PL2112, 1-Amp Fully-Automatic Smart Charger, 12V Battery Charger, Battery Maintainer, and Battery Desulfator with Temperature Compensation

I have a small fleet of fun cars in the garage that I drive occasionally. Some times, weeks go by between trips. Modern cars have systems that drain battery life even when nothing, like lights or radio, are left on. For that reason, I like to have a battery minder running all the time. This kit has all of the connections needed for any vehicle. These pictures show it in my BMW … the sturdy, grippy clamps attached easily and, more important, securely. The unit’s logic recognized my battery quickly and after selecting battery type (clearly explained in the manual) I was all set. It has a cool START button so you will know when things are working. The kit has connectors that can be attached in a few ways … a quick connect wire that attaches directly to a battery, and a cigarette plug as long as your vehicle keeps that plug “live” when ignition is off. This unit is weather sealed so it has applications for boats too. The sealing seems robust so it should be trouble free. Overall, this is a bargain priced full service battery maintenance system for anyone with a tractor, fun car, boat or other occasional use battery started items. Recommended

I’ve never heard of this brand before and it’s not very easy to find info on it because of the brand name, you search solar brand and you get only solar panel related things. I was able to find clore automotive who I think makes this brand but it’s also a bit confusing because they also have other brands like jump n carry which I know is a good brand. I’m not sure how these brands are related to clore automotive but the lack of info has me questioning weather this is a good brand or just a totally generic one. The maintainer looks to work fine, I have several battery maintainers so I have a good idea of how they should perform. This design is meant to be mounted in a garage or carport and charge/maintain batteries. You can remove the battery from the car or you can charge while it’s on the car, if you are planning on charging the battery while on the car then I would disconnect the negative connector to only charge the battery, I’ve had issues with car alarms going off when trying to charge an installed battery, disconnecting just avoid such issues. The maintainer looks to be compatible with several battery types but it’s also too simple that you have to manually choose the battery type, it’s not a huge deal but other chargers do detect this automatically. The start button is also manually operated which is also something that other maintainers do automatically. The one thing I didn’t like about this maintainer is that it doesn’t have a relay like every other maintainer I’ve had has. I’m not sure what protection the relay provides but you won’t have it here unless the relay is to quiet that I can’t hear it or feel it engage, there is no way to open the maintainer without damaging it to see the inside components. The maintainer comes with detachable clamps and ring connectors and a cigarette connector which I haven’t seen before on a maintainer. The power chord is about average and so is the charging cable, the charging cable uses a universal two pin plug so it’s easy to find and extension for it. Overall the maintainer seems to work just fine but I still rated it four stars because NOCO devices are just better than any maintainer I’ve tried including this one. One thing to keep in mind about these devices is that they are trickle chargers/maintainers. They will charge at a very slow current then maintain by drawing and recharging. If you need something to charge fast then you would need a battery charger, those will fully charge a battery in a few hours but don’t provide maintenance to keep the battery on good health. If you need an even faster option then a jump starter will be for you, it won’t maintain or charge the battery but will turn the car on instantly.

I have several batteries that I intend to use for a solar backup power system and until I can put all the pieces together, I have read that I should be sure to charge them regularly to keep them from having problems. One of the four didn’t want to charge with the charger I had, and I wanted this one because it says it can help recover batteries that have sulphated. Keep in mind that I had already tried to charge the battery for four days with my other charger and it didn’t complete. This one, charged the battery in one day. Other things I liked about this charger is that it has an ETL mark on it. That is a good thing. I also liked the adapters provided. This isn’t for fast charging large batteries, but more for maintaining and recovering batteries. It would take a long time too recover a 100 Ah battery like these with 1A. I did like that it correctly identified the battery type.

The Clore battery charger was ordered for use on my car and 12 volt riding mower batteries. This battery is easy to use and different types of batteries can be charged. My car & truck batteries do not typically need to be charged. However, my zero radius and riding lawn mower 12 volt batteries do, especially during the winter. Generally, when testing, I attached the battery clips to the batteries posts (negative to negative, and positive to positive). Then, the charger was plugged into an electrical outlet, and at that time the charger went into a "standby" mode. At that point, the selector button was pushed until "STD" (Standard) came up for my maintenance free battery. Finally, the "Charge" button was pushed at which time the charger began charging the battery. That was it, until the charger was finished. So what's the big deal ??? This is an extremely SLOW charger. It is a 1 Amp charger. Do not get me wrong. It's a good battery charger. It will get the job done. But, it is slow. I would recommend, at least on my part, that it be used for maintenance purposes similar to a trickle charge. Thankfully, it also has a maintenance mode that can be used. It took almost 24 hours to charge the 12 volt battery on a riding mower. If I have a car or truck battery that needs to be charged, I do not want to wait around for 24 or more hours. BOTTOM LINE: This is a good, basic battery charge for use with several different types of batteries. The charger is easy to use, though the instruction manual is not the best in the world. It's purpose is to charge batteries, and it does the job. But it is slow, very slow. I would use it for charging batteries if not completely dead. Otherwise, it is going to take some time. It would be a good charger for battery maintenance since the amperage is so low.