WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

[trouville]

Which battery either a normal cat battery or a gel one??

Today the supermarkets are overflowing with gel batteries from China for starting a car,

Compact powerful,they used to cost £100+ and only seen in garages.
Today from £20! With lamp meter compressor and some even have 4.5v 6v 9.6v and 12v out put as well.

Clearly the quality will vary, but for a small boat and for sevices,bilge pump lighting,would it do?

Could it be used to run the auto pilot VHF and Depth?? And how do you recharge them? will they charge by solar panel?Via the out put cabels? or only via the built in charger?

Or is the normal car/boat lead acid better?? or both? One i see hear is a car charger gel battery "600amps" 5seconds?

A lead acid battery is 350 amp hour, (the 600amp hour would upset the ballast in my small boat!!!!)

Which is the best given a 600amp/secons and a 350amp HR cost the same???

 

[CharlesM]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

perhaps the best is to buy an electrical manual

They are maintenance free, but are VERY succeptible to overcharging. Wheras overcharging a standard wet cell you can replace the ofgassed liquid with new water, the gel ofgasses, and turns to a white powder which cannot be replaced.

I dont know about the batteries you are talking, but be aware also, that you would not use car batteries for the house battery on a boat due to use/charge cycles - a car has high load for a short time, and is virtually never discharged more than 10%, wheras house batteries are discharged 50% regularly..

cheers
Charles

 

[Sans Bateau]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

Go along to the nearest caravan shop and buy a cheap wet, deep cycle battery, £40 should get you about 90ah. It will last 3 years or so, but for the money they are good value.

 

[trouville]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

That reasonable,but i had a vetus sealed battery and a secondhand car one,i used them for the boats sevices i took the old car one from someone dumping it in the old battery area,it still had 11.8v (the vetus lost water even though sealed)

7 years on,the vetus has long ago gone overboard, the other runs the sevices without fault,and is charged directly by an 18w solar panel,which decharges it a bit at night? i also have 4 very large 6v batteris which do the engin starting, and sometimes run the bilge pumps when im cleaning,or the SSB when i chat to much.

Now im moving to a smaller boat one batterys the limit i think, so i wondered if a n inexpensive gel would serve as well, if the solar panel would charge it,perhaps that will ruin it? and if it could deliver current slowly over some hours as well as a lot for a short time?

 

[Christopher_B]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

If the panel is discharging the battery at night it hasn't got a blocking diode. 18W panel gives 1.5 A nominal but can be higher in bright sun. I'd use something rated about 5A to give a margin. Only cost a few pee from likes of Maplin. I think at 18 W on the solar panel you're at the point where a regulator is a good idea. Found cheap ones on Ebay at around a tenner UK - Australian supplier but they ship worldwide: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?V...ssPageName=WD2V

 

[trouville]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

i would have thought so as well, i have a regulator, im useing that for the 80w panel.

This old battery was i thought due to thrown overboard,i put the 18w panel on direct,in summer! and just left it when ever i checked the voltage it was 13v/14v depending when! I just left it as the voltage never went above 14.2v? and even in winter provides all the power needed

Even when im away for a few weeks when i get back the voltage is the same and the bilges dry!

 

[Talbot]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

Think you are mixing up battery specifications. Engine starter batteries (also good for windlass and bow thruster are measure in CCA - cold cranking amps. IIRC this is the maximum output of the battery when fully charged. This type of battery should be used for your engine bank and will normally be wet cell. The domestic - lights instruments radio etc use a lot less amps but ffor a much longer output cycle, thus their construction is different and their specification is on the number of amp hours they will produce. If you are sharing a charging source (e.g. solar panel, wind generator, alternator) between the domestic and engine starter battery it is very much advisable to use the same type of battery. There may be some very expensive regulators that can provide requirements for different battery types, but why add extra complications. If you only charge one bank at a time, you can choose whatever type you want. Personally I like the carbon fibre reinforced wet cell batteries cause you can use them for either task and they accept charge faster than normal wet cell, but you can still top the electrolyte up if needed.

 

[trouville]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

all understood,carbon fiber battery,i expect that could be beyond my buget!

Ive never charged more than one battery at a time. The huge starting batteries, are coupled together to give me my 24v starting,they are charged from the engin so no problem in the med,once or twice a year i put them on a very slow battery charger.

I have more than one alternator on the engin,and when one went wrong it literaly cooked a battery all the liquid was boiled away.If i hadents stopped for lunch on a sandbank on route i could have caught fire?? they are in the cockpit locker otherwise i wouldent have known!

