so, i know we all have a bunch of wheat lamps between us with different battery lives, but heres the story of my 2. so, last night i decieded to do the ol run test to see how long they lasted. i have a brand new battery on one and i knew that better last 12-14 hrs. the other one is 7 years old! this is the one i wanted to test against the new one. so, i turned them on at 5:30 yesterday. at 6 am this morning when i got up, they both were burning just as strong as each other and when i turned them on! now this battey is 7 years old, almost 8. i have never added distilled water to it. i just took it out of the sink tap and squirted it in when it was low. now i know they say to use distilled so you dont get mineral deposits building up on the plates, but, i got this lamp in 03 and have used it since. i think the secret is always leaving it on the charger until we are ready to go. after when we come out i put it on high until the needle enters the black noting a full charge, then switch it to low. i dont take it off until we go in again. i know when you go in every day at a big operation all the lamps are on a rack charger that only charges on high and you have nothing to do about charge rate and you use them every day. but for us who only use them 3 or 4 times a week, keeping them on low all the time seems to keep these things alive much longer. i know they now make a "smart charger" that has a red led that tells you when the battery is charged. supposedly, even though it switches itself to low, you can still hear the acid in the battery bubbling, which is not good.
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