Monitoring Battery Temperature

I have a question for you all related to battery monitors:

How important is it to have a monitor capable of monitoring battery temperature?

According to my research (partially updated here - http://www.bristol27.com/projects/batteries), I get the idea it's important. As I understand it, the temperature of the battery affects things like:

• Calculating how much capacity a battery has (higher temp = higher capacity, lower temp = less capacity)
• Calculating battery voltage (higher temp = lower voltage)
• Required charging voltage, which can help prevent thermal runaway (e.g. At low temperatures, increased internal resistance and reduced chemical activity require a higher charging voltage and visa-versa).
• Timing of off-gassing (Gassing is directly related to battery voltage and electrolyte temperature. If the battery temperature rises to 120F, gassing starts at just 13.4 volts, but hold the battery temperature at 100F, and you delay off gassing until the battery voltage rises to 13.8)

I'd prefer if we could focus this discussion on why it is or isn't important to know a batteries temperature. However, the reason I ask this question is because I'm trying to choose between the Victron BMV 600S and the Xantrex LinkPRO. A key advantage of the LinkPRO is that it has the ability to monitor battery temperature, while the BMV 600 does not.

I appreciate your input and look forward to the discussion.

 

It depends on the type of battery. Lead Acid batteries are not particularly temperature sensitive. You can overheat them, but they will boil off water which can be replaced. You have to boil them pretty much dry to ruin them.

AGM and Gel batteries on the other hand are temperature sensitive and overheating the battery will ruin them rapidly. If you overheat them the electrolyte dries out quickly and then they are ruined.The manufacturers of these batteries recommend using a charger that monitors the battery temperature.

So if you are using Lead Acid you probably don't need a charger with a temperature monitor. If you are using gel or agm you do.

 

Thank you for your response Ike, and I should have mentioned that I plan to use 4 GC2 Lead Acid batteries