Minimum lead batteries needed for three travel days?

[Ralph Mawyer]

I’m going to to the mothership in late August to get a bunch of work done, including lithium upgrade. 
 

My four lead acid are still reasonably good I think and a friend could use two of them. While I could haul them home, she needs them sooner vs later. 
 

So, is it feasible to run with one or two for three days, with minimal draw?  Best way to do it?

[Mike and Carol]

I would think so.  There are others that run with 2 lead acid batteries.  Someone more technical might have the “best way” advice.  Mike

[Jim and Chris Neuman]

One battery should do it providing your TV can recharge your battery as you drive and you do not use any high demand appliances such as your AC.

 

[jd1923]

Most RVs come with 2 lead acid batteries, less AH per battery and no solar. You should be fine, as long as you do not plan on consecutive days of boondocking.

[mossemi]

3 hours ago, Ralph Mawyer said:

Best way to do it?

Make your battery cables look like the diagram below by removing the cables with the red X's.

Mossey

[mossemi]

I tried to edit the battery configuration diagram from the OTT manual and the result looks like first grade art work, sorry.

Mossey

[SeaDawg]

Give your friend the "kidney" of two 6 v batteries, and you'll be fine. You can't camp anyway on 4 6v, and run ac. 2 6v will operate everything else, overnight. (You have solar, right?

It's freaking hot everywhere but at elevation,  so you'll get some charge from hookups, running the ac.

You're very kind to donate to your friend. You're the best.

[Ralph Mawyer]

2 hours ago, SeaDawg said:

You're very kind to donate to your friend. You're the best.

They aren't dead, so mostly would just like to continue their use vs recycle them at this point.  Wish my other friend could use in her Casita, but it takes a single 12v.

 

[SeaDawg]

Just now, Ralph Mawyer said:

They aren't dead, so mostly would just like to continue their use vs recycle them at this point.  Wish my other friend could use in her Casita, but it takes a single 12v.

 

The Casita tray is pretty small,, as I  remember from my friend's Casita. (We helped her swap her battery, some years back.)

Have you measured? I suspect you have. 

 

[Ralph Mawyer]

I'll take another look.

Before I sold it to her, I had to clean out the battery box and refinish it a bit after the existing battery dried up and cracked open due to non-use and a hard freeze.  Pretty snug, but worth a Casita search.

[jd1923]

22 hours ago, Ralph Mawyer said:

So, is it feasible to run with one or two for three days, with minimal draw?  Best way to do it?

It appears you have 4 6v batteries, therefore you must run 2, 1 battery is not feasible, as two 6v batteries must be wired in series to produce nominal 12v.

You have wiring diagrams above, but simply stated, you must connect the + post of one battery to the - post of the other. Then connect positive feed to the trailer to the remaining + battery post. Lastly connect the ground by connecting the final negative battery post to the trailer ground.

Positive automotive battery cables are usually red, and negative/ground cables are usually black. Installing in the order described here is safe and will not allow a short across your tools, when adding ground to the batteries is the last step.

[Frank C]

Hi Ralph, you need to provide details of what type of 4 lead acid batteries you have (6 volt or 12 volt) before you start changing jumper wires into a series or parallel arrangement if you only keep 2 batteries. You didn’t specify in your original post, and you mentioned possibly cutting back to using only 1 battery, so that implies a single 12 volt battery.  There are Olivers with FOUR 12 volt lead acid wet cell batteries in parallel (I have this setup. It was offered by Oliver as an option, maybe you have the same setup as this?). See photos below.   

[Ralph Mawyer]

Bright Way BWG DC24-6

So look to be six volt, sealed lead acid. 
 

Unfortunately, they won’t work for either of my friends’ rigs. Though I still need to measure the Casita box as the 6v are shorter.

Trying to figure out what I’d use them for around the house. A very tiny ‘ Powerwall’.  🙂

[rideandfly]

On 7/24/2023 at 10:14 PM, Ralph Mawyer said:

Trying to figure out what I’d use them for around the house. A very tiny ‘ Powerwall’.  🙂

If you have need for a sump pump, a 12V pump can be installed and two 6V batteries can be used in series or two 12V can be used in parallel, maintained with a battery trickle charger for when power is on or off.