Trolling motor battery placement

[nusta]

Hi everyone im a newby and after some info/suggestions on where to put the battery for my 420 explorer trophy. Some say under the front casting deck some say at the rear under the casting deck. Which would allow me to charge from the outboard. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks

[sweaky]

Hi you could extend your wire where the terminals are with some crimp sleeves i get them from an electrical store where a mate of mine works and this would keep the wiaght up front under your castin deck. and welcome to tbx by the way
the other thing if you want you can leave your batteries where they are i beleive that it is personal choice i hope this has helped


Ian

[skipzx]

Hey nusta,

The placement of your battery can be a (relatively) exact science. Where you place it will effect the trim of your boat. In my opinion I'd be trying a couple of different places and seeing how the boat handles. I think most blokes gnerally put then up front to help get the nose of the boat down and get the boat planing a bit quicker.


Cheers,

Sam

[skipzx]

Hey nusta,

The placement of your battery can be a (relatively) exact science. Where you place it will effect the trim of your boat. In my opinion I'd be trying a couple of different places and seeing how the boat handles. I think most blokes gnerally put then up front to help get the nose of the boat down and get the boat planing a bit quicker.


Cheers,

Sam

[Bartnmax]

My preference for battery location is always down the transome end of the boat (rear, stern, back, whatever).
Heavier items at the rear will assist the boat in getting the nose out of the water & onto the plane a bit quicker.
If there's too much weight rearward I'd prefer to try to get some of the other items up front & leave the batteries down the back. You can easilly run wiring via a relay to your motor but the shorter the wiring from the charge source (outboard) to the battery the quicker & better it will charge. All wiring has some level of resistence in it. The more wiring, the more resistence to flow. With the battery up front you'll no doubt get good voltage to your elec moitor but you may only get 10.5 - 11 volts from the OB to the battery when charging. The closer the motor is to the charge source the more voltage you'll get to the battery when charging. Charge voltage should ideally be 13.8 to 14.2 volts.
The other reason I prefer to have the battery down the back is that once the boat is on the plane the front will get more of a pounbding then the rear will. Compare thre ride quality between front & back yourself & you'll quickly realise exactly what I mean. More bashing up front is not good for the battery. They are, after all, another component that is prone to breakage.
Why tempt fate. Keep it down the back where it's less likely to suffer impact damage.

Bill.

[nusta]

Thanks for the advice guys, my thinking is along the same line as Bill. The recharging factor seems too important to dismiss. And i was hoping the weight of the leccy will balance out the battery. Any other advice?

[Bartnmax]

Charging is a very important factor.
One problem with batteries is that over time they develope a memory.
If the battery only ever get's 10.5 volts fed to it over a fairly long period of time (due to over-long wiring, etc) then after a while, even if you do put it on a Charge where the voltage is higher you'll find that it wont accept over 10.5 volts.
It's important, especially when dealing with deep cycle batteries (such as are used with elec motors) to ensure that they are able to get a full charge (13.8-14.2 volts).Otherwise you'll find that you'll use it one day & run it down with a fair use of the leccy motor, & it wont want to come right back up to full charge.
It's equally important to ensure they are used over a fair range of discharge.
If f'rinstance you constantly only use a little trickle off the top & then just replace that little trickle, then when you do eventually use a big dose of the batteries capacity, you'll find that it will have developed a memory in regard to charging & will only accept a little trickle when charging.

It pays to, every now & then, give it a good dose of use to drop the capacity level well down & then ensure it's got a good strong voltage/amperage source available to recharge it right back up to fiull capacity.
It also pays to charge it occasionally overnight with a remote 240v chgarger rather than just relying on the outboard alternator.That way you 'trick' the battery into accepting charging over a prolonged poeriod of time rather than just in high volt/amp doses over a short period.
It's about maximising the charge/discharge over the widest possible range so that is doesn't 'learn' to just accept a little of 'this' & nothing else.Small charge/discharge, deeper charge/discharge, fast charge/discharge, slow charge/discharge. Get the battery used to it all.


Bill.

[nusta]

Thanks for your advice Bill sounds like you have done your research on this. It is greatly appreciated.

[Bartnmax]

It's part of me job to know electrics but I'll quite happilly bow to the superior knowledge of any Auto elecs we have around.
I believe we do have at least 1 on board the list. I'm quite happy to be corrected if I'm wrong.
I'm a mechanic, not an auto elec.
Bill.

[sweaky]

Bart with some of the new gennies when you out the bush they have twelve volt source on them and you can charge your batteries of these i think they charge pretty quickly i am not very sure so as you posted that you need to trick batteries into taking chargses in different formats would this be ok to use a gennie to charge quikly?