How To Install A Perko Dual Battery Switch

Do-It-Yourself: Installing a Second Battery

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By Tom Burden, Last updated 6/1/2020

Demand more than juice?

If your boat came from the mill with only 1 battery, or with ii batteries of inadequate size, consider installing a second bombardment depository financial institution. Boats often need two banks to have a reserve bank to be sure the engine will start, or to have a big "house" bank so you lot can run bigger DC loads for longer time periods. If you are installing a reserve starting battery, you lot can usually ensure enough amps of cranking power by duplicating the type and size of your original bombardment. To install a "business firm" bank, you should probably invest in a quality deep-cycle battery.

Types of Marine Batteries

Dual-purpose flooded batteries combine the ability to withstand deep discharges with cranking power to start your engine

Starting batteries are similar to automotive batteries. They can supply lots of current for a short menstruum of time, only like to exist recharged almost immediately and are not tolerant of deep discharges. They are appropriate equally the single bombardment for wakeboard boats, runabouts, personal watercraft and other boats with minimal DC loads where the engine is always running.

Deep-cycle batteries tin can suffer repeated deep discharging and recharging without impairment. They are appropriate for sailboats, line-fishing boats and all other boats with larger DC power requirements. Whatever battery used to power onboard DC loads such as lighting, trolling motors, inverters and other systems should exist a quality deep-cycle battery, similar our West Marine brand. Nearly boats with dual-battery systems use one starting bombardment and one deep bike bombardment.

Dual-purpose batteries piece of work well in some applications and are a good compromise because they tolerate deep discharges that would ruin a typical starting battery. Since they have lower storage chapters than comparably-sized deep cycles, nosotros recommend them for boats with two identical batteries used interchangeably for starting and house electrical loads.

Condom Precautions

• Batteries comprise a tremendous, and potentially unsafe, amount of stored free energy. Whenever you are working on your electrical system, remove the positive battery cables from the battery terminals to eliminate the chance of a short circuit and/or possible electrocution.
• The American Gunkhole and Yacht Council (ABYC) publishes safety standards for circuit protection, wire sizes and other related issues in electrical systems. Where appropriate, we have provided information on excursion breakers and wire sizes, which are in accordance with these guidelines. The consummate text of these standards is available in reprints from the ABYC.
• Since the connections made in the battery circuits can carry hundreds of amps, it is imperative that you take low resistance connections. This means having make clean metallic-to-metal connections, the right size terminals which are properly crimped and waterproofed and secure mechanical fasteners.
• For outboard engine applications we recommend replacing wingnuts on the tops of the battery with nylock basics or hex nuts and lock washers that are tightened to at to the lowest degree 10-human foot-pounds of torque. For inboard engine applications, y'all should use clamp-on battery terminals connected to the correct gauge of battery cablevision.
• Exist sure to wear safety glasses when working on batteries and have a h2o hose or other available method of flushing battery acid out of the eyes and off the face. Be careful of using unshielded droplights or whatsoever open up sources of heat or flame around the batteries. Be very careful with uninsulated tools that might short across the battery terminals.

Location, Location, Location

This credo works equally well for batteries as it does for real estate. Batteries are temperature sensitive, needing a temperature that is comfortable for a person, and high temperatures dramatically shorten their life. If the proposed battery location is too hot for you lot, information technology is also too hot for your battery. This presents a dilemma for many battery installations since y'all want brusque runs of battery cablevision to your engine's starter or alternator to forbid a loss of voltage, but your battery won't final long in a hot engine room and must exist ventilated.

Batteries, especially the flooded type, give off lighter-than-air explosive hydrogen gas when charging, so they must be vented from the tiptop directly to the outside of the boat. If there is insufficient natural ventilation y'all may have to add a sparkproof exhaust fan to eliminate gas buildup and to lower the temperature. Batteries, peculiarly the flooded blazon, must also be easy to get to for service.

Use Quality Battery Cables

Heavy-Duty Stainless Steel Lug Curling will crimp #6 to 4/0 AWG wire using a hammer or vise.

We recommend depression-resistance, tinned copper wire in all applications. Moisture, vibration, heat, chafe and chemicals are major enemies of all electric system components, and merely marine rated wire (like that from Ancor Marine) is built to withstand these atmospheric condition. Be sure to use tin plated copper connectors as well, for the to the lowest degree electrical resistance and the best corrosion protection. We recommend double-crimped terminals, with solid metal-to-metal connections and heat shrink tubing for waterproof protection.

Pre-manufactured battery cables are bachelor in various lengths with well-constructed connectors, properly covered with agglutinative-lined heat shrink and terminated with closed barrel ring terminals. All the same, the lengths available may non be appropriate for your installation then you lot may accept to brand your ain bombardment cables.

To do this requires a proper crimper. In that location is no style to shortcut this since terminals smashed on the cable with a pair of Vise Grips or a few hammer blows volition certainly fail, perhaps with catastrophic results. You lot must use a heavy-duty crimper designed for the purpose. Use closed-barrel terminals with holes the right diameter for the bolts to be used at the terminations. Positive and negative terminals oft accept different diameters.

