How low should you take your batteries?
Simple question, at what voltage level should one start to consider kicking on the genny? I'm running dual 6V Costco batteries.
Forum Discussion
If you want 500-1000+ cycles, out of the batteries stay above 50% SOC. If you are willing to live with 250-500 cycles which I suspect very many of us will since in the even 10 year life of a battery, that's 25-50 such cycles/year, you can go down as low as 20%, at least according to trojan 6v graphs. But going below 20% SOC drops cycle life drastically.
My personal experience is that normally I go to 50% before charging, measured using my trimetric gauge, but we dry camp a lot, and 10-20 times/year I got my batteries down to 20% before I charged them. add in 50 cycles to 50%/year. After 8 years, I gave them to my daughters FIL, they still have very high SG and cycle life data says they are still at around 80+% of initial capacity and going strong.
Now, don't try this with a typical dual purpose 12V. Remember GC batteries in GC at clubs get cycled like crazy.
My personal experience is that normally I go to 50% before charging, measured using my trimetric gauge, but we dry camp a lot, and 10-20 times/year I got my batteries down to 20% before I charged them. add in 50 cycles to 50%/year. After 8 years, I gave them to my daughters FIL, they still have very high SG and cycle life data says they are still at around 80+% of initial capacity and going strong.
Now, don't try this with a typical dual purpose 12V. Remember GC batteries in GC at clubs get cycled like crazy.
