Back to the main site

Dual Battery Switch Installation

F

Four R's

Well-Known Member
Messages
75
Reaction score
3
Was told that I could wire this myself or is it cheap enough to have the dealer do it?
 
TomS said:
The BlueSea "Add A Battery" is very straightforward and incorporates a voltage sensitive relay to enable charging of both batteries under way. Just pay attention to proper fusing and use buss bars where needed.
Click to expand...
Agreed the Add-A-Battery is a good choice for a switch and is easy to install yourself. The directions that come with it are quite good. Good Luck!
 
In addition to a switch I installed a Yandina Combiner 100 (C-100). This allows me to charge the house battery while the engine is running automatically, and when you turn the motor off it disconnects so you always keep a charge in the starter battery. Works sweet. The only time I turn my switches to off are for extended storage periods.
 
Can someone describe the function of the "Power Distribution Panel"?

This is seperate from a dual battery switch.

Nevermind, found it in the technical section!

Thanks TB!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I have a single battery and it does have a battery switch (2012 Bennington). I'm assuming it would be a single switch? I would like to get a second battery, would that make that switch useless, do I need to buy a dual switch? My kids want to use their DVD players on the boat, not sure how much this and the radio will drain the battery. I would like to make sure I don't get stuck on the water. Would I want the same set up as PDX for my purpose? Thanks.
 
floves said:
I have a single battery and it does have a battery switch (2012 Bennington). I'm assuming it would be a single switch? I would like to get a second battery, would that make that switch useless, do I need to buy a dual switch? My kids want to use their DVD players on the boat, not sure how much this and the radio will drain the battery. I would like to make sure I don't get stuck on the water. Would I want the same set up as PDX for my purpose? Thanks.
Click to expand...
As an experienced father of two teen girls (now adults) living on a lake and driving the boats a lot, I strongly recommend a second battery and VSR setup like suggested above. Otherwise you'll be getting out the jumper starter on a regular basis.
 
My rule of thumb is if you have an I/O, go with the Blue Sea Systems Add-a-battery package, if you have an inboard go with the Yandina. I'm installing the Yandina and a second battery this Spring. I am making certain nothing apart from the heavy gauge starter cables (and the Yandina) connect to my 'Starting Battery' and plan to skip installation of a switch.

Don't get me wrong, I installed the Add a Battery package on my bowrider and love it. This will be the 6th season on my original batteries, and they are still going strong. Only time I touch the switch is to go from On to Off; and even that is rare.
 
floves, I would install an additional dual battery switch and make your original switch control everything but the starter. It gives you a way to isolate the extras if you have to switch to battery #2 to start, which hopefully never occurs because #1 has to do nothing but start the motor. Steve
 
I am not as ambitious as the rest of these fine posters... but in looking at your initial question, I paid the dealer $142.50 for one and a half hours of labor to install a dual battery set-up in my boat before he dropped it in the water last year. I provided the second battery and tie down box and told him where I wanted everything. In addition, he charged me for the switch, wire, and copper lugs on top of that. So, you can do it yourself and save on the labor... lots of guidance online. Or, pay about what I did for the labor. Either way, you have to buy the, battery, tie down, and associated switch/wire/parts. I would have spent much more time than an hour and a half researching how to do it myself, buying parts, worrying if I was doing it right, etc., etc.
 
Well you make a good point. However my install would have taken them more than two hours. My house (2nd) battery is under the helm and all of the work involved was fishing cable from the port-side compartment through to the boot under the helm. Once I had my power run installed it only took 45 minutes to hook it all up. I have done this type of setup (battery combiner C-100) on my RV, so I did have the benefit of past experience.

I say if you can get it done for less than $200 that's a smoking deal. My time is worth more than that. But I also love to tinker and work on projects, so this was as much a hobby activity as it was saving a few bucks.

Chateau Vinne said:
I am not as ambitious as the rest of these fine posters... but in looking at your initial question, I paid the dealer $142.50 for one and a half hours of labor to install a dual battery set-up in my boat before he dropped it in the water last year. I provided the second battery and tie down box and told him where I wanted everything. In addition, he charged me for the switch, wire, and copper lugs on top of that. So, you can do it yourself and save on the labor... lots of guidance online. Or, pay about what I did for the labor. Either way, you have to buy the, battery, tie down, and associated switch/wire/parts. I would have spent much more time than an hour and a half researching how to do it myself, buying parts, worrying if I was doing it right, etc., etc.
Click to expand...
 
Chateau Vinne said:
I am not as ambitious as the rest of these fine posters... but in looking at your initial question, I paid the dealer $142.50 for one and a half hours of labor to install a dual battery set-up in my boat before he dropped it in the water last year. I provided the second battery and tie down box and told him where I wanted everything. In addition, he charged me for the switch, wire, and copper lugs on top of that. So, you can do it yourself and save on the labor... lots of guidance online. Or, pay about what I did for the labor. Either way, you have to buy the, battery, tie down, and associated switch/wire/parts. I would have spent much more time than an hour and a half researching how to do it myself, buying parts, worrying if I was doing it right, etc., etc.
Click to expand...
I must be getting a good price because I'm getting the dual switch installed along with the battery for $200. I'm handy but figured why not let them do it for a few bucks.
 
