Manuals are a function of what the engineers are putting into them. IMHO they're a year or two behind the current knowlege base. When we bought our Lifelines it was said of AGM's they could go flat and you could bring them back to full capacity. Now Lifeline say's no and real world experience agrees. I ran thru a capacity check each year, running them to 10.5 volts and then recharging. Now they say NO- NO! Their AGM's won't come back to full and Ample Power comfirms it as well as what I read off of Morgans Cloud conversations with Lifeline and their full time cruising experience. I also have a DC genset and ran it twice a day to charge the batteries and pull down the cold plates as well as 3-4 hours straight once per week to make water. I had two Lifeline D8's and an Optima blue top starting battery. During the day the batteries were charges some (depending on how much daily use Kindles and a computer uses) from the solar. Of course sailing in the Caribbean is not all sailing and when we had to motor of for any length of time (like going from the BVI's to St. Martin) they would be fully charged. The batteries operated between 85-100% most of their life, with various periods of a deep discharge and some intermittent charging when we were traveling inland and had the power cycled on / off during the day.

I'm glad those that have them in the states are getting good life out of them. I've a friend (he just replace his) that say's he has enough solar to equalize them monthly as Justin of Lifeline suggests. BTW when he called Lifeline and asked about AGM's on the boat Lifeline referred him to Morgan's Cloud site for a real world cruising application. That's too when I came upon their info.

I don't know if they've changed the batteries over the years (most likely they've made small changes) but at the moment they're not for me. If I was in an RV and plugging in every week yes, I would get them again. But when I leave here (Colon, Panama) I don't expect to be plugged in for another 10-12 months.

Good Luck

Go Slow
Sail Far
Stay Long