What's up with my battery?

[Rapidly]

Last year I switched from a 12 V car-type battery for my jayco 1007 camper to a marine-type, "deep cycle" battery. Bought at Walmart, worked fine. For winter, I took it out of the camper and put it in the basement. No battery tender. This season, charged it up and put it back in. But now, anytime I try to use it (i.e., without shore power) I start getting the low-voltage alarm from the LP detector within a very short time. Even if it's just lights. Is it possible the battery discharged completely over the winter and now will not recharge to any more than a very low level? The trickle charger tops it off after a trip and then goes into float mode so everything appears OK. Is it maybe just a bad battery?

[Les7h]

Most marine batteries are a hybrid starting - deep cycle but not a true deep cycle
Check the battery voltage & if it isn't what it should be - have it tested at a battery retailer ( it may be under warranty )

[NVGun40]

It is entirely possible that the battery discharged over the winter. Hopefully, it was not sitting on concrete, that can be bad for batteries as well. Once the battery has died one time, it will never be the same again.

[oldmanAZ]

Take it back to W*mart. I had a bad battery in my TV a few years ago. W*mart tested and replaced both TV batteries at no charge.

[RoyBraddy]

I have had excellent use of my GP24 12V Interstate 85AH batteries on my OFF-ROAD POPUP.

One thing I do is follow very basic maintenance of watching the fluid levels and the somewhat static DC Voltage outputs... I like to observe what the batteries DC Output voltage are when just sitting there which will read around 12.6-7VDC telling me the batteries are holding their charge state rather well. Then when I hookup to shore power I observe the DC VOLTAGE on my remote DC VOLT PANEL Meter and want to see the DC VOLTAGE jump up to its minimum 13.6VDC charging state. This tells me my batteries are receiving a normal charge state. If I ever see any of my batteries drop to around 12.0VDC charge state I will check the fluid levels and immediately start a charging routine.

Waiting to use the batteries when I am 30 miles away from anything and finding them in a bad charge state is not a good idea for me. I want to know the charge status before leaving on any off-road trip...

I have been camping off-grid since the early 2009s and just last season my battery bank started showing trouble of holding their 12V charge level after sitting for many hours without being switched into the trailer circuits...

I am now into replacing my batteries before getting into OFF-GRID camping mode again...

I am pretty sure my success is doing a minimum scheduled maintenance program watching my batteries in my battery bank...

Just showing up in the woods and expecting the batteries to work without knowing the status of your batteries is not an option for me for sure...

Roy Ken

[Rapidly]

Thanks everyone for the information!

[Force]

Originally Posted by NVGun40

It is entirely possible that the battery discharged over the winter. Hopefully, it was not sitting on concrete, that can be bad for batteries as well. Once the battery has died one time, it will never be the same again.

Concrete is no longer a concern with modern batteries, but I agree with everything else you've said.

Some Google-Fu results:

https://www.homepower.com/articles/s...eries-concrete

Why Does Storing a Car Battery on a Concrete Floor Drain It?