Smart Maintenance Battery Charger question.
 

My daughter and I each have a caravan with 110 amp leisure batteries. The batteries spend at least half of a year sitting on the garage floor doing nothing. I try to remember to check their voltage every few weeks and give them a 24 hr. charge with my basic, and ancient, battery charger. They each seem to take a charge of 0.6 amp decreasing to 0.3 amp after 24 hrs. For some time I've been considering buying a smart maintenance charger and an advert by Milenco in the latest C&MC magazine has jogged my memory.
Has anyone any observations as to the best value for money versions of such chargers?

I bought myself a smart charger and I keep a spare battery on charge at all times, putting batteries on a cold floor are a no no, so hopefully yours are raised.
I think it was about £100.

When shopping around, be careful to do your research as not all "smart" chargers are actually very smart. I bought some on e-bay a good few years ago and all they do is trickle charge at 0.4 amps. Not really anything special.

I've never owned one but whenever the topic comes up on here, the CTEK chargers get universally rave reviews. http://smartercharger.com/

However - I've been very impressed with my £5.99 ALDI battery charger - probably not as good as CTEK but does have some intelligence and can be left connected permanently. Charges only at low power but if you're not in a hurry it's a good bet (it was reduced when I bought mine).

http://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/car-...om-aldi-770190

This is the one I bought.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/OptiMate-6...IAAOSw9GhYk0~h

Thanks guys.
The floor has always seemed the obvious place and I've always kept unused batteries there but I'll take the advice and get them raised.
Seems CTEK are the favourites up to now. I'll have to some research into which particular one.

Same here Ian I thought the same, but apparently the cold concrete floor zaps the batteries.
So I always put mine on top of another old scrap battery.

I'll probably knock up a plinth with a couple of pieces of old fence post as batten and a plank to stand them on.

Yeah cold concrete floor is a bad idea. One point I read about leisure batteries, they are designed to be run down and charged. Keeping them fully charged all the time can be bad for them.

I believe that is what a good quality maintenance charger takes care of. Pulse charging to reduce/prevent sulphation and cycle of discharge and recharge and temperature monitor. Just need to decide which one to buy and where from. I'm led to believe that CTek are one of the best but may be relatively expensive.