I was asked about buying Deka Dominator GEL batteries for $390, to replace MK GEL batteries. I was unfamiliar with Deka and am sharing my findings.
MK batteries are a division of Deka – East Penn manufacturing and in my opinion both Deka Dominator and MK are the same battery with different labels.
They also may have different warranty agreements.
Battery warranties are so many months at 100% and so many more months of pro-rata reduced credit, reduced more each month.
I would not pay much more for a better warranty, since both are the same battery.
MK-8G8D looks to be the exact same battery as Deka-8G8DM.
Below are specifications for both labels.
Deka information
http://www.dekabatteries.com/assets/base/0909.pdf (http://www.dekabatteries.com/assets/base/0909.pdf)
MK information
http://www.mkbattery.com/documents/7175MK%20Gel%20Brochure%2011-09.pdf (http://www.mkbattery.com/documents/7175MK%20Gel%20Brochure%2011-09.pdf)
Barry, I replaced my MK's with Deka's in 2004 and they are still going strong.
Good price! Online or local?
When Wilson asked me about what battery to buy, he said he has a local distributer in Louisiana selling Deka for $390 + tax. I don't know the seller's name.
Wholesale Battery Co.
9266 Mammoth Ave
Baton Rouge, LA,
70814-2629
Phone: 225-926-4693
Fax: 225-926-4694
Wow, $390, I just checked on mine today, they're the German Exide Prevailer PV-8D gels. Looking them up on the internet I found a price of $888. Does that make any sense? Are they more than twice as good? What is the expected life of these things? One of them was replaced in 05, no idea about the other one.
Gayland,
I'm no battery expert, but I doubt if the German Exide batteries are THAT much better. Some of us as newbies have no frame of reference and end up paying way too much. We bought our 8Ds from Interstate Batteries at about $600 each back in July of 2009. But considering the difficult installation and a battery weight I could not possibly manage, I did not have too many options.
Barry,
I paid $435 for the Deka 8D8G's about six months ago. I did have an issue with one of the cells leaking acid and they replaced the battery no questions asked, at least it was the outside battery that turned out to be bad. They stated it could not be spewing acid, but when I went in to exchange they looked at the acid and said it had to be a factory defect. The other batteries seem to be fine and I guess time will tell.
Brad
2000 U320 4000