running two batteries
05-01-2005, 10:42 AM
#1
Hello to all.
I recently picked up a 200 amp alt from Loud Brown Kicker Colt. It puts out 100 at idle and 200 2000rpm.
Assuming this is more than enoguh amperage to charge two batteries at once, I am thinking about putting a second battery in the trunk, but I am a little confused as how to wire them.
Do I just from 0awg from positive to positive and negative to negative? Is a ground loop relay really necessary?
I am picking up an exide orbital extreme next week, and am planning to use my stocker in the trunk. Is this ok?
I dont know very much about running two batteries, so any help wil be greatly appreciated. [img]smile.gif[/img]
I recently picked up a 200 amp alt from Loud Brown Kicker Colt. It puts out 100 at idle and 200 2000rpm.
Assuming this is more than enoguh amperage to charge two batteries at once, I am thinking about putting a second battery in the trunk, but I am a little confused as how to wire them.
Do I just from 0awg from positive to positive and negative to negative? Is a ground loop relay really necessary?
I am picking up an exide orbital extreme next week, and am planning to use my stocker in the trunk. Is this ok?
I dont know very much about running two batteries, so any help wil be greatly appreciated. [img]smile.gif[/img]
05-01-2005, 10:57 AM
#2
if u are using defferent batteries u should use a battery isolator. with out the isolator your batteries should be same/very similar.
and yes u just run wire from positive to positive and from negative to negative from one battery to the other. u 'could' ground them both to the frame but u should do that anyway as well as having their negative terminals connected directly.
and yes u just run wire from positive to positive and from negative to negative from one battery to the other. u 'could' ground them both to the frame but u should do that anyway as well as having their negative terminals connected directly.
05-01-2005, 11:32 AM
#4
Guest
Posts: n/a
do not use an isolator, use a solonoid. isolators will cause you to lose arounf 1 volt through it, a 200 amp soloniod is the way to go, scosche amkes a great one, model# pmbc200. i have used these soloniod many times with different main and auxilliary batteries and have never ONCE had a problem charging or a soloniod failure, but back in the day when i used to use isolators i had occasional failures. be sure to fuse between the front(main) battery and the rear. you can ground at the back for the aux battery, just make sure the ground is good
05-01-2005, 11:59 AM
#5
500 Watt CAFz'r
Join Date: Apr 2004
Posts: 756
A stock alternator can handle two batteries, when installed properlly. My van has Orbital up front, Orbital blue top in the back, about 1.8Kw of continous system power, and a stock 105 amp alternator. My alternator is sufficient, unless I'm REALLY pumping my system, and it becomes to loud to listen to anyway.
Do not put your "stocker" battery in the trunk. It is inefficient, and downright dangerous (unless it's the trunk of a BMW or the like, where the stock one is anyway, but properlly vented). First and foremost, it will make your new Orbital null and void, not the warranty, but it's usefullness. That is, assuming your amps are hooked up to the rear battery, the rear battery will have more internal resistance than the Orbital, and therefore make the Orbital do absolutely nothing to improve your stereo. Also, sticking a lead acid battery in a trunk that is not vented properlly, the hydrogen gas will escape from the battery during normal use, and either make your trunk stink, or even prone to explosion/fire. When putting a battery in a non-vented area like a trunk, ALWAYS make sure it's vented properlly, or a sealed gel type battery like Orbital, or better yet, both.
Battery explosion is rare, but it does happen. I'd say 1 in 500-600 batteries explode. Sometimes that's just how they die when they get old, hitting the key to start your car causes an internal spark in the top of the battery, and since it's an old battery that has probably gased enough to evaporate enough water to expose the plates, you hit the key, the plates spark, and BOOM. I've seen much damage from exploded batteries over the years, dented up hoods, acid-eaten wires, etc. There was a kid at a high school here in town several years ago that was installing a new battery in a car in the auto shop of the school... he tapped the positive down with a hammer and BOOM. Hydrogen gases tend to just go WOOF... not lots of heat or flame, but loads of shrapnel and flying acid from a battery. He was lucky he had looked away, or he'd probably be blind. He did end up with facial scarring though. Also remember a commercial boom truck, the two CAT batteries that power the boom were in a stainless steel box on the deck of the truck. It was vented poorly, and the boys stacking 200lbs. of cables on top the box didn't help. They said they hit the button on the boom (which can cause a spark through corroded terminals), and that was enough to blow the stagnent hydrogen in the box & batteries. They said the 200lbs. of cables on the top of the box flew 30 feet up. Lucky no one got hurt...
