2620 onboard charger questions

[thor]

I purchased a guest 2620 charger from cabela's a couple of weekends ago and am finally getting around to installing it. I decided to purchase 2 - 12 volt batteries that I would like to hook in parrallel for my 12 volt powerdrive trolling motor. My question is how to do this the "best" way.
I have two sets of wires running to the front panel which can be set up as 12/24 volt.
Can I hook one set of leads from the charger to one battery and one set of leads to the other even though they are connected by a short set of jumpers? Do I need a seperate switch between them to effectively isolate them?
Has anyone else been in this dilemma?

[lil^eye]

Yep I've got the same problem. I ordered a battery switch from cabela's but I haven't gotten it yet.

[P. Thomas]

I have a 24 volt system and have my onboard chargers two sets of leads hooked up one set( positive red and negative black)to each battery.(positive to positive and neg to neg. Yours would hook up the same way, a set of leads to each battery pos to pos and neg to neg. You also have the option to hook one set of your chargers leads too the positive and one too the negative of your trolling batteries which are in parallel and the other set to the starting battery. The disadvantage to this is long charging time for the trolling batteries .

[Bosbar]

I bought the 3 bank charger and there's a positive and ground lead for each battery. Hooked it up that way, been working great ever since then. By the way, Bass Pro sells a 3 prong plug you can install on your boat so all you have to do is plug an extension cord into your boat. The only hard part is bringing yourself to drilling a 2 1/2" hole in your boat.

[Sue D.]

Thor,

I would suggest hooking one output to your 2 trolling batteries in parallel and hook the second output up to your start battery.

You could hook both outputs up to your 2 trolling batteries however the output of the charger would be reduced as the 2620 is 2 separate chargers in one housing. This would cause one output to read back from the other and reduce it's output. In this case I would recommend using an on/off switch to break the positive connection between the batteries while charging.

Have a great day!

Sue D.

[lil^eye]

Hi Sue, is it acceptable to lenghen the wire to the starting battery a couple feet?

[thor]

I decided to hook the two nuetral terminals together at the batteries. Then hook the two positive terminals at the trolling motor plug together. Essentially when the trolling motor is unplugged, the two batteries are isolated. This will allow the two batteries to be charged independently when the trolling motor is unplugged.
Does anyone think that this will present problems down the road?

[Sue D.]

Yes, you can extend the cables. I would suggest using either 12 or 14 gauge wire and solder the connections and cover with a shrink sleeving.

Have a great day!

Sue D.

[Dave in Mpls]

Sue-

Based on what I have read on this board, as well as BFHP, I understood that the Guest chargers could be hooked up to each battery, irregardless if they were wired in series (24V), parallel (12V), or stand alone, and that the Guest charger would monitor and maintain the battery to which each lead was connected, without seeing the effect of other batteries in the group. Is this not the case??

Regards

[Hans]

If they're wired in parallel it will be impossible for the charger to know which battery it is "seeing".

Two 12V batteries wired in parallel become just one bigger 12V battery.

Hans

[Sunshine]

Hi Sue,
I guess I'm a bit of a slow learner. I want to make sure that I do this right. I have the same setup, a 12 volt system w/ two batteries hooked up parallel. I should get the 2620 and hookup one set of wires to the starter and one to set of wires to the clster of two batteries. The confusion comes on how to hook the two wires to the two batteries in parallel. Should I hook the + and - leads from the charger to one battery or is it better to put + lead from charger to one of the batteries and then the - lead from the charger to the second battery?

[Dave in Mpls]

That's kinda what I was thinking, Hans. If I recall correctly, the installations instructions which came with my 2631 seemed to indicate that connections between batteries need not be interupted, and that the leads could be attached to each battery in the system. Perhaps it was refering to batteries wired in series only. Now my curiosity is peaked...I'll look again when I get home this evening.

Regards

[Sue D.]

Dave,

Hans is correct, with the batteries in parallel you have one large battery. With the 2620, since it is 2 seperate chargers in a single housing, it can read back. The 2611 charger however will not do this as it is a single charger that has split outputs. This reading back of the 2620 is only when hooked up to a single battery and the charger is not affected by 2 batteries hooked in a 24 volt series.

Have a great day!

Sue D.

[Tackleman]

So then Sue, if I just ordered a 2611, and I have my batteries in parallel, should I hook up the two 2611 leads to the same battery? Or, one set of leads to each battery? I want the best performance for out of the 2611 for those two deep cells wired parallel only. Thanks

[mfstanton]

My dealer installed the charger last fall when I put the boat into storage because I didn't trust myself drilling on the boat. It was wired in the configuration that Hans is talking about.

When I put power to it, I just got both the charging and ready LEDs on the unit on. The dealer lost the manual when he installed it so i can't tell what it is supposed to be.

I decided it was because there was electrical x-talk and separated the batteries from each other by disconnecting all intercabling. It still lights up both LEDs on the charger. The batteries had been run down by fishing most of the day on the lake. So they needed a charge.

What did I do wrong? Did I damage the charger by having it in the fully parallel configuration and running the charger? I plan to make it possible to isolate the batteries in parallel by putting a switch in line on the hot lead so there is no crosstalk when charging.

[unlogged Rod Holder]

I just want to make sure you have the positive cable from each battery going to your female outlet to which you plug your trolling motor and you are making the parallel connection in the male plug? If this is exactly how you have set up your connections and you routinely unplug your trolling motor when turning your charger on, I see no troubles. If you are using the unit that has two independent chargers built into it, since you are removing the parallel connection, your two trolling batteries will charge faster because you have created two independent batteries in that case. I have a similar situation on my starting batteries and my parallel connection can be made by the selector switch if I want them connected together. My selector switch also provides me with the flexibility to run on either battery or parallel.

[mfstanton]

What kind of switch are you using? I tried to find one that let me get rid of the spaghetti of wires but could not find one that met my needs. I have an Alumacraft Boat and it is set up to run two sets of leads up to the trolling motor connector.

[still unlogged]

What I have is a Perko battery switch. Go to the Cabela's website and just search for "battery switch" It will come right up. Unfortunately, on boat wiring, I don't believe you can get away from all the wiring mess. It just comes with the territory (boating) I do use my switch and probably should more than I do. My brother and I had to get back to the launch Sunday evening using my kicker since I had run down both starting batteries running lights/sonars/etc.