For those of us that aren't knowledgable I listed the link for the dual battery schematic below. Will someone please tell me where I will install the single switch, the dual switch, and the ACR(automatic charging relay) will be installed. I like to use lakebum idea of using both single and dual switch, just not sure where everything goes. Thanks.

http://club.benningtonmarine.com/index.php?/topic/2063-2013-battery-and-distribution-panel-schematics/

lakebum said:
floves, I would install an additional dual battery switch and make your original switch control everything but the starter. It gives you a way to isolate the extras if you have to switch to battery #2 to start, which hopefully never occurs because #1 has to do nothing but start the motor. Steve
Click to expand...
 
Alot of people may not like the idea of the single and dual switch but if I had it I would use it. The best palcement for your single switch would be (looking at the dual diagram)tied to term.#2 with the house load tied to the #2 term. or switched term. of the single switch. Hope this makes sense. The way Bennington's diagram is, you can never isolate the house power when cranking.This might be overly anal but it is how I would do it. The VSR ties to term. #1 and #2 on the dual battery switch. Steve
 
lakebum said:
Alot of people may not like the idea of the single and dual switch but if I had it I would use it. The best palcement for your single switch would be (looking at the dual diagram)tied to term.#2 with the house load tied to the #2 term. or switched term. of the single switch. Hope this makes sense. The way Bennington's diagram is, you can never isolate the house power when cranking.This might be overly anal but it is how I would do it. The VSR ties to term. #1 and #2 on the dual battery switch. Steve
Click to expand...
I'm not following the idea of the single switch per the above. If the house load were moved from com to term #2, then you have effectively isolated house and starting systems, with Batt #2 becoming the dedicated House Battery. The stater connection would be controlled by the dual switch - Batt #1 for dedicated starting battery, Batt #2 to start from House system battery, or Both to combine batteries. This part I like. I'd think one would want to keep the dual switch set to Batt #1. If the dual switch were set to Batt #2, Batt #1 would be doing nothing, and the House battery would power all systems. If set to Both it'd be same as no switch. So the single switch would be a house systems 'off switch' to allow more juice to the starter? If so, not sure that would work, as the helm is on the House system, and power to the Helm is needed for start up.
 
Jim, you are correct in stating the single switch would isolate the helm for full power to the starter. I need to research a little more to see if the helm was isolated there would be no switch power. You might already know this to be true, I don't. Like you said, run the dual switch in position #1 all the time unless there is a starting problem. If battery #1 has a problem I would prefer to go to pos. #2 to avoid whatever caused a problem with battery #1. Another angle might be to keep helm power on dual switch #2 and use the single switch to isolate the stereo, which I assume is everyone's main power user. Let's beat this some more if necessary as I'm sure everyone wants to know the best way or best options. Steve
 
Steve, I really enjoy exploring concepts, but I don't enjoy stepping on toes. I sincerely hope I am not doing so here. Most power amps are wired to the yellow power sense wire from the head unit, so if the head unit is off, the amp(s) will not draw power. I'm not saying this is as certain as a single switch, but it is close. About the best use of a single switch I can think of would be to put it inline on the ground side of battery #1. An odd concept to be sure, but between the two switches one could totally remove battery #1 from both positive and negative circuits by switching the dual switch to Batt #2, and the single switch to off. Even the ACR (whether Blue Seas or Yandina) wouldn't have a complete path to Batt #1.

Cheers!

Jim
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I installed a Blue Sea charging relay with my second battery and in my mind, EVERY boat should at minimum be set up this way. What I mean by that is two batteries is FAR superior to a single battery. You should not be out on a lake without at least a second battery somewhere (hooked up and ready to go via an ACR or just there in storage ready to jump off of). However, I did NOT install any "master" switch. I pull my batteries and take them home for the winter, and since I don't do any dock-side charging, I didn't see the need for one. I figured I could always install one later if I thought I needed one. After one season running this way, I find no need for the master switch. Note that every situation is different, which is the one thing I learned from this forum when I was installing my ACR, so do what works best for you. There's no one right setup for all boats, and there are more wiring/operating configuration variations for 2 batteries than you might think until you dig into this.

The only advantage I could see was the master switch makes sure you don't leave something else turned on and drain the battery while you're gone. But, you still have to remember to turn the master switch off! That's six of one, half dozen of the other in my mind. I figured if I had to remember to turn a switch off either way, I might as well save the money and just make sure all the dash switches are off at the end of the day.

The other thing for us is we us a valet service at the marina, which makes the switch issue moot (it would need to be left "on" so the dockhands could start the boat, and then I'd be relying on them to turn it off long after we're gone). I figured it would be easier to just have them be responsible for simply turning the ignition key off after they put it on the trailer. I make sure everything else is off before I leave, and that way the dockhands only have to worry about the key switch, which is impossible to forget to turn off or the motor would be running on the trailer, and we'd have much bigger problems!

Most people have a short "disembarking" checklist. One of my items is to turn of all the electrics.
 
Jim, I was serious when I said we need to beat this some more. I always like to get differing opinions and appreciate your views. Had not considered the power-on wire for the amps. One thing I found that I thought was odd on my boat is it has two #10 wires with 30 amp fuses leaving the batteries but are tied together at the helm. Works but thought it was odd but makes sense. Steve
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top