If you can only afford to purchase one Orbital for now, stick IT in the trunk for your system, and keep the stock battery in it's stock locale. Your starter in your car doesn't need the high-amp low-resistance qualities of an Orbital, but your stereo will thank you for it. The lead acid battery WILL reduce alternator overall-efficiency, so you do want to get a second Orbital in the near future, and get that stocker out of there completely.
Do not use an isolator, as they have internal resistance too, they tend to drop a whole volt across themselves. So that means your rear battery would get 13.5 volts out of your alternator instead of 14.5. Isolators do do what they say however, even when the vehicle is running, your stereo will not be able to draw any power from the front battery, ever.
Using my van as an example:
Orbital up front, Orbital blue top in the back. Replace the "big 3" if you haven't already. Then, run another cable directly from your alternator, through a 225 or 250 amp fuse (since you have a 200 amp alternator), then to a relay. These continous duty relays are called a few different things, relay, switch, solenoid, RV solenoid, etc. They can be had in the $30 dollar range. Then run a cable from the other side of the relay, to the battery in the back of your vehicle. This does not need to be fused, since you fused it on the other side. If that fuse blows, then the line going to the back of the car will also be dead. Add a second route cable to that side of the solenoid, fused, and stick it on the stock battery. This just gives an extra path for power to get from your alternator to you stock battery. Ground the rear battery too.
Then you will need to give the relay a switched wire - a wire that lights up when the ignition of the vehicle is on, and shuts off when the vehicle is off. This is a low power wire, 16ga. or 14ga. will suffice. It tells the relay when your car is on, and off. Once hooked up properlly, you will be able to hear the relay everytime you turn the car on, it'll give a nice mechanical "click", or "pop", once, as it turns on. Then, since it's mechanical, it makes no further noises, until you shut the car off, when it'll click once again.
That's it. Move all your power wires for your system to the rear battery, including the HU's constant power (usually the yellow wire) and you can even move your switched HU wire (usually the red one) to the rear batteries, if you install a toggle switch, so that absolutely no power is taken from the front battery.
Now, when your vehicle runs, the alternator will charge both batteries, and your stereo system will draw power from the alternator & both batteries. When you shut the vehicle off, the batteries are isolated, and you can sit for an hour or two (or four, or seven, depending on total rear battery capacity), listening to the stereo, kill your rear battery, still able to hit the key, start the car, and drive away.
Bonus, if heading out "to the cabin" for a weekend, and you wish to play your system for extended hours at "normal" volumes, you can grab any batteries and hook 'em up to your rear battery, even with just some booster cables, and now you can run your system all weekend, and still start the car on Sunday night to go home.
Totally killing your rear battery when sitting is not a good idea though, especially if it's an Orbital (or similar), as they suck a charge so hard out of chargers & alternators, that it could cause your alternator to overheat and burn out. So get in the habit of NOT totally killing your rear batteries when parked. Use, say, 50 to 60% of it's capacity, then charge.
[ May 01, 2005, 01:05 PM: Message edited by: GrizZz ]
Do not put your "stocker" battery in the trunk. It is inefficient, and downright dangerous (unless it's the trunk of a BMW or the like, where the stock one is anyway, but properlly vented). First and foremost, it will make your new Orbital null and void, not the warranty, but it's usefullness. That is, assuming your amps are hooked up to the rear battery, the rear battery will have more internal resistance than the Orbital, and therefore make the Orbital do absolutely nothing to improve your stereo. Also, sticking a lead acid battery in a trunk that is not vented properlly, the hydrogen gas will escape from the battery during normal use, and either make your trunk stink, or even prone to explosion/fire. When putting a battery in a non-vented area like a trunk, ALWAYS make sure it's vented properlly, or a sealed gel type battery like Orbital, or better yet, both.
Battery explosion is rare, but it does happen. I'd say 1 in 500-600 batteries explode. Sometimes that's just how they die when they get old, hitting the key to start your car causes an internal spark in the top of the battery, and since it's an old battery that has probably gased enough to evaporate enough water to expose the plates, you hit the key, the plates spark, and BOOM. I've seen much damage from exploded batteries over the years, dented up hoods, acid-eaten wires, etc. There was a kid at a high school here in town several years ago that was installing a new battery in a car in the auto shop of the school... he tapped the positive down with a hammer and BOOM. Hydrogen gases tend to just go WOOF... not lots of heat or flame, but loads of shrapnel and flying acid from a battery. He was lucky he had looked away, or he'd probably be blind. He did end up with facial scarring though. Also remember a commercial boom truck, the two CAT batteries that power the boom were in a stainless steel box on the deck of the truck. It was vented poorly, and the boys stacking 200lbs. of cables on top the box didn't help. They said they hit the button on the boom (which can cause a spark through corroded terminals), and that was enough to blow the stagnent hydrogen in the box & batteries. They said the 200lbs. of cables on the top of the box flew 30 feet up. Lucky no one got hurt...
