In this article I will be reviewing the Battery Tender 021-1163 5W Solar Maintainer. Anyone who has ever charged a battery is probably familiar with the Deltran Battery Tender brand. They have been around since 1965 as a family owned business. The first battery maintainer I ever bought was a Battery Tender and I still own one today.
Get Your Battery Tender 021-1163 5W Solar Maintainer At The Lowest Price
So what makes this maintainer different? Of course having it solar powered certainly changes the game. You can hook it up and as long as it gets some sun it will keep your battery charged through a long northern winter. There are three key differences that set it apart from the Schumacher SP-200 2.4W Solar Battery Maintainer. The first you notice in the name of each product: 5W vs. 2.4W. While 2.4W is sufficient for maintaining a batteries charge, it may not suffice when the battery is very low.
Get Your Battery Tender 021-1163 5W Solar Maintainer At The Lowest Price
The second difference, and the one I believe is most important is that the Battery Tender is an automatic charger while the Schumaker is a manual charger. You can read more about the difference here, but on a smaller battery it would seem that the best bet is the Battery Tender. As far as I am concerned, the cost of replacing one overcharged battery is easily offset by the higher price of the Battery Tender. According the the Deltran website, Battery Tender solar panels are the ones available with this feature.
Which brings me to the third difference, price. The Battery Tender 021-1163 5W Solar Maintainer is more expensive than the Schumacher SP-200 2.4W Solar Battery Maintainer. Both are very good products designed for specific uses. If I had a car or truck that I kept out back as a toy, I would go with the Schumaker while if I had a motorcycle, atv or snowmobile with a smaller battery, I would opt for the Battery Tender.
Here are the specs:
- Built-in 3-step microcontroller for precise charging
- Waterproof and sparkproof for outdoor installations
- Easy, do-it-yourself installation
- Built-in temperature compensation sensor
- 12V nominal voltage 270 mAmps
There are many glowing reviews on the Amazon website. Here are a few:
I purchased a Deltran Battery Tender JR 5 years ago as well as a motorcycle battery. Both the battery tender and the battery are still going strong 5 years later, this is not a typo! Yes, I said 5 years! Anyone who owns a motorcycle (especially a Harley) knows that you typically replace batteries every 2 years. Because of the performance of my battery tender Jr I decided to pick up this Deltran Solar Panel. I recently had to move my bike to a garage with no electricity and had to install the solar panel on the outside of the garage fully exposed to the elements. I’ve only had it about 2 months but I must say that this solar panel has performed above expectations. We have had some of the craziest weather on record in New Jersey. Warm days, cold days, heavy rains, 50 mph winds, 3 and 4 days at a time without sunlight. Yeah, Mother Nature has been sending us all kinds of craziness. So today I decided to go to my garage and see what kind of mess this solar panel was in. At the very least I expected to find the panel damaged by all the rain we’ve had. To my amazement it was working perfectly! It was 2 in the afternoon and cloudy due to all the rain and the solar panel LED was green indicating a fully charged battery. The panel has not been hit with any sunlight for 2 days yet it has been able to fully maintain my 5 year old battery. Another great product by Deltran. Read More..