Spray a corrosion inhibitor such as Fluid Film, Lanocote, or Boeshield into the connector earlier crimping. Comprehend the articulation between the cable insulation and the connector body with a three-inch section of agglutinative-lined heat shrink tubing. Using a heat gun is the best mode to apply rut shrink, although you can use a propane torch with a flame spreader if y'all are very careful. Be certain to take a fire extinguisher on hand. You tin can as well tape the articulation with several layers of quality electrician's tape and finish it with a small-scale nylon tie where the record ends to keep it from unwrapping due to oestrus and solvents. Remember to cover positive terminals with a boot (or the battery box encompass) to prevent shorting.

Bombardment Boxes

The batteries must exist secured then at that place is no more than ane inch of movement in whatever direction. A loose battery skidding most (weighing about iii/4lb. per amp hour, or 150lb. for a 200Ah bombardment) is both a physical hazard and a fire hazard. Pre-manufactured, acid-proof battery boxes are bachelor in various sizes and are the all-time way to safely ballast the batteries.

Use more one box if your batteries require you to brand a serial or parallel arrangement. Home-built battery boxes must be ruggedly constructed from marine grade plywood, covered inside and out with fiberglass cloth saturated with several coats of epoxy, and secure even in the issue of a capsize. Practice not mount batteries directly in a higher place or beneath a fuel tank, fuel line or filter or directly beneath battery chargers or inverters.

Battery Switches

Old–schoolhouse OFF-1-2-BOTH battery switch

Nearly unmarried engine boats built in the last xl years are equipped with ii nearly identical (and undersized) marine batteries, used interchangeably for starting or house loads. Prior to starting the engine, the operator would turn the OFF-1-2-BOTH battery switch to the BOTH position to have both batteries' total cranking power. With the engine at present running, the switch would stay in the BOTH setting, and both batteries would be charged while powering to the day's destination.

Once the engine was turned off (while anchored or under sail) the operator would (in theory) return the switch to the 1 or 2 positions, and reserve a battery for starting. When it was time to crank the engine again, the battery switch would exist turned to BOTH, or possibly to the reserve bombardment, and the engine would exist started.

The problem is that this requires a lot of thought by the operator, who is trying to relax in the starting time place. Sooner or afterwards a crew member may leave the switch in the BOTH position, resulting in a very dead battery. Statistically, dead batteries are one of the most mutual reasons for calling a towing service. "I can't crank my engine!" is correct upward in that location with "I'g out of gas!" for ruining a twenty-four hour period on the water.

Dual Circuit Plus switch and relay combo

The Dual Excursion Plus switch is a simpler culling to isolate your Kickoff and House circuits. In the ON position, it keeps your batteries isolated, so both tin can't exist fully discharged by accident. In the COMBINE position, it parallels your batteries in the event of a low Starting bombardment. Used with the 7610 Automatic Charging Relay (ACR), it automatically combines or isolates your batteries when in the ON position. The most affordable mode to purchase the Dual Circuit Plus switch and SI7610 ACR is to buy a battery combiner kit that includes both, the "Add-a-Battery" Dual Circuit System.

Charge Direction

Battery isolators used to be the all-time method of distributing charging current to multiple bombardment banks while assuring that they remain electrically isolated during discharge. These devices are electrical "i-way bank check valves" that allow current to catamenia to, but not from, the bombardment. Their disadvantage is that diodes cause a voltage drib that wastes charging energy, creates estrus and causes batteries to be undercharged. Alternators with external voltage sensing can correct for the undercharging problem, just voltage drop and the heat generated remain a problem.

Blue Ocean Systems Starting Isolation (SI) Dual Sensing Automated Charging Relay

Automatic Charging Relays (ACRs, also chosen Voltage Sensitive Relays) are a pop method for achieving the same goal every bit isolators, but they piece of work on a unlike principle. Instead of using diodes to block current from flowing in both directions, ACRs apply mechanical relays combined with a circuit that senses when a charging source is beingness applied to either bombardment. When a charge is being applied, the ACR closes when the circuit senses that the charge is no longer present, the ACR opens (after a short time delay to assure that the ACR doesn't open due to temporary voltage sags acquired by load startups, similar a refrigerator turning on).

Automatic Charging Relays have lots of other uses in add-on to isolating the First and House batteries, and we offer a broad pick now from Blue Sea Systems and BEP Marine. ACRs can exist used for load shedding, pilothouse navigation battery isolation, and charge current limiting for a remote battery.

Decision

Calculation another battery is a skilful idea if you want to add a powerful stereo subwoofer organisation, cabin lighting, electric windlass, wakeboard ballast pump or whatever of the other electric and electronic accessories nosotros all want. The installation tin exist as simple as connecting two batteries in parallel to make one larger battery bank. Yous can build in redundancy and failure protection with two battery banks, bombardment switches and accuse direction devices like ACRs. That way, when y'all drop ballast and apply all your new gadgets, your engine will notwithstanding start at the end of the solar day.

Remember that yous must match battery chemistries betwixt your banks. If your starting bombardment is of the pb-acid type, stick to a deep bike battery of the same chemistry, instead of choosing a gel or AGM battery with different charging requirements.

Source: https://www.westmarine.com/WestAdvisor/Installing-a-Second-Battery

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