Dual battery dilema

[Brock200]

Hey all

Ive slowly been modding my D22 to be a well set up camping truck. I have one of the D22 single cabs with the extended tray which is perfect to sleep in. Im now looking for a dual battery setup that will suit my needs. with the 3L there are few battery tray options as most opt to put it up in the top RH corner where the fuel filter resides.
I have a safari snorkell so ive eliminated the pre cleaner problem. I was thinking about custom making a battery tray to fit in that area, however the induction piping still sucks up a bit of room there. Im also considering putting an intercooler kit in at some point and i know that will obstruct the piping by having a dirty big battery in the road. so my option really is just the pirahna battery tray that fits the small 9" battery.

To make up for the small battery i was looking at getting a 100ah marine/gel battery. This ends up being quite expensive as the pirahna tray is $200~ and the battery would easily cost about $400 for a 100ah (to run 60-80L fridge) Then theres all the cables and solenoid etc so thats another $150-200. This all adds up to be some pretty big $$.

I have been considering this option Thumper, 105 Amp Hour Dual Battery System - Jumpstarter | eBay
For the price it seems to be a pretty good piece of kit and is quite portable so it has more than one function, the only issue i face is that in the boot it would take up valuable space. I can see ways around this but i question whether its worth spending the same amount for the dual battery setup that i want. If anyone has any other suggestions please let me know. Taking into account the following:
- 3L D22, single cab with extended tray
- Running a 60-80L fridge
- Use the tray to sleep in
- pre cleaner gone due to safari snorkel
- looking to fit intercooler in the future
- more than happy/proficient with electrics and custom fabricating parts.

thanks for any help in advance!

 

[joshman]

Hey mate, haven't seen you round here before, so welcome. First thing, if you're looking at a gel/agm battery, then look at putting somewhere out of the engine bay, those batteries don't like the heat. Your best option, and the one I would do is to find a space in the tray to put the battery. The biggest question now is, is it a style side tray(these do exist!)? Or a steel/alloy job?

If it's style side, then some careful packing of stuff in the tray is in order, but behind the rear wheel is the best place, seems to be the most un-intrusive place for them.

If it a tray-back, then you've also got the space under the tray in front of the rear wheels to use. And a custom job should be easier.

As for how you run it and the actual system you put in... Don't skimp. A well built system, while expensive, will serve you better in the long run. I personally skipped on the isolator and went with the more advanced RedArc BCDC1220, picked it up cheap off eBay. And it does a fantastic job of keeping my 100Ah Gel topped up.

Hope some of that ramble helped!

 

[Old.Tony]

If you have a tray, what about mounting a frame under the side of the tray with a lockable door (to prevent theft/tampering) and mount whatever size battery suits you in there? Feed the cable up to where you want, put water resistant plugs straight on the box itself (perhaps where they aren't too obvious), run an isolator from the main battery back to this guy?

Those Thumper packs had (might be different now, you should check!) Gel batteries in them and while they do withstand a bit of physical punishment, they're particularly fragile when being charged and won't take kindly to the 14.4-14.7V that you get off your alternator, they start to cook the gel at anything over 14.1V. You'd be better off, if you're intent on spending $, to get an AGM. If you want to save a bit, you can get an ordinary deep cycle and just keep an eye on the fluid levels.

That's what I'm now contemplating, having looked at Gel/AGM (we currently have a Gel that we aren't entirely happy with) and learning that they all have compromises and in the long run, as long as you're happy doing the maintenance, a normal structure deep cycle battery would appear to give you better life for your $.

I think part of the move towards Gel/AGM batteries in the RV industry is because of the zero-maintenance, and a big plus would be the sealed nature of the batteries - they rarely vent hydrogen unless they're being charged heavily. It is still possible for them to vent, which means they could still represent a danger, but it's much, much less than an ordinary battery.

Gels really need a specialist charger, like the C-Tek. You'd have to invert power to charge yours (that's how we do ours).

