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Posts: 167
Location: Ontario | Hi All,
I picked up a new fish and ski this spring and its been great for when I am fishing. However, when out with the family and friends for the day, it would be nice to have some more 12V power to run things like an electric cooler, extra outlets for charging electronics, etc. I already have 2 big HDS Units and a stereo hooked up to the cranking battery. My question is, if I am going to run some additional 12V outlets for some of the items listed above, what is the best way to do it?
Should I add a 5th battery to the boat and hook this up to the on board charger? Or, will I be fine running all this off the cranking battery as long as I am running the big motor periodically?
Thanks guy,
Matt |
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Location: Des Moines IA | I'd consider running another battery parallel with your current cranking battery. Just use the exact same battery and all should be fine. I believe your on board charger will charge both off one bank as well. |
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Posts: 167
Location: Ontario | Thanks Mike. The charger is a Minn Kota 440D. I have 36V TM using 3 of the banks. It would be great if I could hook up the cranking and this new 5th battery to the same bank.
Thanks again |
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Location: Des Moines IA | I'm not an electrical engineer, but I am guessing a 10 amp charge would be enough to charge both batteries in parallel. If it were my boat, that's what i would do. What size is your current cranking battery? |
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Posts: 167
Location: Ontario | I dont believe it is a 31, I have to go check though. However, I have a brand new 31 in my garage that I could put in and use the current cranking for the extra play things. |
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Location: Des Moines IA | If you run them parallel (so you can run them off a single bank charger), they need to be the same size to be most effective. Running them in parallel basically doubles your current run time. Everything would run off both batteries essentially. If you want to run an "extra" battery just for the extra stuff, you'll need to run them separately, and add another charger just for that battery. |
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Posts: 167
Location: Ontario | hhhmmmm...ok, so I have 2 options.
Purchase a 5th battery to match the size of the battery that is in there now or purchase another group 31 and replace the existing battery with it and then add my existing group 31 as the 5th battery. If I have to purchase a battery anyways, makes sense to make it a group 31.
If I run the batteries in parallel, wont that make my 12v power 24 volt and that causes other issues? I know your not an electrical engineer, but trust me, you know WAY more than I do!.
the other option is to add a 5th battery and just run it seperately for the additional items. Then hook that up to the 4th bank and let the big motor charge the cranking battery and disconnect it from the on board charger.
Man...I just confused myself |
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Location: Des Moines IA | Parallel keeps the same voltage of the original battery, but doubles battery run time. Running them in series doubles volt output to that of both batteries combined(think of filling a mag lite with batteries).
http://www.ehow.com/how_5810012_wire-two-12v-batteries-parallel.htm... |
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Posts: 167
Location: Ontario | Ok, so this is it. I remove the existing non group 31 battery and replace it with 2 group 31s. Then I run everything (with exception of TM obviously) on these batteries which are running in parallel (see, I am paying attention). Then I run both of these batteries off the 4th bank of my on board charger? |
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Location: Des Moines IA | Yes. That is what I would do. Running two 31s will probably be overkill, but better safe than sorry. Remember parallel is Pos to a Pos, Neg to Neg connection between both batteries. I would use some pretty thick battery wire to connect the two batteries as well, like 6 or 8 gauge. Then you hook all the toys up to the pos, and neg of only one (same battery) of the 2 batteries. |
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Posts: 167
Location: Ontario | Awesome Mike...thanks! |
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Posts: 5874
| Running those batterys in paralell will nearly triple the run time. That's what I would do. |
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