I always carry a spare leisure battery with me and sometimes it's used to run the Inverter.
If the sprae did run low would it be possible to put some charge into it run of the cars battery via jump leads whilst the engine is running of course.
No,not really,leisure batteries are designed for lower current use,a car battery has much thicker plates. However,leisure batteries get charged when you tow,so they must be ok up to point. Max charge rate is normally given on the battery. How about a car battery as a spare? ps," leisure battery" is a manufacturers code for " cheap battery painted orange and sold at twice the price"
Car batteries can provide a massive amount of power for starting etc but can't keep it up for long, they don't like being drained to low either.
A proper leisure battery will be a deep cycle type, it can provide only a mild amount of power but can give it for a longer period as well as being able to go to a lower state of charge without damage. They usually need trickle charging rather than boost charging.
Reputable brands will be designed specifically for leisure use. They do normally charge from the car but are better being trickle charged from the EHU charger, some motorhomes will have power regulators fitted to limit the charge from the engine going to the leisure battery.
If you connect with jump leads to the other battery, then the charge from that battery will flow through the leads until the voltages are equal, this is what I meant by "big wallop". Charging it from the alternator should be fine as it would be a trickle charge, but the correct kit is needed to do this, without transferring power from the good battery into the flat one you can't just connect the battery up in parallel.
------------- Steve.
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I have since had the electrics upgraded to twin sockets (for charging leisure battery and fridge operation whilst towing)
In addition to this I also had two further connections added into the boot to connect my spare leisure battery to charge whilst driving.
My only slight concern is that the wires seem pretty standard gauge similar to the wires on my CTEK 5.0 charger, is this the standard sort of wire used to connect to charge battery's?
The charging wires (green/white) will only take around 3-4A so not too heavy, the fridge (red) wire is usually much heavier as is the fridge earth wire (black).
If it was a pro upgrade then you should not need to worry, just enjoy
Quote: Originally posted by Miserly on 30/7/2011
No,not really,leisure batteries are designed for lower current use,a car battery has much thicker plates.
A car battery has a larger number of thinner plates, this is to give a larger surface area and thus a larger current output. They are more likely to be damaged by a deep discharge.
A deep cycle battery has thicker plates that will deliver less peak current but will withstand deeper discharge cycles.
Hope this clarifies the difference between battery types!
------------- Love a lot. Trust a few. But ALWAYS paddle your own canoe!!
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Those who talk don't know.
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Quote: Originally posted by davek0974 on 10/8/2011
I presume it was a professional conversion?
The charging wires (green/white) will only take around 3-4A so not too heavy, the fridge (red) wire is usually much heavier as is the fridge earth wire (black).
If it was a pro upgrade then you should not need to worry, just enjoy
Yes, it was a tow bar fitter, the guy that fitted my towbar originally.
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Topic: Spare LeisurevBattery
