Add A Battery Advice

[Gator1996]

I am interested in adding a second battery to my 1988 Stingray project. I have the 3.0 Liter motor, alpha one outdrive in case that's needed. I have been looking into the Blue Sea Systems add a battery kit. I have decided to go with the mini which handles up to 65 amps. I get the concept of the wiring diagram but the execution is killing me.

My accessory panel and gauges, stereo etc. is all at the bow of course, my battery(ies) are in the stern and will be staying there.

I was able to keep the original wiring harness as it was in good condition and functioning normally. Is it not possible to pull the wire that delivers 12V+ to the panel and gauges directly from the harness and connect it to the house load terminal on the battery switch? In my thinking, this would take this load from the starting battery and put it on the house battery. I am trying to avoid having to install an expensive run of wire from the battery switch to the bow of the boat and use a bus to terminate and run the panel and gauges to.

If this is not feasible can someone who has done this tell me the best way to accomplish this?

The blue seas diagram is here http://assets.bluesea.com/files/resources/instructions/980014350.pdf

Any thoughts are welcome.
Thanks

 

[glenn property of pam]

Re: Add A Battery Advice

firstly why are you adding a battery. It sounds a simple question but the answer will decide on how to wire in another battery.
Do you want a back up battery in case the first goes flat
Do you want or need a house battery and what do you want to run on the house battery

The blue sea is a acr which means that the engine will transfer charge to another battery when the voltage in the first battery is high enough. If you just want extended run time with a back up battery then a acr and a dual battery switch will work fine and does not require a major rewire as the whole boat will be running from the dual battery switch

 

[Gator1996]

Re: Add A Battery Advice

The boat had no electronics at all when I got it. So I have added a stereo and LED lights and intend to add a Fish Finder and possibly a subwoofer and amp. I would like to be able to listen to the radio for a few hours at anchor reasonably worry free. I thought I would run the stereo, fish finder, amplifier, 12 V outlet and the accessory panel on the house battery. Altogether I have calculated a max of 30 amps.

I am not totally sure that the Blue Sea isn't total overkill but I also appreciate that it seems to be pretty idiot proof (after the idiot gets it installed anyway).

Thanks for the thoughts, I would love to hear anymore you guys may have.

 

[glenn property of pam]

Re: Add A Battery Advice

I would use one starting battery and one deep cycle. Put the stereo/amp and 12v outlets on the deep cycle battery then run one positive wire to a dual switch terminal B use a heavy gauge wire the same as the motor starting cable. Connect the starting battery to terminal A on the dual switch then connect the motor and motor accessory's to the common terminal. Make a jumper cable to join the battery negatives together using the same size wire as the motor starting cable. leave the switch on the A setting unless theres a emergency where the boat will not start then try B and as a last hope try both. The blue sea acr will charge the starting battery first then once that's full it will recharge the deep cycle.

Or

you can use 2 dual cycle batteries and leave everything on the common post of the dual battery switch then just switch between the batteries ever few weeks. Once the first battery gets real low its time to turn of the tunes and start the boat. If the battery is to low then switch to the second battery.

Fish finder, nav lights will run for many many hours with no noticeable drain on the battery but the stereo and amp are heavy loads so size matters when it comes to batteries.