Maintenance on an ordinary battery would be:

* Fortnightly/monthly check of specific gravity in each cell, top up fluid where needed
* Every 2-4 months conduct an equalisation charge

That charging process makes the battery acid fizz, ensures that all plates in all cells are as evenly charged as possible and it stirs up the electrolyte preventing what's known as "stratification", which is a big word meaning that the acid is no longer evenly distributed throughout the battery. That's important - you need an even distribution, because the acid really represents an ionic fluid and THAT conducts electricity. If there's more acidity (conductivity) in the lower part of the battery, you won't get the upper part producing power and you'll damage the battery to boot.

Hope that helps!

 

[Brock200]

Thanks guys for both those posts, very informative. I visit the site regularly but dont post to often. My nav has the style side so im contemplating making a small battery holding tray in the far top right hand corner.
To my understanding the new thumpers are AGM so this would solve the issues you brought up tony. If you have a read they seem to be spot on for what i would want, and being sealed its safe to have in the enclosed tray. Fortunately due to being a scientist for work the description of how the battery charges made sence to me! haha. I wasnt aware that you could get stratification within the battery, however with an AGM that shouldnt be a problem.
Upon thinking more about the thumper due to it having a 12v ciggie socket i could also use its portability combined with a pump to be able to pump my tyres up. So it serves more than one purpose as a fridge battery. So perhaps the best way would be to purchase the thumper and considering it comes with all the gear to connect up it is probably the most cost effective solution, with me only having to make up a tray to hold the battery. Ive attached a pic of the truck and a pic of the top right hand corner of the tray where i would be putting the battery.

 

[ljacko78]

I bought battery box for $20, put it in tray behind wheel arch, bolted and tied to tray floor - pic in my garage with the fridge.

Kits don't need to be expensive. Paid $150 for 120Amp hr projector isolator with cables. Paid $50 for extra -ive cable to tray. Battery was about $150 lead acid. $10 for a marine grade 12v cig plug. Done.

 

[scottybobcat]

If you do the 80 series air box mod you will have plenty of room to run a 12 inch deep cycle up the back corner.By doing this it will free up the left hand side inner gaurd.

 

[Dave]

You can put a YD25 battery tray up the front, since you have deleted the Pre-filter.

 

[Brock200]

Thanks for the input everyone. I think my biggest issue with putting the battery where the precleaner is, is the fact that i want to fit an intercooler kit oneday and i think that it will be in the road of the piping. Im willing to run a battery in the tray but it has to be sealed because i will be sleeping in there so AGM is a must.

 

[Old.Tony]

I'd say AGM is vital in there if you intend to charge it while you're sleeping. Batteries don't give off gas unless they're being charged. If you make the container that the battery sits in acid-spill proof (so that any spilled acid can't escape to the tub) you shouldn't have any problems at all.

Just throwing that there, because AGMs are three times the price of ordinary deep cycle batteries and if you come to the end of the day and run out of cash for the project while looking at the AGM on the shelf, it really won't be the end of the world.

 

[tommyhodgkin]

If you look on the eBay listing for the piranha tray it has a pretty good pic of the tray, no dimensions but if you are mechanically minded and can be creative, go buy some sheet metal and make up your own tray! I'm in the process of doing a dual battery setup and have made my own tray, it's not hard and will probably save you 150-170 dollars! Once I'm done and I paint mine I'll post up some pics.

 

[kempseyken]

G'day , Brock , mate ive got one of those (thumper battery) but only the 75 amp one . I use it to run my fridge with 3 x40 watt solar panels it works really good. It wasn't the cheapest option for me but when you consider you have such portable power its not bad . We use it of all sorts of things now from the electric fence to the electric motor in my canoe and so on.

 

[tommyhodgkin]

Some pics of the tray I made, very similar to piranha one. Would make for other people if they are interested.

 

[tommyhodgkin]

 

[tommyhodgkin]

 

[Swell]

Tommy, what dimension is the tray would it fit a 75 Aamp Hour deep cycle battery? I was looking at that location but I thought it was a little small. Did you move anything to fit it?

 

[tommyhodgkin]

hi sorry i know this is a very late reply, but this fits a 60amp hour battery and you have to move the fuel filter, I incorporatedd this as part of the tray...