In fact i have bought a new boat! and was wondering if a gel cell could be useful to power the simradTP10(when i buy one) and if it could be charged from my solar panel,which off load gives 23v? I wonderd if it might damage it?I cant charge from the engin as i havent got one!

As it happens i will buy 2 55amp hour liquid batteries with carrying handels!

And if i were to buy solar panels new now would buy an 18w as i have and a 10w those would provide all the energy i need,I least i hope so. now i will take the 18 and an 80w in case i need more power, i had once a 30w which was useful but a bit to big for the output,and why i got broken,pity as i might have been able to swap for a 10w!!!

 

[Talbot]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

I would have though 2x55 batteries to have been completely inadequate for most needs - unless you are totally converted to parrafin lights, dont sail at night and dont use an autohelm. I have done a complete energy budget for my boat and reckon that my present solar panel with my existing batteries are fine for local cruising, but woefully inadequate for long distance sailing. I have 220 amp/hr of battery and an 180 watt solar panel. 220 amp/hrs costs in the region of £110 with deep cycle wet batteries, and abt £190 for the carbon fibre versions

 

[trouville]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

Well not oil lamps. But im only hopeing ill have enought power!

In fact i havent a clue? Ill be coastal crusing and the longest passage (if poss) wont be longer than 8/10 hours and hopefully about a maximum of 6hours? I will take my old and illegal?? oil nav lights,other wise electric with battery back up?

Ill be sailing in the Baltic so there its daylight 24 hrs a day???(never been befor so will all be new) and my brand new boat is a 1946 Folkboat (wood).

I have a spare 180 amp hr battery but i thought i might be to heavy,and ive no idea where i would put it??

I have a bad feeling that with all those hard rocks they have every where ill be at the helm non stop,but i hope to let a simrad do the steering???As there ought to be pasages offshore without??

I thought a simrad useing 10w hour for 6 hours ought to go??I will have the 18w simons panel permently on?The 80w ill leave below when on route.

I was going to add wireing,but for this year at least ill have 2 battery neon lamps and 2 battery lanterns (all running on U2s)a battery radio MP3 and wireless speekers again U2 and the mp3 one AAA battery.

One battery will be for the bilge pump but folkboats have dry bilges,SSB and VHF, the other for the tillerpilot and depth.?

I have also a fresh water pump an old good piston one with pressure regulator,sounds extreem but far better than the foot pump or hand pump Honestly! Thats all Oh and a 300w inverter for running my PDA and recharging my electric razor! Thats it! The GPS will be run on batteries, but 12v cable ready just in case.

The wind instrument is a windex!

Will my batteries do??I almost bought a very small generator this morning,but i dont know where i could put it???and i dont really like running them, i have one on the Hillyard and that gets used perhaps once a year or less.

Any thoughts?

If i want to put much more on board,i suppose i could buy a second Folkboat and join them together--catlike??? that would sove the space problem but then id be back to the Where to moore" problem!! the FBs supposed to solve,

 

[SteveGorst]

Batteries Overboard!!?

[ QUOTE ]
7 years on,the vetus has long ago gone overboard,

[/ QUOTE ]

Is this a figure of speech or do you literally throw your batteries into the sea? I'm surprised that nobody else has asked this as personally I was a bit shocked to read it.

Is this common practice?

 

[Das_Boot]

Re: Batteries Overboard!!?

What is wrong with throwing batteries into the sea? I throw a lot of things into the sea my old television etc.

 

[trouville]

Re: Batteries Overboard!!?

These days i take them to the recycling,as they make such a splash,i get soaked, waters very cold just now,and in the Baltic the waters even colder im told,so recycling as well.

I wonder if the baltic States have recycling? Perhaps as theres so many rocks,they use them to sink the daily refuse??

Besides that,some just to be sure their batteries are not going to fail,change them two yearly or even yearly!!Taking mine along gives me a chance to find a new one!

Empty bottels,old gas cookers though all over board!!

What i wonderd was how do i recognise a "carbon fiber" battery??

 

[Das_Boot]

Re: Batteries Overboard!!?

It floats

 

[SteveGorst]

Re: Batteries Overboard!!?

There are over a thousand yachts in Conwy sailing in a relatively limited areas. As well as the yachting there are other local industries such as farming mussels, which are exported all over Europe. Can you imagine the effect of dumping all those batteries into the sea!! /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

 

[Phoenix of Hamble]

Re: Batteries Overboard!!?

The fish would find it shocking......

 

[iangrant]

Re: WHICH battery for sail GEL or LIQUID???

The nice man in the shop (superstart in Southbourne) said "silver" batteries are the way to go..

- green bobble in the middle (red if half way down grey is nearly flat) not gel, but sealed batteries..

Ian