Um, my experience doesn't match some of these posts. I've bought several wet batteries that were dry in the box, had to add the acid, and most of them would show 12+ volts after just sitting a few minutes; most didn't even need further charging. A tender would bring them up to full charge no problem. Some of the newer "smart" tenders, like some Noco Genius models, have a setting to charge an undercharged or dead (if not totally dead) battery to maintenance voltage level. I don't recommend cheap chargers, either, bought a couple that each cooked a battery; the battery cost alone would have paid for a good Noco - have two of those now.

 

Have to agree with Imold --- I have added acid to lots of batteries, dropped them and started the vehicle ( including bikes). I generally get 4 to 5 years out of a battery.

 

A typical battery tender is a "smart" trickle charger that will go into "maintenance" mode once the battery is charged. A normal trickle charger does not have a maintenance mode and will charge at it's rated charge indefinitely. My Harley and Optimate charger/maintainers will charge, but only at about .75 amps so they will take much longer to charge a battery.

My 75 amp booster charger will charge at 2 amps and also has auto float/maintenance mode. It is capable of maintaining a bike battery although I wouldn't use this on my bikes battery unless it needed a quick charge and then only at 2 amps. Even then this charger would also work fine for maintaining a motorcycle battery.

 

It's important to understand the electronics when comparing a maintainer to a charger.


An old time trickle charge is old-school and will destroy any battery that it's left connected to for a long period of time.
The idea of a trickle charger is that it puts out an "approximate" amperage at a battery "rated" voltage that is "supposed" to average out and keep the battery fully charged.
However, all those words in quotes above are a real bugaboo because trickle chargers are dumb chargers that don't monitor the battery itself.


A true maintainer reads the voltage of the battery and puts out enough of a charge in amps/volts to GET the battery to it's optimum storage voltage (exactly 13.8v, no less, no more), and once there, it KEEPS the battery at that voltage by maintaining that specific voltage but varying it's amperage output as needed to KEEP it at that voltage (usually very little amperage).


Technically, a true maintainer could have a charge capacity of 50 amps and still not hurt a battery because all that would do is GET the battery to its optimum voltage, but then cut back to almost nil to KEEP it at it's proper voltage.


A .5amp maintainer actually will charge a low battery, but it will just take some time (could be a few days in fact).
I think that a sweet spot for a maintainer would be 1.5amp current because that should bring any lowish battery back to full charge in just a few hours, give or take.


As to batteries themselves nowadays... why in hell anyone would put a liquid lead acid battery in a motorcycle anymore is beyond me.
Messy, needs constant water level management, rusts out nearby terminals and other metal parts, and rarely lasts as long as any good brand of gel-cel.... sheesh.

 

WOW!!- What a response.Thanks everyone for their responds. I should clarify a couple of things. actually I didn't buy the battery ,it came with the bike when I bought it in 7/14.wet cell,still in the box.(2) the trickle charger is a cheapo that I've been using for about 5 yrs and I don't have info on output and such.(3)I,m no electrical wizard so I don't understand all the technail stuff.SOOOOOOOOOOOO maybe i'll go to batteries plus give the guy $5 and ask him to do it for me.