Trickle charger ?

[krinkov58]

Wondering if anybody has every thought of permanently mounting trickle-charger leads in their car connected from the battery to a female socket hidden somewhere, then attaching a male socket coming from the charger? I think it would be easier to just be able to plug/unplug something than to have to open the door, pop the hood, disconnect the cables, pull them out from under the car etc. I guess I'm just tired of laying down in oily kitty litter trying to throw the leads up from underneath in an unheated garage...I live up north and don't drive anything but an SUV from December to March for the most part so everything else get mothballed for most of the winter, but on a nice dry day I'll take the Buick for a spin around the neighborhood to keep her juices flowing. Just curious if this is even possible, I'd think I would have seen it by now (I can't be the only lazy person) so there must be an inherent flaw somewhere?

[Al's 52]

I'd fix that leaking kitty if I was you then the kitty litter won't be oily!

Unless.....you kitty's name is "Dynaflow"

[Bob]

The battery minders that I buy have two plug in ends with them. One is aligator clips and one is for directly mounting on your battery terminals. On some of my applications I do as you suggest


Battery Minder

[krinkov58]

Yeah the old Dynaflow is flowing a little bit...going to swap it out as soon as I get the stones to tackle the open drive swap. Maybe over the winter.
I think I'm going to try this, Bob...where did you mount the female plug, underneath? Would be neat to just walk into the garage and unplug a socket from the car and go. I like to keep the hood shut while it sits so I have the leads going up behind the front passenger splash pan on my '51 and it's a pain to try to get them connected and disconnected if I'm on my way somewhere.

[JZRIV]

I've been using the $20 Schumaker Battery maintainers that can be bought at Walmart.
As mentioned they come with the permanent leads but the wire harness may not be long enough for it to reach where you want. you can easily splice longer wires. Since you aren't driving the car you could run the wires out between the hood to fender gap or out the grille.
Wondering why you have to plug it in and unplug it often enough to warrant this. Is there a reason you can't just hook it up and leave it on all winter? I used to swap my battery maintainer from vehicle to vehicle every 3 weeks or so but once I found them for $20 I bought enough so I don't have to do that.

[SuperST8]

Can these chargers be used in the cigar lighter as they were called back then??

[krinkov58]

JZRIV, I do actually drive the car over the winter...not a whole lot, granted, but I hate to let cars just sit for long periods of time. Call me superstitious but it seems like that's when the gremlins tend to get in there and screw with things.