steelhead63 wrote:
I am thinking on changing from 2 27 series batteries to 1 31 series interstate battery. We seldom dry camp except when spending the night at a Walmart when we're traveling to and from our snowbird location. Most of our inside lighting is LED. I am wondering if this 1 battery will be enough or should I stay with 2 12 volt
With what you say that you only dry camp in the occasional Walmart parking lot and have mostly LED's, there is no reason you can't remove one and free up space/some tongue weight. With the draw of LED's, even if you left them on all night you would likely be safe. From your post and being in the confines of a Walmart parking lot, my guess you won't be there long enough for it to be an issue, even if you used your furnace...
Also, unless your 27 batteries are bad, it is a waste of money to upgrade to a 31. Just keep your old ones, and put the money into upgrading the remaining incandescent bulbs.
Finally, everyone's usage is different and while you say it is "just lights", it will put you at ease to test this. The easiest way is to disconnect the parallel connection and connect just one battery. You can do this in the driveway, or if that is not possible/feasible, just leave both batteries on the trailer connecting same as above, but now give it a real world test at Walmart. Should that fail, you have the second battery as a backup. Check your voltage the next morning and if all is well, now you can go home and remove the 2nd battery and clean it up. BTW, if this is a Deep Cycle or Marine battery, they can be run down to 20% without issue. Many confuse this with a regular battery that should not be taken below 50-40%, otherwise it will reduce life drastically.
