MR2 Owners Club

Any views/opinions on using 'smart' battery chargers ? My MR2 only gets used occasionally.
Do you have to disconnect the battery from the car ? If not, can you connect the smart charger to the cigarette lighter ?

Obviously I want to avoid the hassle of having to remove/replace the spare wheel & disconnect/reconnect the battery from the car.

Any advice greatly appreciated.

i believe its good practice to disconnect the battery, but i never have
as for cigarette lighter, its only live when the ignitions on iirc

just leave the spare out, i mean how many punctures have you had where you have had to use on ? and if you did get a puncture, would you be far from assistance ?

or you could wire in a solar charger, unsure on how but im sure Jimi has done it and will comment

Hmm...don't fancy leaving the spare out...sods law & all that

you think its bad in an MR2, on the Seat i have , you have to remove the boot carpet, then loads of foam trays, then the wheel, then there is a cage around the battery with four bolts that needs to be removed, real pita

if you dont want to leave out the wheel, another suggestion is to hardwire a couple of leads to the battery terminals and route them around the spare wheel, you would need to ensure there well insulated when not in use though

Many thanks for the replies Jeff. Couple of years ago I added extra cables from the battery to route around the spare wheel. That's worked fine for me previously when using a normal charger but now having purchased a smart charger, the instructions clearly state it can be left switched on all the time but omits to state whether I should leave the battery connected to the car.

dont see how its much different to a normal charger, all it will do is switch to a maintenance charge when it detects the batteries fully charged

I'm using one of these smart chargers CTEK MXS 5.0 Fully Automatic Battery Charger (Charges, Maintains and Reconditions Car and Motorcycle Batteries) 12V, 5 Amp - UK Plug
And it can be hard wired to the battery with a clip on connection.

they look good, didn't realise they made them with a charging jack
wonder if you can purchase a spare set of jacks so you could use it on more than one car

CTEK, Optimate and a few other well known charges will sell you spare jack leads that you can leave connected to battery.

I use the same charger on the MR2 and my bike.

You don't need to disconnect the battery and you can leave charger connected till you want to use car / bike.

Thanks guys

angpozzuto wrote: ↑30/06/19 15:56 I'm using one of these smart chargers CTEK MXS 5.0 Fully Automatic Battery Charger (Charges, Maintains and Reconditions Car and Motorcycle Batteries) 12V, 5 Amp - UK Plug

any reason you went for the CTEK MXS 5.0 over the MXS 3.8 ?

jeff wrote: ↑01/07/19 13:13

angpozzuto wrote: ↑30/06/19 15:56 I'm using one of these smart chargers CTEK MXS 5.0 Fully Automatic Battery Charger (Charges, Maintains and Reconditions Car and Motorcycle Batteries) 12V, 5 Amp - UK Plug

any reason you went for the CTEK MXS 5.0 over the MXS 3.8 ?

I didn't look into it that closely tbh, I just bought the first one I found on Amazon with good reviews

just order one with a spare set of charging leads

I've got several of the Lidl's smart chargers (£14), had them for years. Keep my
batteries up no problem. You have to go in store start of winter to get one though.