Leisure Battery Options

[Andrew Brierley]

Needed primarily a leisure battery for overland trips, but also with decent CCA in the event of main battery failure.

I have previously run Oddesy batteries and been delighted with them, but talking to Man Bat today, they suggested a US 'Traction' Battery (US 31 TMX - £204) which is rated at 130AH. Apparantly these are used in heavy duty electrical equipment (e.g. cherry pickers) which is used during all day, and re-charged each night. They also provide a decent supply of CCA.

Man Bat rate these as better than Oddesy, and are about half the price - or better.

Does anyone have any experience of US Traction Batteries?

 

[Matt Wright]

I haven't used those, but I can highly recommend the 130Ah Numax Leisure battery range. £85 delivered to your door on eBay from a reputable supplier. Hard to go wrong with that. Mine's been running in the truck almost a year now..

 

[ModelMakerMan]

I haven't used those, but I can highly recommend the 130Ah Numax Leisure battery range. £85 delivered to your door on eBay from a reputable supplier. Hard to go wrong with that. Mine's been running in the truck almost a year now..

link?

 

[Chas]

Could this be it

http://www.tayna.co.uk/96051-Varta-Leis ... P3646.html

 

[Matt Wright]

I haven't used those, but I can highly recommend the 130Ah Numax Leisure battery range. £85 delivered to your door on eBay from a reputable supplier. Hard to go wrong with that. Mine's been running in the truck almost a year now..

link?

These guys : Unsealed, the one I have http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Numax-110-Ah- ... 1240wt_924

Or sealed : http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/12V-110AH-Lei ... 2c60d92d60

Both ar e110Ah, not 130. apol

 

[Chas]

I have three of these in my Red 80 from this company for a couple of years now and one in my green 80 for about two months, so far no problems whatsoever.

http://www.tayna.co.uk/Numax-CXV31MF-P3694.html

 

[ModelMakerMan]

So are you guys using these as starting batteries too?

 

[Paul_Humphreys]

I use them for starting my 80 series

 

[Chas]

Me too

 

[sae70]

I liked my Numax battery as well

Here's a couple of links to old threads on batteries that include some chatter about the Numax batteries

Which battery?

Best leisure battery - Optima or Elecsol?

NEW BATTERY REQUIRED FOR LC 100, ANY RECOMENDATIONS?

The only point I would make about the Numax batteries is that they are known for Marine batteries and as such quote MCA (Marine Cranking Amps) not CCA (Cold Cranking Amps) and they are worth slightly less, so 1000MCA is slightly less than 1000CCA. You can read about it on Wiki

 

[MuckyPup]

Any experience ?
Yep, The US battery is a very good battery, with no CCA rating. It will start an LC but it's quite a "lazy" battery, not intended for traction use in the slightest but because it uses relatively thin plates it discharges CCA better than most true "deep cycle" batteries and earnt a "semi-traction" label (Trojan is a better brand for true deep-cycle)
Stick with the Numax CXV.
Whatever the 1000 MCA Marine cranking amps is supposed to be it comes out at about 800 CCA for the CXV when tested.
I've yet to find anything to touch then for value for money and they're lasting well too.

Unbiased Manbat retailer

 

[sae70]

Cool

I almost can't wait for my existing Banner Battery to die, so I can rush out and get me another Numax CXV Lol

I just had a look on the X-Eng site and it look like they no longer sell the 4X4 Off-Roading labled one that I bought from off of them at the Donny show. It was not long after buying it that I discovered it to be the exact same spec as the CXV24MF without a nice flashy 4X4 sticker for around £30 less at the time

 

[grantw]

Reviving an old thread here ...

I came across this link which was very informative on what all the battery terms mean (i.e maintenance free = slow charging)
http://www.sterling-power.com/support-faq-2.htm

Moving on from that it did get me thinking that a proper "traction battery" would be a much better buy to use as a leisure battery - especially with it being able to be discharged to very low levels.

As I understand it pros/cons would be:

Pros:
-True deep cycle i.e use 80 - 100% of available amp hours a opposed to 20% for normal car battery. This means from a 100 ah battery you can safely use 80ah instead of just 20ah
-Quicker charging - at cost of losing water?
- much longer life
- putting the battery in line could charge your main start batteries?

Cons:
- Wouldn't be able to run a winch
- Wouldn't be able to start directly from it
- Special charger needed?

Any further thoughts on this would be great

 

[Andrew Brierley]

Well, I tried a Numax XV35MF and was wholly unimpressed. Its primary role was to power a Waeco fridge and freezer on my last trip, together with tent LED lights, phone charger etc. The first test was a 24hour ferry crossing to Tunisia which it failed completely, but it didn't even last overnight on any occasion. The battery is now US, which I presume was due to the constant deep-cycle use over the four week trip. I have tried to revive it with a smart charger, but to no avail.

I'm going to have a chat with these guys (http://www.powercell.co.uk/products/6v-to-12v-mono-blocs.aspx) next week to see if they have any ideas, and I'll post their answers. I may be doing the drive to Cape town next year, so need to get this sorted.

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

How were you charging it and what were ambient temps like? Might be a poor battery but before you waste money killing another it's worth making sure it is the battery?

 

[Andrew Brierley]

T-Max split charge system from a standard altenator. Temp range around 5 - 30deg. Now it just won't hold a charge at all .

Just another thought.... whoever fitted the T-Max had to exend the wire from the control box to the leisure battery in the rear, so always a chance that the run was too high a resistance for it to get fully charged - but that doesn't answer why it now won't take a charge at all from an intelligent charger...

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

Deep discharge will have killed the battery, sometimes they will come back to life but not yours by the sounds of it. I meant make sure the charging system and expectations are not the problem before you buy and kill another battery, not that the numax might not be dead

A split charge never recharges the aux battery fully and that can be made worse if the power (not sense) cables are too small for a long run and the battery is being discharged quite heavily. It's a vicious circle where due to inadequate charge the battery is discharged even more deeply each cycle.

I asked about temps because when we went through France and Italy last year it was hot and I noted that our fridge was running almost constantly, putting much more load on the aux battery than the manufacturers 'average' figures suggested or running about the UK. If you are running a freezer as well I imagine that will run a high duty cycle at lower temps than the fridge. It's worth checking what your actual demands on the battery are.

 

[Andrew Brierley]

Good point John. I will be talking to the chaps at Powercell about the charging requirements for traction batteries. I'm also planning on building a slide under the roof rack to take a solar panel which will give an extra few hours of trickle charge after we have parked up for the night - hopefully reducing the overall daily drain on the battery.

The fridage and freezer were fine during the day with the engine running, just didn't last the night. I calculated the drain as being within the capacity of the battery, but if it wasn't charging fully during the day that could be the cause.

 

[grantw]

Andrew, keep in mind also that unless it's a proper traction battery you can only use approx. 20% of the rated amp hours without causing damage.

Interested to know how your conversation goes with power cell and charging traction/monobloc batteries. Also be aware that some of the Trojan traction batteries are only rated for 50% discharge so still not a true traction battery.