The Schumacher Electric Corp has been making top notch products for better than 65 years and the Speedcharge 1200A battery charger continues the tradition.  For many of those years they have been making a best selling line of battery chargers and jump starters. They are the choice of NASCAR for their chargers and jump starters. . This review will cover the 3/6/12 amp battery charger which also doubles as an automatic maintainer.

Buy The Schumacher SC-1200A/CA SpeedCharge 3/6/12 Amp Charger

What are the main features and specs of the SC-1200A/CA?

There are many attractive features of this fast battery charger. Here is a partial list:

12 Amp fully automatic microprocessor controlled battery charger
Automatically adjusts the amperage rate to charge and maintain batteries
Features float mode monitoring
Auto Voltage Detection automatically detects 6 or 12 Volt batteries
Reverse hook-up protection with LED indicator
Input Voltage: 120V AC
Output Voltage: 12VDC
Output Power: 3A/8A/12A continuous
Amperage Control: Push-button
RoHS Compliant: Yes
Energy Star Compliant: No
Certifications: UL, CUL
Warranty: 2 Year
Dimensions: 7.6″ x 3.5″ x 9.8″
Weight: 3.1lbs

As you can see, there is a lot to like about this charger. You can use it as a standard emergency charger. With up to 12 Amps available, it can very quickly get a dead battery fully charged and ready to start your car. This is where the SpeedCharger part of the name comes from. Schumacher claims it will charge a battery up to twice as fast as a standard charger. It can be used on standard automotive batteries, deep cycle batteries and gel type batteries.

Another feature is that the microprocessor controlled charger will automatically decrease the charging rate as the battery charges. This minimizes the possibility of damaging the battery and also increases the life.

You also get the benefit of having a trickle charger built in. Once the battery is fully charged, the microprocessor automatically switches to maintenance mode. This is also beneficial for smaller batteries such as motorcycle and atv batteries. It is great to know that you can throw the charger on any battery, 6 or 12 volt and leave it there as long as you want and the battery will be ready when you are.

Buy The Schumacher SC-1200A/CA SpeedCharge 3/6/12 Amp Charger

Are there any negatives with the Speedcharge SC1200A?

In doing research on this product, we found out something very interesting. There were several complaints that it would not charge a totally dead battery. One astute reviewer discovered that there is an alternate setting which you can use for a very short period of time that over rides a safety setting that prevents damage to batteries or to the charger itself. Once over ridden for a few minutes, the battery is no longer completely dead and can be charged normally.

Most of the complaints we found regarding the Schumacher SC1200 charger were centered around the inability to charge a completely dead battery. It seems that this added feature is not well known, presumably because it would be easy to over ride the safety feature and do some damage.

Disregarding this misunderstanding, there seem to be very little in the way of complaints. This is rare when you consider that there are over 700 reviews on Amazon alone.  As an alternative, you may want to look at the Schumacher SC-600A SpeedCharge High Frequency Battery Charger which is another fine product in the SpeedCharge line.

So what is the verdict on the Speedcharge charger and maintainer?

After extensive research, we found that the answer to this one was easy. Many times in our product reviews we qualify our verdict. In this case we do not feel the need to qualify our decision. The Schumacher SC-1200A SpeedCharge 3/6/12 Amp Charger/Maintainer/Tester is a buy for anyone looking for a low price, highly versatile portable battery charger/ maintainer.

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What do customers say?

by Brad

Some people complained it will not charge a totally dead battery.
This is safety feature so it will not turn on if nothing is hooked up it.

To charge a dead battery – you have to give it a little pre-charge to get it to about 1 volt so the charger knows something is actually hooked up to to it.

To do this:
1. unplug charger from wall
2. hook battery to charger
3. press and hold “display” and “type” button at the same time
4. while holding those buttons – plug the charger into wall.
* this will bypass safety features and charge the battery even if it is dead (assuming the battery can be charged at all)
– do not run in this mode for more then 5 minutes or you can damage unit and battery.
– this will get the battery enough of a charge so that the charger can detect a battery is hooked up to it (1 volt) .
5. unplug charger from wall.
6. wait 30 seconds and plug in charger into the wall.  Read more…