Extra trailer battery's
I have two batteries on the trailer but for my 2 week boon docking trip I was thinking about taking along 2 of my boat deep cycles as well. Can I leave the 2 trailer battery’s hooked up to the trailer...
Forum Discussion
Should work just fine...
Are you going to be re-charging these batteries while on your off the power grid trip.
These four batteries connected in parallel will be demanding a good 17-20AMPS of DC charge current for each battery being charged from your smart mode on-board converter/charger unit if you have it connected to a generator. This will probably exceed the output current you have available to use. Won't do any harm just don't expect to re-charge all four batteries to their 90% charge state in a three hour generator run time period.
You won't be doing any damage to the batteries unless you run them down below 12.0VDC and not re-charge back up to the 90% charge state right away. Bringing batteries below their 50% Charge state and not re-charging right away will do harm to your batteries performance. This would happen to your two batteries connected or all four connected.
Most folks like to plan ahead for trip like this and the best thing you can is change out the automotive incandescent bulbs for led boards for lighting. Each automotive type bulb will draw 1AMP of DC Current. Just having four or five automotive type lights on will discharge your batteries real quick. LED Boards will give you an 80% power drain savings.
If I was going to do this alot I would wire in all four batteries using the BLUE SEA four-position battery switches. Then you can select which battery you want to use - one of them or all four - or none at all... This would allow you to re-charge only two of the batteries at a time if that is all the DC Current your has available.
This is how my off-road POPUP trailer is setup for four each GP24 Interstate 12VDC batteries in parallel...
Lots of fun playing with PLAN Bs for us hehe...
Roy Ken
Are you going to be re-charging these batteries while on your off the power grid trip.
These four batteries connected in parallel will be demanding a good 17-20AMPS of DC charge current for each battery being charged from your smart mode on-board converter/charger unit if you have it connected to a generator. This will probably exceed the output current you have available to use. Won't do any harm just don't expect to re-charge all four batteries to their 90% charge state in a three hour generator run time period.
You won't be doing any damage to the batteries unless you run them down below 12.0VDC and not re-charge back up to the 90% charge state right away. Bringing batteries below their 50% Charge state and not re-charging right away will do harm to your batteries performance. This would happen to your two batteries connected or all four connected.
Most folks like to plan ahead for trip like this and the best thing you can is change out the automotive incandescent bulbs for led boards for lighting. Each automotive type bulb will draw 1AMP of DC Current. Just having four or five automotive type lights on will discharge your batteries real quick. LED Boards will give you an 80% power drain savings.
If I was going to do this alot I would wire in all four batteries using the BLUE SEA four-position battery switches. Then you can select which battery you want to use - one of them or all four - or none at all... This would allow you to re-charge only two of the batteries at a time if that is all the DC Current your has available.
This is how my off-road POPUP trailer is setup for four each GP24 Interstate 12VDC batteries in parallel...
Lots of fun playing with PLAN Bs for us hehe...
Roy Ken
