6v vs. 12v house batteries
If you have 4 6v house batteries, would you be better off to replace
them with 2 12V house batteries.
them with 2 12V house batteries.
Forum Discussion
22 Replies
carp65 wrote:
If you have 4 6v house batteries, would you be better off to replace
them with 2 12V house batteries.
Lots of info provided so far...some confusing. Bottom line, four 6volts are better and more powerful that two 12volts.carp65 wrote:
If you have 4 6v house batteries, would you be better off to replace
them with 2 12V house batteries.
NO!!!- You need the amp hours, not just the volts.
I would suggest 4 6v golf cart batteries as they have a lot of amp hours in them.
Wire 2 of them in seiries to make 12V, the other two in series to make another 12v. Then wire the 2 12v series of batteries in parallel to make a 12v high amp hour system that will work great for boondocking. - Hi,
If you boondock and wish to run an inverter at high loads then 12 volt jars may be best. If you have room, weight capacity, and deep pockets then what harold1946 is lovely.
If you don't boondock then a single 12 volt deep cycle type battery is all you need. - For me the answer comes down to weight. A given battery is going to weigh a certain amount per amp/hour per cell. A deep cycle battery with a decent amp-hour per cell rating is going to weigh around 75 lbs for a 6 volt battery and 150 lbs for a 12 volt battery. I have both, and I much prefer installing the 6 volt batteries...
I have 6v deep cycle US2200 at 232 AH, and some 8D 12V start batteries (not deep cycle) at 245 AH. I need to stretch and do deep breathing before I install the 8D's...
Brian donn0128 wrote:
Only if you NEVER rely on battery power when boon docking. I have 4 golf cart batteries and can along with my solar panels boon dock for 4-5 days even on cloudy days before I need to use my generator. Previously I had 4 12 bolt batteries and had to use the generator every couple of days under similar circumstances.
You must have had rather small 12 volt batteries. I have three that are 245 AH each, total 735 AH.
8D AGM deep cycle.- This is a common question here. Are six volt pairs or 12 volt singles better.
(NOTE: you have 2 pair or 2 singles in your question)
The answer is a bit more complex than YES/NO but the answer boils down usually to Six Volt pairs are best.
The reason: COST.
now... Here is why.
When you talk about 12 volt there are many different batteries,, Group 24,27,29,31, 4-D 8-D and dozens of others not listed.
Each battery is a diffeent size.. Group 24 for example is about 75 amp hours.
8-D around 250. (They are heavy and expensive).
The better question is this: What TYPE of battery.
Starting batteries like to be well fed, If you run them down to half full they get kind of unhappy and may well not recover.
Marine/Deep Cycle are starting batteries first, with lip service to deep cycle, Though they can recover from a lower discharge than an engine type battery, they still object to 50 percent
DEEP CYCLE batteries, such as Golf Car batteries, do not object to 50% discharge, provided they are recharged swiftly.
And when it comes to DEEP CYCLE the common GC-2 Golf car battery is the most popular, it's made in great quanities and thus costs less per unit than other large lead acid batteries.
HOWEVER: There are a couple of golf car companies using 12 volt batteries now,, This is going to result (over time) in 12 volt DEEP CYCLE batteries dropping in price.
Testing says I need to replace my GC-2's soon. At 8.5 years they finally bit the electrons. - I would stick with the four 6-volt batteries wired in series/parallel. This will generally give you more than double the amp-hour capacity. If you never boondock and cost of two vs. four batteries is driving this decision then you could get by with the two 12-volt batteries pretty easily.
Mike. - Typically four each 6V batteries (Two groups of two 6VDC batteries in series) will give you around 450AHs of battery capacity.
Two standard 105AH 12VDC batteries in parallel will give you 210AHs of battery capacity.
Depends on what you need to have your battery capacity supporting when you are camping off the power grid..
Roy Ken
