of 6. They help keep the water inside the battery where it belongs. They also help keep the battery tops cleaner. The manufacture claims they recapture up to 90% of the water. My experience has been closer to 50% or 60% when compared to Hydrocaps. But they do have some advantages. They are half the cost of Hydrocaps, they do not require removal during equalization of the pack, they aren’t as tall, and are less prone to damage. Water misers will reduce you maintenance workload. After a few months with them you will be able to determine how often you need to check the electrolyte, typically every 3 months, as opposed to weekly for us in Florida.
Now for Hydrocaps they cost $10 to $15 for 6 but they do so much more. The Hydrocap contains a catalyst in the vent that encourages the hydrogen gas to recombine with oxygen to form water and drip back into the cell. It is around 95% efficient at doing that so you rarely need to water your pack. However high temperatures will damage the catalyst so they must be removed during equalization and very heavy charge cycles and eventually they do wear out. The real beauty is how clean your battery pack stays.
Will Hydrocaps make my batteries maintenance free? No, depending on how you charge your batteries you may find yourself removing all the caps weekly.
If you are interested in some more reading on these things check out the link below.
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/academic/environment/alternative-energy/energy-resources/homepower-magazine/archives/11/11pg37.txt
I can only recommend you try both on 1 or 2 of your batteries before committing the whole pack to one technology. If you search the retailers that cater to alternative energy you can usually find one or both in the battery maintenance section.