Motorcycle Battery Winter Storage Tips
Read our post about how to avoid a flat battery when you get your bike out on the first sunny weekend of the year and how to use a maintenance charger to get the most out of your motorcycle battery.
Every year the busiest time for motorcycle battery sales is early spring; you could set your watch by it - a week or two before Easter, first hint of a sunny weekend and you want to get the bike out only to find it's got a dead battery that needs replacing.
For seasonal riders, we recommend keeping your motorcycle battery attached to a maintenance battery charger when the motorcycle is not in use. One of the CTEK or Optimate range would be perfect for this.
Even when not in use, motorcycle batteries will slowly self discharge and if the bike has an alarm, this will happen even faster. If the bike has been left throughout winter, the battery will most likely have lost all its charge by the time spring comes around.
Unfortunately leaving the battery in a discharged state will ruin the battery.
A lot of people find themselves buying a new battery every year for this reason.
This can be easily prevented by using a maintenance charger. These chargers are very simple and straightforward to use. You can just connect them up to a battery and leave them all through winter or as long as the bike is not in use. This will not cause any damage to your battery, it will just monitor and keep the battery in top condition until you’re ready to use the bike again. These chargers can be left permanently connected for months on end without over charging or over heating your battery.
At MDS we recommend the CTEK and Optimate ranges of battery chargers - these have been used by our customers (and staff for that matter) for many years without any issues.
Both manufacturers supply a range of chargers including 6V and 12V models, motorcycle only chargers and models that are also suitable for charging your car battery.
To view our full range of CTEK motorcycle, automotive and marine battery chargers click here
To view our Optimate range of motorcycle and automotive battery chargers click here
