solar trickle chargers - any good?

[Ben]

Got a maplin one from Play.com for £13. Jumped the MPS, left her sitting for 20mins and then gave her a blast for a while, parked her up and hooked this yolk up. Time will tell in a couple of weeks if it's working or not

 

[DaddyCC]

Just bumping this up as wondering if anyone has more up to date knowledge of these items? With this whole working from home thing and car always in the garage and when winter comes in more so, there will definitely be a lot of dead batteries potentially on the cards.

Specifically ones that can go on the roof of a garage or the like so it needs to be waterproof. I had a quick look but most seem to be ones you stick on your windscreen and not waterproof etc. If it can be plugged in as well as a backup even better

 

[Artoir]

I have one that plugs into the OBD port but its a windscreen job which won't be much use in the garage.

 

[DaddyCC]

Found this one which seemed to line up well for the 5 minute knowledge I gained lol.

Amazon product ASIN B0836CM9FJ
Not sure of 20w is overkill but suppose not much dearer than those rated at 10w, plus has 6.5m cable, weatherproof, reverse/over charge protection etc.

Any thoughts?

 

[Smick]

Just bought this after seeing this thread.... Will let you know if it does the job. Car lying in the drive needs jumped every couple weeks as it's not being driven at all with WFH. Something must be draining battery as it's only couple years old.

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[Coog]

I run my garden shed on a solar panel and it goes all year round without ever needing an external charge. I did a fair bit of reading up about it at the time and provided you do the maths - i.e know what your drain is and what the output of the panel is likely to be in the exact spot it's located, then you could stretch that draining time out to a month or two, or indefinitely if it gets lots of sun.

Personally I run cteks on all my cars which does a brilliant job of keeping the batteries good long term, especially over winter. If you have mains supply nearby I would recommend one of those.

Another better alternative is to take it a run every so often. Cars don't like sitting around for extended periods outside.