Switching over to Gel cells for my trolling motor and wanting to know what the pro and cons are other than cost. They seem to weigh about 1/2 as much but do they hold a charge as well?

I'm planning on converting as their power to weight ratio looks very good. I don't see a down side.

I have a Everstart that I want to return and get partial credit on a gel--but does Walmart carry a gel cell(yes I know their batteries are ca-ca)

Haven't gone to gells but do have AGMs in right now and they are doing a good job. They also seem to recharge a bit faster than the regular flooded cells.

+1 on the AGM's. They work really well for me. Keep a charge
alot longer.

Look at the Deka AGM's.....

I used to sell car parts 8 years ago. And some came in with a red top. Wanting to use it as a core (it was 5 years old at the time) I of course asked him if we could test it first. He said, no, and I told him, I'm going to test it and take it home if it works. He was like good luck, but it is bad bad bad. (he musta been having a terrible day)

So I charged it, tested it, then tossed it into a f-100. This was in 2003. Anyway, that is my dad's daily drive, probably put another 150k on the truck since then. And it still start the truck strong every time.

I have 4 Cabelas AGM's, after alot of research, looked at the Optimas hard, I went with Cabelas AGM's..

Love Them so Far.

I put 4 of the sears Platinum AGM's in my boat. Ive yet to run out of power even on very windy weekends.

In my humble opinion, if you take care of a lead-acid battery, you can save a bunch of money. I have a good on-board charger that I plug in immediately after using my boat and leave it on until I take it out again. I typically get over 4 years service from a cheap WalMart lead acid battery and don't believe I can save any money by converting to newer batteries.
I would also point out that with the newer motors used in trolling motors today, the battery will run me all day on most days. The motor efficiency is that good.

Suspect you are wanting to switch over from traditional flooded wet cell batteries to Absorbed Glass Mat (AGM) batteries which are not actually GELCELL technology. Anyway...

Haven't located a true dedicated 'AGM' charger built yet for bass boats. Everyone is using their same traditional flooded wet cell chargers which are being marketed as 'AGM capable' but they apparently only 'get by' on AGMs partially re-charging them. They might think they are getting a full charge (the charger lights will tell them so)but in fact the AGMs with their slightly higher full charge voltage needs are getting only about 80% charged. Even only about 80% charged, most AGM's are giving excellent results though.

Many have successfully run Optimas . Deka is another source and they are havng good reports but I have not yet used one.

Lou, if what you say is correct, won't that shorten the life of the AGM's? I know the leading cause of problems with lead acid is not properly keeping them charged. Just curious.
And maybe you could enlighten me on the advantages of AGM's as Im ignorant of them.

I have 5 Deka's and love them.....

Coming from the broadcast video industry, we have been using professional gel cells, AGMs and other sealed lead acid batteries for many years because we can legally fly those SLAs on airplanes beside and along with News TV crews.

Professional true AGM capable chargers though are not marine rated and would surely prove too expensive for the US.recreatonal boater.

I find in the various technical and engineering battery tables that the starved acid batteries .. Optima and Deka AGM batteries with their increased proximity of electrolyte to plates have a higher voltage per cell resting output and also truly require a higher recharge voltage (about .2V higher total on a typical 12 volt marine battery) to reach 100% charge than the traditional flooded wet cell battery.

A typical state of the art recreational wet cell charger widely used today used on a marine AGM battery only reaches about 80+ or so % full charge ever ..... including. Then the battery charger not knowing it is an AGM battery connected , floats and goes no higher.

In Europe and Hong Kong and Australia you can find the manufacturers acknowleging this fact making such statements as " AGMs requires a higher voltage charging regime
than standard FLA / SFL (charging
equipment would need to be adjusted)"

Here in the US, at least in the recreational marine battery business, AGM builders do not discuss/acknowldege that their batteries need their customers to additionally buy expensive special true AGM chargers that are adjustable, so instead they spec a very wide and lower range of acceptable input charging voltages.

And also here in the U.S. the battery charger makers/sales staffs don't want to acknowldege to their users they need to make a tweak adjustment or switch an internal dip switch bank to optimize their chargers just to be able to properly 100% charge an AGM.

So best we can do today as consumers that must live with what is presently on the market is accept that we are in a very cost conscious recreational boater market..... and that 80% of an AGM is still outperforming a 100% charged flooded wet cell.

OK Lou r Pitcher you seem to know what you are talking about. I have 2 of the small Optima's on my trolling motor 2 1/2 years old bought at Sam's club. Had a Minn Kota charger that went bad and replaced it with a new Guest charger but I think the damage was allready done to the Optima's. Make it simple for me I'm going to buy 2 new batteries what should I buy?