Chuck,  you did nothing wrong and should in no way feel bad about things.  You asked a question (which us members really like that) and you got some replies.  That's how the forum is supposed to work.  If anything, I owe you an apology for not posting a picture ir 2 sooner.  Life & job has been keeping me pretty busy for the last couple of months. 

 

Posts in this thread have been changed.  Be assured that it was not done by Admin or the moderators.

 

Please, you are always welcome to private/personal mail any of us, if you feel offended in anyway by us or any forum member.  This is the last thing any of us wants - and I'm sure you want to read.  We'll continue to do the best we can.

 

Chuck shifted the subject to dual battery connections and asked for advise.  All 3 of us (myself, Tech, and furpod) offered opinions/advise.  It is really up to Chuck to decide how he wants to proceed.  This is "standard operating proceedure" here.  Someone will ask for advise and a whole bunch of us will jump in and try to help.  It's one of the really cool things about the forum.  We get exposed to a whole lot of different viewpoints/opinions/practices. 

 

I asked to go PM as you quoted me and seemed to be upset - a personal matter between you and I that would be best handled out of the public forum.  I would have done this - moderator or not.  If 2 members are upset, it is best to discuss the matter privately as many of the readers find this sort of thing distasteful.  PM is a good thing.  A number of us use it to "talk" directly with each other.  Podders Helping Podders advertise that they are happy to go "one on one" with you to help where they can.  No offense should be taken.  There are times to discuss things confidentially. 

 

 

I'm not sure that I understand?

 

 

Perhaps a more direct way of saying it would have been: Readers, more than one opinion on the subject has been offered.  Each is kindly trying to help you but, you will have to decide for yourself which way you want to go.

 

Again, I'm a little confused.  If you would like further clarification/discussion, how about we use the private mail feature?

 

 

While I can only speak for myself, I gain or lose nothing regardless of how anyone hooks up their batteries, lifts their matresses, empties their black tanks, etc.  Anything that I offer is done so out of generosity of spirit and within the limits of my knowledge and experience.  Others may do things differently or be of a different opinion - that's OK - refer to the opening paragraph.

 

At the end of the day, it is your (readers) TT.  If you ask for advise/opinions, you'll likely get several from some real nice folks who are willing to take time out their busy schedules to help you.     

 

The solar forum I mentioned in that other thread is full of guys that have been running large battery banks for years (some for decades).  They all talk about problems they had with early implementations where the slightest imbalance between parallel strings caused early failure of cells or entire batteries.  Many of them discharge shallowly, less than 10%, and few go below 50% DOD.  Just passing along their experience.

 

One way to get around this problem for campers is to use two 6 volt golf cart batteries in series - same overall capacity but nothing in parallel so physics ensures an even draw/charge for both batteries.  My own battery bank at home is 16 12 volt batteries in series (192 volts nominal), so no issues with parallel strings there, either.  Later I'll convert to a 48 volt nominal system and I'll go to 6 volt batteries so everything is still in series, but at half of the total capacity since I don't need a 22 kw battery bank.

 

That UK site has many other good articles, such as long explanations of the Peukert effect and a dowloadable calculator so you can calculate based on your own loads.  Few understand it or the advantage it brings to using multiple batteries at the same time.  Yes its a commercial site, but their techical section is unbiased from what I've read.

 

 

Here is my disconnect switch

 

 

There are several suppliers of switches.  You only need one.  In addition, you'll need 2 short battery cables, which can be purchased at Walmart, AutoZone, etc.

 

If you would like a picture of my dual set up - I'll take one for you.