Next message: Jim Mitchell: "Re: lv-ab: boat hauling"
At 10:42 AM 8/25/99 -0400, you wrote:
>I don't like the idea of one bank. If you accidently deplete that ONE bank
>what then - you may have no fall back - really because how often are you
>going to remember to charge the starting battery. I had one and it was a
>pain in the butt and for that reason I got rid of mine.
My starting battery and the house bank (6 golf cart batteries in series
parallel to make up a 660AH 12volt battery) are both charged through a
battery combiner. This IS NOT a battery isolator.
A battery combiner allows charging to one battery (in my case, the house
bank) until it reaches 13.8V (adjustable) then combines the two batteries
in parallel so the engine battery then gets charged. Ther is no voltage
drop (.6 to 1.2 volts) as there is on an isolator. Both batteries get full
charge.
You can do it the other way around if you want but I found that my engine
battery NEVER needed charging while the house bank ALWAYS needs charging.
Combiners are available in different sizes from several sources. They even
have them for 3 bank applications. I have a 2 bank 70 amp (the smallest)
that I got from West Marine for less than $80.
I have never had a problem with this setup (two years so far) and the
engine battery has always been fully topped up.
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