Adding an Extra starting battery.

[somewhereinusa]

The short answer is yes. How far away from the two start batteries?

[lornaschinske]

http://www.smartgauge.co.uk/batt_con.html The recommended hookup is from a UK canalboat forum

This is the canal boat build. Kinda reminds one of... a skoolie! Great read. The canal boat threads are an awful lot like reading a skoolie build thread. I got sucked into a few while researching Traveler/Gypsy Vardo paint schemes.

[bansil]

Alot of people would say it will work, problem is the batteries will not be balance so long term the weaker battery will die.

If you want to make one a "house" battery that can be used to jump off the truck that is doable and fairly easily

check this out:

http://www.expeditionportal.com/foru...y-setup-for-50

l;ots of good reading

[bansil]

Lorna good read/find

thanks

[the_experience03]

I'd have to second the recommendation of just allowing for a link to the starting system from your house batteries. You wouldn't want to make a habit of using them to start the bus and you would need isolation between the two systems, but it would be great redundancy without adding the weight and expense of another battery when you already have backups on board.

[bus-bro]

I'm guessing that you are getting air in your fuel injection system. If so, and if it only happens after prolonged sitting*, you could bleed the air out of the fuel system so you wouldn't need to crank so much. Might solve the battery issue.

* If it happens often, you'd be better off fixing the problem.

[bapos]

This would be my suggestion for the starting batteries...... bite the bullet and go buy 2 MAXX batteries from walmart. They have a 3 year replacement warranty. SOME HOW... mine seem to always go out before their 3 year period ends oddly enough. I have been swapping batteries in my demotion derby cars that way for years. I do the same thing with road hazzard on PLT tries I buy from discount tire.

As for house batteries.... I would look at 6 volt golf cart batteries and wire them in series to get 12v out of them. I was going to use car batteries but they are not really made to be discharged and charged constantly. It shortens the life out of them. Yes you can connect them to your start batteries if needed. Im sure theres a multitude of ways to connect them. You really want the shortest cable run possible to do this. The longer the run the bigger the cable will need to be. But if your just tying them together for an emergency use type gig you could get by with smaller in a pinch. I would suggest using welding lead cable. It hold up WAY better than most automotive cabling in my experience plus you can get some REALLY NICE juicey big stuff from the welding shops that will usually crimp the ends on for you right there.

[lornaschinske]

We plan on using the house batteries to crank the bus. We are parked far more than we are rolling. We use a smart charger to keep the house bank up. The house "bank" is a single cheapie 12vDC starting battery from Wal-Mart right now. It was the one we bought when we went to buy the bus. We will use a few 12vDC deep cycle marine batteries once we get all the 12vDC/inverter stuff hooked up.

We rolled in to Roswell NM in December 2011. We have moved the bus once.... from one campsite to another within the same campground. So I think it is safe to say that we rarely move the bus.

As for the 6vDC batteries.. the battery boxes on the bus are roughly an inch too short to allow us to put in the golf cart batteries. We have had good luck with the 12vDC Deep cycle marine batteries from Wal-Mart. The one we used as the house battery on the Class C lasted for as long as golf cart batteries are said to last.

[Elliot Naess]

Ascend, you sound fairly sure of your fuel problem diagnosis, but just in case...: I had such a problem with Millicent, and I solved it by replacing the rubber fuel hoses, both supply and return. They had hairline cracks that apparently allowed air in. That was six years ago and she fires right up even after sitting all winter.

Still, Millicent requires that I squeeze the fuel pedal a little bit right when I hit the key -- hot, cold, anytime. You might try that.

Millicent has three 12 Volt batteries from the factory. In parallel, yes. I theorize the main leads ought to be connected to opposite ends of the stack so there is no "front battery" and "rear battery", but mine came wired to "the front battery" and I kept it that way, which seems to work fine. I bought three new batteries from NAPA and they are going strong after six years.

Yes, "cranking batteries" and "deep cycle batteries" are different. Mixing them will not immediately detonate the bus, but they serve much better in their assigned roles.

[scooter56]

Originally Posted by bapos

This would be my suggestion for the starting batteries...... bite the bullet and go buy 2 MAXX batteries from walmart. They have a 3 year replacement warranty.

This is my line of thinking, as well. New batteries will not only be able to hold a charge better, but will probably have more 'umph' than reconditioned batteries of the same rated capacity.

Originally Posted by ascend

I've been using "reconditioned" batteries that I pick up from ProBattery locally and tbh, they usually only last a year and then don't hold their charge worth crap (though at $40 a pop compared to $150, I'm ok with replacing them yearly).

I'm thinking this is probably the most expensive way to keep oneself in batteries. No disrespect intended.

I don't know if the batteries in my truck relate to those in a bus, but the Cummins engine in my Dodge is virtually the same as in many buses. The OEM batteries in my pickup lasted for seven years before I replaced them, and they still had not failed. I replaced them due to their age, my cautious nature, and I detected a little dragging when starting. They lasted a pretty long time for me living in a very hot location, but I went to Wally world and bought the biggest MAXX batteries they had at around a hundred bucks each and I would expect that they last five years. That is, if I get anywhere near the similar service from them as the factory supplied batteries. If they last five years, that amounts to $20 a year for each, or $40 a year total.

Buying reconditioned batteries at $40 each and replacing them yearly (I assume you mean both of them), then that is twice as much as buying new batteries that should last much longer. Not only that, but at my age, I would not want an annual battery hassle.

Now, my truck gets driven every day and, thus, the batteries are kept charged; where a bus would not be driven as much and would not keep the same level of charge. This is admittedly not as good for a battery, so it might be reasonable to expect them to not last as long as the batteries on my truck anyway. YMMV (Your mileage may vary).

Just my two cents and I hope I didn't step on any toes. I'm open to comments if I may be viewing this incorrectly.