On board charger help

[bgmny]

Just bought a two bank on board charger. I bought it mainly for the 12 volt trolling motor with the thoughts of adding a second trolling battery in the future. Can you hook both leads up to single battery without any problems? Also it says to maintain 8 inches of clearance on the the sides, pretty hard to do, how hot do these things get? Does anyone use the charger on their starting battery, because the leads don't reach all way to the back and they want 20 bucks for extensions. If the motor charges the battery, I shouldn't need the charger hooked up also. Any help would be appreciated, I want to do it safe and right.

[picksbigwagon]

My two bank charger gets pretty darn warm. I always thought is was somehow in the sunlight when I had it running, but I did it at night last night, still pretty warm, not hot, but not somewhere I would want my hand for 5 minutes. I mounted mine to the flip lid of the battery storage area, that way when I am charging it, it is flipped up and out of the way of everything. I wouldn't hook both up to one battery....that doesn't sound good to me. Of course if you have a fully distributed charger, all 20 amps should go to that one battery anyway. Re read you directions before you do something like that.

[stmichael]

You can also Email the tech support for the charger company. I have not purchased one yet, but, I have been in contact with a couple different makers just to ask questions. They will be more than happy to answer your questions, also, you may be able to call them.

[bijou bum]

My boat came with a 3 bank charger, 15 amps per bank. I asked the same question of the tech. He did not recommend it. The tech told me to roll up the extra wire and cap it until you need it.

[ricqik]

I have a 4 bank, one per battery. Yes you should hook one up to the crank battery as well cuz you want that bad boy to fire up everytime, the outboard charger doesn't charge at full charging amps unless it's rpm's are high enough, depending on what your's is rate at and tape the extra charging wires out of the way until you're ready to use that extra battery.

[TSCTSC]

I want to say that bolting the charger to the lid is a really good idea. I did do that cos I thought it would be too heavy. How did u secure it to the lid? Does the screws come out of the top?