If you can only afford to purchase one Orbital for now, stick IT in the trunk for your system, and keep the stock battery in it's stock locale. Your starter in your car doesn't need the high-amp low-resistance qualities of an Orbital, but your stereo will thank you for it. The lead acid battery WILL reduce alternator overall-efficiency, so you do want to get a second Orbital in the near future, and get that stocker out of there completely.
Do not use an isolator, as they have internal resistance too, they tend to drop a whole volt across themselves. So that means your rear battery would get 13.5 volts out of your alternator instead of 14.5. Isolators do do what they say however, even when the vehicle is running, your stereo will not be able to draw any power from the front battery, ever.
Using my van as an example:
Orbital up front, Orbital blue top in the back. Replace the "big 3" if you haven't already. Then, run another cable directly from your alternator, through a 225 or 250 amp fuse (since you have a 200 amp alternator), then to a relay. These continous duty relays are called a few different things, relay, switch, solenoid, RV solenoid, etc. They can be had in the $30 dollar range. Then run a cable from the other side of the relay, to the battery in the back of your vehicle. This does not need to be fused, since you fused it on the other side. If that fuse blows, then the line going to the back of the car will also be dead. Add a second route cable to that side of the solenoid, fused, and stick it on the stock battery. This just gives an extra path for power to get from your alternator to you stock battery. Ground the rear battery too.
Then you will need to give the relay a switched wire - a wire that lights up when the ignition of the vehicle is on, and shuts off when the vehicle is off. This is a low power wire, 16ga. or 14ga. will suffice. It tells the relay when your car is on, and off. Once hooked up properlly, you will be able to hear the relay everytime you turn the car on, it'll give a nice mechanical "click", or "pop", once, as it turns on. Then, since it's mechanical, it makes no further noises, until you shut the car off, when it'll click once again.
That's it. Move all your power wires for your system to the rear battery, including the HU's constant power (usually the yellow wire) and you can even move your switched HU wire (usually the red one) to the rear batteries, if you install a toggle switch, so that absolutely no power is taken from the front battery.
Now, when your vehicle runs, the alternator will charge both batteries, and your stereo system will draw power from the alternator & both batteries. When you shut the vehicle off, the batteries are isolated, and you can sit for an hour or two (or four, or seven, depending on total rear battery capacity), listening to the stereo, kill your rear battery, still able to hit the key, start the car, and drive away.
Bonus, if heading out "to the cabin" for a weekend, and you wish to play your system for extended hours at "normal" volumes, you can grab any batteries and hook 'em up to your rear battery, even with just some booster cables, and now you can run your system all weekend, and still start the car on Sunday night to go home.
Totally killing your rear battery when sitting is not a good idea though, especially if it's an Orbital (or similar), as they suck a charge so hard out of chargers & alternators, that it could cause your alternator to overheat and burn out. So get in the habit of NOT totally killing your rear batteries when parked. Use, say, 50 to 60% of it's capacity, then charge.
[ May 01, 2005, 01:05 PM: Message edited by: GrizZz ]
05-01-2005, 06:59 PM
#8
500 Watt CAFz'r
Join Date: Apr 2004
Posts: 756
hehee Ya I was always told that I'm very verbose.
Long-winded works too
edit: Oh ya, I forgot that. Line from alternator to solenoid, fused. Line from solenoid, to the rear battery, fused as well, at the back. This is so that in the event of a dead short in that cable (from it rubbing against steel or whatever), the fuse off the alternator (and therefore front battery) blows, and the rear fuse blows so that the rear battery can't fry the line.
[ May 01, 2005, 08:13 PM: Message edited by: GrizZz ]
Long-winded works too
edit: Oh ya, I forgot that. Line from alternator to solenoid, fused. Line from solenoid, to the rear battery, fused as well, at the back. This is so that in the event of a dead short in that cable (from it rubbing against steel or whatever), the fuse off the alternator (and therefore front battery) blows, and the rear fuse blows so that the rear battery can't fry the line.
[ May 01, 2005, 08:13 PM: Message edited by: GrizZz ]
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