disconnect battery?

I decided to turn off the battery switch and leave the cables attached. I was going to hook up a battery minder but I store in a HUGE building and I'm not close to an electric outlet. When I took it out of storage Wednesday and turned on the switch all was good. Plenty of battery left (70% according to the monitor) to work the landing gear and turn on interior lights. This was an extremely cold winter here with temps often at sub zero degrees F. I have never removed batteries in years and years (25+) of boating and camping but I always disconnected a cable. Never had a battery problem. Now I think that I can safely turn it off and leave it with this camper. I'm not advocating others follow my example just reporting my experience.

Unless you can SEE the switch, along with the battery and one and only wire between the battery post and the switch, it is safe to assume the switch could power a few accessories even in the OFF position. Too much creative stupidity at the manufacturer.

If you disconnect all the leads to the negative battery posts, the battery is isolated, 100% guaranteed.

Removing cable is better than switch. Switched can cut all power or just some of it. Removing cable prevents all power loss.

My neighbor has contantly had a dead battery. it is stored off site and no power. I showed him the load on the battery because he does not shut off his weingard antenna and you can not shut off the propane detector. .97 amps. I guess I finally convinced him to disconnect the neg battery lead. I also have a friend with a big pusher and the electric relay battery disconnect does not disconnect everything like the propane detector, the steps that come out when the door is opened. the inverter seems to be on standby and what else. His batterys are always dead and what a deal to find the wires to disconnect. Maybe going to get a Quest disconnet and shut off everything

A lot depends on the battery switch. Is it a complete battery cut-off switch, or just the battery switch in the trailer? My 5th wheel battery switch doesn't cut off all the electric drain so I have a complete battery disconnect switch installed.

That is for short term storage. For the winter I pull the battery and bring it into the garage and put the battery on a Battery Tender.

I have two AGM batteries and I charge them up and disconnect both cables from them and leave them over the winter. They have not frozen yet and I have been doing this since 2006

DutchmenSport wrote:
Unless you have a specific reason, no. If your camper has a built in cut-off switch, there's no need to pull wires from the battery. The battery is disconnected when you flip the switch. Why would you want to do more?

I remove the batteries from the MH and put them on a trickle charger (BatteryMinder) in the garage for the winter.

If battery is to sit for over a month, it would be a good idea to put a trickle charger on the battery too. I have used a trickle charger for my battery in the off season, and it is over 6 years old and doing fine.

I know with our trailer there are a couple of vampires loads that will take a very small amount of current even when battery switch is off, but then I have a solar panel that more than makes up for it.
The best answer take off the negative terminal once you know the battery is fully charged. Partially charged batteries are more likely to freeze.

Trailer connected to 120VAC or not? In cold climates a fully charged battery is semi protected from freezing. A discharged battery is definitely not..