dual battery/wiring person in bay area

[HellsAngler]

Left the lights on in my delica and it drained my brand new batteries all the way dry. The van has dual batteries stock and this is the second time this has happened. I think may have blown an inline fuse or something. Couldnt get it jumped off another battery or portable jumper.

I'd like to get the wiring mess in the battery box cleaned up and ideally run a true dual battery set up with a starter and a aux deep cycle. I'm in the livermore/pleasanton area and would like recommendations for someone close since it will need to be towed.

any rec's or tips are greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[Sgt12XU]

You should have a battery isolator switch to protect your starter battery. That way, when the the voltage hits a certain threhold on the main starter battery, it switches to your auxilliary battery and will allow you to run that one to zero while protecting the main battery.

 

[HellsAngler]

You should have a battery isolator switch to protect your starter battery. That way, when the the voltage hits a certain threhold on the main starter battery, it switches to your auxilliary battery and will allow you to run that one to zero while protecting the main battery.

Thats part of what I want to have done. The delica comes stock wired for the second battery to make starting in cold japanese weather easier. would like to replace one of the batteries with a deep cycle marine battery and have an isolator installed

 

[El Solis]

Let’s talk. I’m in Livermore and have installed a few of these on my own rigs. I also will be selling a National Luna split charge system soon so this might work out. I’ll PM you.

Chris

 

[Road]

@james k - Is your Delica diesel? It may have dual batteries that are both used for cranking, as diesel has a much higher compression ratio to overcome to get the engine cranking. They can be much more difficult to jump, and most jump boxes I've seen won't do it; just not enough oomph. Even hooked to a good tow truck's batteries it can take a bit for them to charge enough to crank your engine. I had a AAA guy drive off in frustration one time because he would only use the jump box and it wasn't working.

If the batteries are both new, you might be surprised if you put it on a good charger overnight, not just try to quick jump it.

If your Delica is not diesel but came stock with dual batteries, as you say, and no isolator between them, it's probably for a reason and I would not separate them.

The more likely scenario might be a previous owner added a second battery to power an amp or something, so now it needs isolation.

edit: Just read the other post about wired stock for 2nd batt for the cold in Japan . . .yeah, add in an isolator for California. Weird there is no provision for an isolator. Must be something online from other Delica users about this.

Hope @El Solis can help you straighten it all out. Let us know what ends up being the fix. All good info that can help another forum user.

 

[HellsAngler]

Ended up getting a game plan worked out with @El Solis to eventually get a starter/deep cycle set up using his old National Luna.

In the meantime after using my 1000 peak amp jump starter only to drain it during the jump and then doing the same to a spare battery I had laying around I eventually bought a battery charger to try and recharge the batteries. Connected it to the secondary battery because it was easiest to access and figured it would charge both since they had a parallel connection. tried to start in the morning with no luck. So i then set up the main battery to charge while at work. tried again when i got home after a full charge and still no luck but it wanted to turn over . hooked the secondary back up to get as much charge in both as I could and after a couple hours charging she fired right up.

So Im good to go for now. definitely cant wait to get it all cleaned up though and lucky it wasnt a bigger problem

 

[Road]

@james k - sounds like they were dead dead! Glad they finally took a charge and got you going. Dual battery systems can take twice as much or more as a single battery system to bring back from being as dead as that. When a cranking battery goes through being that dead too often, it'll ruin it. They're not meant to deep cycle.

Hope the National Luna system gets you all set up the right way. Good that @El Solis is helping you out and is nearby. Another win for OB forums making connections like that possible!