House Battery Replacement or Upgrade Time?

[Thomp318]

Hi All,
I have a 2001 Hunter 410 new to me this summer and I have a bad house battery. My first thought was to replace with the same battery from Interstate or one from West Marine but I would like to check in with the group if this is a good time to make a change or some type of improvement. I have a stock 401 layout with no AC or Genset besides a small 2000watt unit from Harbor Freight. My long term (this Winter) goal is to install AC that could run from house battery ideally or the 2000Watt Generator for AC only and house battery for everything else, then recharge from Solar and whenever I run the engine. I was planning on upgrading my Solar first then install the Salon/Pullman AC unit and then the Aft Cabin AC unit. I haven’t done my homework yet on the amount of battery needed and the Solar capacity I would need to plan on so any insight or suggestions is greatly appreciated.

 

[Nodak7]

Highly recommend switching to a 6v system. Much easier to deal with weightwise and more Amp Hrs. We switch to 6 Trojan T105's a few years ago and have been very happy! Additionally we carry 2 280w solar panels and they pretty much take care of the power needs. We do not have a generator but carry 2 Honda EU2000i's if we want to run the AC Unit.

 

[Thomp318]

That sounds good, how do you wire the T105's, could you send a photo so I could see what type of jumpers I would need to make?

 

[Nodak7]

TH here you go. Hope this helps. The first is the original battery. the second is 2 sets of two where the originals went. There is another set of two under the sole plate (last pic). Making a total of 6 batteries in the full bank. The third is a wiring diagram of how I wired it with wire sizes. Ignore the total Ah reading that is not correct.

 

[Thomp318]

Thanks, I think this is what I'm going to do. I hope it doesn't matter that the other house bank will still be the larger 4D battery.

 

[Nodak7]

I got rid of my 4D's because they were such a pain to deal with. Back killers. I also had one "run away" on us so I just decided they had to go. You will get more aHrs out of the 6v batteries! Good luck!

 

[Valerio]

I manage to squeeze 4 trojan lp 16 , 6 volts for 800 amp, my 41 will take to low battery after 20 hours of sailing. I usually start my gen 1 hour in the morning and 1 in the evening and they are almost full again. There is a post in this forum with photos. I could not fit as Nodak7 did because a have there the water pump for the water maker and the engine battery

 

[Valerio]

If 4d are back killers mine are really a problem to move

 

[Nodak7]

I manage to squeeze 4 trojan lp 16 , 6 volts for 800 amp, my 41 will take to low battery after 20 hours of sailing. I usually start my gen 1 hour in the morning and 1 in the evening and they are almost full again. There is a post in this forum with photos. I could not fit as Nodak7 did because a have there the water pump for the water maker and the engine battery

I manage to squeeze 4 trojan lp 16 , 6 volts for 800 amp, my 41 will take to low battery after 20 hours of sailing. I usually start my gen 1 hour in the morning and 1 in the evening and they are almost full again. There is a post in this forum with photos. I could not fit as Nodak7 did because a have there the water pump for the water maker and the engine battery

VA that is about what we had to do before we had the solar. Now we do not need to charge unless we go wild using power.

 

[Thomp318]

I just installed these baby’s, 230amp hours a piece. It’s the second bank, the other house bank is the large 4D. Question, does anyone know if your supposed to reconfigure the xantrex inverter/charger for the new capacity? Not sure if it’s configured to each battery bank capacity/battery type.

 

[Don S/V ILLusion]

I just installed these baby’s, 230amp hours a piece. It’s the second bank, the other house bank is the large 4D. Question, does anyone know if your supposed to reconfigure the xantrex inverter/charger for the new capacity? Not sure if it’s configured to each battery bank capacity/battery type.

To be clear - how does connecting two 230 A/H 6 V batteries in series change the total capacity?

 

[Nodak7]

To be clear - how does connecting two 230 A/H 6 V batteries in series change the total capacity?

 

[dakno]

Nodak7 How do you handle maintenance on the LA batteries? How often? Any concerns about gassing? Why did builders use AGM in the 1st place? Did you reconfigure your charger?

 

[Nodak7]

Dakno, about once a month I check levels in the cells and top off with distilled water. With the Solar Panels they are in charge mode quite a bit. No changes made on the charger. Works good! Not certain regarding the AGM's other than the AGM's are low/no maintenance.