Mineral oil in batteries

[imolared]

A friend suggested to put a small amount of mineral oil in the battery cells.

The goal is to reduce evaporation.

your thoughts??

[AZ Traveler]

Would not put anything other than distilled water in your battery. If you never want to put water in a battery buy a maintenance free AGM battery or a lithium battery - both are more expensive than a standard lead acid battery.

[jeffba]

Looking at AGM batteries

[mlh]

Wonder why the battery manufacturers don’t put mineral oil in their batteries?
Lynwood

[1retired06]

And specify distilled water only?

[Dave W]

That mineral oil trick dates back to the old days when cars had generators instead of alternators and mechanical voltage and charge regulators.RVs had less then great converter chargers as well and quite possibly could overcharge the battery some. Mineral oil supposedly would slow down the boil off and need for constantly adding water to a battery. I don't know how much water most folks add to their deep cycle RV batteries, but mine may need a very slight top off 1X a year and that water is always distilled. Adding mineral oil to a battery may actually shorten its life if it is driven onto the lead plates and spacers when you add water.

[Kyle and Lisa]

Oil would become impregnated in the lead plates, making it harder for the battery to recharge, and shorten the life of the battery, as with un-distilled water.

[Eagleback]

My Father god rest, talked about that once when i was a young lad and said that if you use the oil method you use an eye dropper to just add a small amount to cover the cell and if you need to add water you MUST use the eye dropper and add water pushing the dropper through the film of oil. But with today's smart charging battery boil off is more of a thing of the past.

[DQDick]

After our first year, I just bought AGM batteries and forgot about it altogether.