OTC 3181 130 Amp Heavy-Duty Battery Load Tester Black

I have several 12 volt batteries at home. One good one that I use to jump start my lawn tractor when need be. A spare lawn tractor battery. and an old 12 volt battery with a hole in the case that allowed one cell to leak and dry up. I have all these batteries on a maintainer in my garage. So they all read over 13 volts with my meter. I have a quality Fluke multi-meter I used to first test the accuracy of the Battery load tester. The tester was right on, no need to try and zero the needle at all. I then load tested the known good battery and with the multi-meter also taking readings. Again the tester worked perfectly delivering a 130 amp load to the battery and reading an accurate voltage drop and a "good" result on the display for the battery. Waited for the tester to cool down. Can not test multiple batteries, or retest a battery too quickly or you will over heat the tester. My small tractor battery tested "good" with the load. I then tested the battery with the dry cell. I do keep this battery charged and with a multi-meter it reads and maintains 13 volts. This is the good part, under the load test the needle dropped to where the "known good" batteries did in the first several seconds, but as I counted off the 10 second test the needle dropped steadily to the "bad" range on the display. This to me was a perfect controlled experiment with an accurate result showing this Load Tester works perfectly. I feel that I can trust the results that it will give me in the future. I bought this because my power boat has 4 batteries. I noticed at the very end of last season I was having some issues with at least one of them. These batteries cost almost $200 to replace. I can now feel confident about testing each one of them and only replacing the one/ones that fail. This alone will more than pay for itself because I was prepared to replace them all just to be safe on the water. Will be testing them this weekend as I get my boat ready for the summer season.

Easy to use, clamps are first class! As advertised!

I use a Digital Multi Meter to check the DC voltage (typical 12.6 volts at rest before starting), because the readout is more accurate than the OTC test analog needle, but the OTC is close enough to get and idea where voltage is at.The true purpose of the load tester comes AFTER holding the test switch down for ten seconds. The internal resistor loads the battery at 130 amps, similar to a heavy start cycle. This test, at the ten second mark, you can clearly see if your battery is holding up under the strain. Green is good!! It's neat to see the resistor glow bright orange as it heats up!! Remember to let it cool down before storing it in the box. After testing, my battery reads 12.5 volts. But comes back to 12.6 in a minute.I bought mine for testing my camper batteries, but I also have used it many times for testing my car battery. Also lend it out to friends who need to determine if their battery is sulfated or just not up to snuff for the winter. So far my VARTA OE battery in the SUV is 7+ years old, counting the actual car build date (07/2012). Still kicks over easily,even last winter. Nothing wrong with the charging system or the battery. 90K + miles.

item is and works as described. Well constructed. Fast shipping and delivery.

The tester works well the analog voltage on mine is off about 1.3 volts. The unit will smoke during a load test. I would have no problem buying it again. If the voltage was perfect I would have give in 5 stars.

Great for a quick test on batteries

Awesome

I got this today and put it to use right away. I was suspicious of the batteries in my truck, turns out one of them is for the most part dead, so I will be replacing them both. I tested some other batteries I had laying around too. The tool was getting hot after two test, so be sure to let it cool down between test. It getting warm is not a product deficiency, it just that way it works, no way around it, all load testers will produce heat. While it is made in Chain its has a very well made feel to it. For a size reference the clamps are full size jumper cable size clamps, so you have an idea of how big the tool really is in the picture. The size is not a bad thing though, at least you know you are not getting a Mickey Mouse tester. The cardboard box it comes in is hefty enough to make a good storage box for the user that wont use it very often. What I thought was odd is they didn't use single conductor wire for the cables, its three conductors. All three conductors are connected to the clamps and they don't seem to get hot, so I guess its fine. I can only reason they did this to save money and/or keep the cables flexible.The reason I found for hooking it up the way the instructions say to, which is negative on first, and off last, is that if you don't then the needle will peg toward zero. Over time this could mess up the accuracy of it, however there is a zero adjust to help fix that should it ever occur.