Tip Maintaining your starter battery

[Neal]

I think I'm about to make another change to my starter battery maintainer and jump starter accessory lineup...

I learned of the Anti-Gravity XP-1 while at CubCrafters for my FX-3 build week in 2021. I also learned they used the NOCO Genius 5. Later a YouTuber as mentioned above suggested the Odyssey battery charger which I've been using and have been pleased with. I'm not sure anything really was wrong the the NOCO Genius 5 setup either.

Recently from discussion with @craig.roser and his question on Facebook about chargers and jump starter I learned more about the NOCO lineup. Both @craig.roser and @Tsquared are using NOCO Genius 10's which is just a higher amp (10 vs 5) charger. I don't know what's the best maintainer for long term use i.e. when I'm on a 5-7 month motorhome trip. But something nice about the NOCO lineup is they offer jump starters as well and what's even better is you can attach ONE pigtail to your starter battery that works for both the charger as well as jump box. So I'm thinking of adding more to my hoarding collection to streamline my setup in the plane:

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As to the pigtail, the one above supports both charging and jumping. There is another pigtail that is thinner gauge wire for charging only so be sure to pick wisely.

 

[Neal]

For those using a NOCO Genius 10 - you have to consider how you're using this to charge your starter battery. As the NOCO 10 is a 10 AMP charger you should NOT be plugging this into the 12V outlet under the panel for the Carbon Cub owners here. The reason is that the line going from the 12V outlet to your starter battery has a 5A inline fuse and this is why most likely that CubCrafters uses and sells the NOCO Genius 5 (which I have). If you are going to use the NOCO 10 or the Odyssey like I use then you should be charging via a pigtail directly connected to your starter battery with the proper gauge wire.

 

[Cubonaut875]

Will the jump starter battery plugged into the Cig lighter actually start the plane? I was thinking of putting the pig tails to the battery directly in case I need it someday.

 

[Neal]

Will the jump starter battery plugged into the Cig lighter actually start the plane? I was thinking of putting the pig tails to the battery directly in case I need it someday.

No, that is definitely not something to do. Use a pigtail directly to the starter battery.

 

[Cubonaut875]

I didn't think so, I just found it in the case with the battery and I thought that was a bad idea

 

[Neal]

Amazon has "big prime day" deals going on right now. I was on the fence in getting the NOCO products as I like what I have but the deals are good so I bought.

Now to wait for the Jackery 300 to go on sale...that's my next purchase. The solar panel is on sale now so I got that. Next spring I need to do some camping!

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