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What battery are best for long term use

I have a 21hp jonhn Deere ZTR 717a and D105
Don't want to buy a battery every year

Ojhooker said:

What battery are best for long term use

I have a 21hp jonhn Deere ZTR 717a and D105
Don't want to buy a battery every year

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In my opinion the best is a dry cell Optima or Odyssey type battery. they are rather pricey though.

Interstate Batteries are my choice. I'm getting 3 yrs out of the ones I'm running in my ZTR mowers. There running about $65.00

midnite rider said:

In my opinion the best is a dry cell Optima or Odyssey type battery. they are rather pricey though.

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Thanks, but $215 is more than I want to spend
How long have u had yours??

Ric said:

Interstate Batteries are my choice. I'm getting 3 yrs out of the ones I'm running in my ZTR mowers. There running about $65.00

<img src="http://www.lawnmowerforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=11552"/>

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Thanks , how often do you have to charge it??

Ojhooker said:

Thanks, but $215 is more than I want to spend
How long have u had yours??

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You asked for the best battery in my opinion. The most economical may be the Interstate due to the Odyssey may outlast your equipment. The service life of a Odyssey dry cell battery is up to 10 years or three times the best conventional battery service life. The storage life is two years before needing a charge. Unfortunately the best battery is going to cost more. Most of the $40 dollar batteries only last a couple of years or less so if you take that into account it cost about the same.

Ojhooker said:

Thanks , how often do you have to charge it??

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I had the battery for three years on my 44" ztr when I replaced the battery and I'm starting the third year on my 48" ztr and I've never had to charge any of my batteries. The mowers have there own charging systems. The batteries are maintained when you run the mower.

I typically get 3 to 4 years out of average $40 lead acid batteries. The only time I ever charge mine are during the winter when they are off the equipment. And then, I'll charge them up when they are removed, then only once more before they get put back on in early spring.

Wal mart's Everstart brand is made by Johnson Controls. I have used them or years. Life in my ride around has been 2-3 years with a lot of trickle charge maintenance along the way . $25

i agree with Ric, interstate batteries are the best in my opinion. but i run a deka battery in my craftsman and an everstart in my yard machines. the deka and interstate keep a charge longer but the everstart works well for being cheap but your paying the price of having to charge it if you dont use it for a long time

:smile: I use Interstate battries. I use the biggest amp battery I can get in the battery tray. Those dime store 19.99$ battries are pretty much low amped and you fiqure on buying one every year. But I also remove the grounds when storing equipment for the winter. On my snow plow tractor, I use a battery tender. In this day and age, how does anyone know, whos manfacturing what battery?

Buckshot 1 said:

:smile: In this day and age, how does anyone know, whos manfacturing what battery?

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The only way to tell who is the manufacturer is to check the code on the battery or the MSDS sheet for the battery. Most retailers such as Sears (Diehard) and Walmart (Everstart) might have batteries with the same private label name made by several manufacturers depending on the location to reduce shipping costs or to provide different types or sizes of batteries and contracts with manufacturers might change.There are thousands of global battery manufacturers. :confused2:

:smile: How true. Just like anything else, shop around for the cheapest cost and they get a bigger bang for their buck.

Welcome to LawnMowerForum!

I moved your thread to the Small Engine & Mower Repair forum. :smile:

Back a few years ago when I was working on electric fork trucks which runs on lead acid batteries. When we were buying replacement batters as I understood there was only a small amount of US lead acid battery manufactures. What they did was just putting different names on the batteries to sell them. As I under stood it was, you get what you pay for?

I get my rider batteries dry, with no acid in them. They are light and ship reasonably cheap. They can sit on my shelf for years without going down or the cardboard separators wasting away from the acid. When I sell them, I put fresh acid in them. Customers prefer this as opposed to a battery thats been sitting on the shelf for months with the acid in it.

I'm sure there are others, but the only two manufacturers that I'm aware of are Johnson Controls and Exide.

mullins87 said:

I'm sure there are others, but the only two manufacturers that I'm aware of are Johnson Controls and Exide.

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You could be right on this.

There are a lot others, found these.

Lead Acid Battery Manufacturers in USA

Lead Acid Battery Manufacturers in United states - Lead battery scrap, Recycling Directory: Traders, Manufacturer, Supplier, Exporter & Importer

mullins87 said:

I'm sure there are others, but the only two manufacturers that I'm aware of are Johnson Controls and Exide.

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There are many other manufacturers (not brands) of lead acid batteries in the USA alone. Here are some listed below that are just A through D not counting the rest of the alphabet.

ABS Alaskan Inc., (US)
Alaska Battery Manufacturing, (US)
Antique Auto, (US)
Asisco Classic Car, (US)
Atlantic Battery Corp., (US)
Battery Builders Inc. [Fork Lift Deep Cycle], (US)
Battery Specialties, (US)
Best Battery LLC, (US)
Braille Battery, (US)
Bulldog Battery [Deep Cycle], (US)
C&D Technologies inc., (US)
Cell-Con Inc., (US)
Commercial Battery, (US)
Concorde, (US)
Continental Battery Mfg. Co., (US)
Crown Battery Mfg. Co., (US)
Discover-Energy, (US)
Dyno Battery, (US)

There are many more throughout the world especially China.

Y'all may be right, but every battery I've ever bought has been built by either JC or Exide, at least only the ones that had the manufacturer listed. However, for the purpose of this discussion, I thought we were only considering 12v starting batteries such as the ones on our mowers. I realize when you consider all other types of batteries, there are a myriad of manufacturers.

motoman said:

Wal mart's Everstart brand is made by Johnson Controls. I have used them or years. Life in my ride around has been 2-3 years with a lot of trickle charge maintenance along the way . $25

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Everstarts are not bad batteries. I just replaced my old one with another everstart, and it had a date code of 2007! That's pretty good in my opinion...

I'm sure they aren't the "best" but I've gone cheap in OPE around my place. The expensive ones don't seem to last any longer, so I'm looking for best price for the capacity in an AGM battery. I've bought several on-line from Chrome Battery. Great prices and free shipping + they seem to be holding up well. Google 'em.

SWSportsman said:

I'm sure they aren't the "best" but I've gone cheap in OPE around my place. The expensive ones don't seem to last any longer, so I'm looking for best price for the capacity in an AGM battery. I've bought several on-line from Chrome Battery. Great prices and free shipping + they seem to be holding up well. Google 'em.

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The acronym OPE in this case stands for outdoor power equipment, I presume?