Replacement of house batteries

[grant3791]

I have a 2002 Ultimate Advantage 40J. The house batteries are going bad. What are your recommendations on replacement batteries?

[rgvtexan]

If they will fit, 4 6 volt Golf Cart Batteries. Wired in series/parallel.
.

[Arch Hoagland]

Bought our 6 volt batteries at Costco. Around $87 last time I looked about a month ago.

[dennis45]

When you are ready to make the switch, take a few photos from different angles of the current set up to ensure all the connections go back the same way.
When disconnecting, remove the NEGATIVE terminal connections first to prevent arcing to ground. When reinstalling the new set, connect the POSITIVE cables first and the the negative.
Make sure all connections are clean and shinny using a wire brush. Clean the battery box using a water/baking soda solution to dissolve any corrosion and then rinse with water.
Be VERY careful not to allow any baking soda solution near the cell caps on the new batteries. Baking soda will ruin your new batteries in a heartbeat.
Inspect all the cable connectors to make sure they are clean and tight onto the cables. Good contact between cables and terminals is very important to performance of your charging system.
Once you have all connections in place, smear a little Dielectric Grease around each terminal to prevent air contacting the terminals or a Dielectric Spray designed for this purpose. (I prefer the grease)
After everything is connected, turn on the converter and after a few hours, check the battery voltage. It should be in the range of 13.6 - 13.7 VDC. If it's higher than 13.8, you should be looking at your converter as it will reduce the life of your new batteries.
Check the water level on your batteries about every 4-6 weeks and top up with distilled water as required to the ring in each cell. Allowing the electrolyte to run down to expose the cells will reduce the life of your new batteries.
Follow this simple procedure and your new batteries should last you for at least 8-10 years.

[lajuene]

Take a photo of the batteries before disconnecting them.
This would be a good time to upgrade to AGM batteries if you are ok with the extra cost. Wet batteries are definitely the way to go if money is more of an issue and AGM if you want no maintenance or if you want to relocate the batteries to a storage bay. We went with AGM partly for the maintenance free aspect but also I wanted to go up to 6 batteries and they would not fit in the battery bay. The six batteries fit nicely in the storage bay just ahead of the rear wheels. Both wet and AGM are good choices for different reasons. four batteries is enough but if you want to do long boondocking you may want to consider the six battery idea.

[AFChap]

Unless you do a lot of dry camping, 6 volt are not worth the trouble of converting.

The three 12v house batteries in your UA are Group 29 "Marine Deep Discharge". I get mine at Walmart, and get 5 years or so out of them. There are only a few battery mfg'ers out there, so most of the time brand names mean little difference.

As recommended above, take pictures and/or draw some good diagrams before you remove the cables, negative first.

[rgreen45]

AFChap is spot on with his advice. He is correct about there being a limited number of battery manufacturers, the same with oil/fuel filters, and lots of other products. What happens is a buyer says we want 10,000,000 units and we'll pay this much $$. The producer builds them accordingly. Just because Globe Battery built the Walmart product and the one from Batteries Plus doesn't mean they are equal.

Just sayin'

[wa8yxm]

Originally Posted by AFChap

Unless you do a lot of dry camping, 6 volt are not worth the trouble of converting.

The three 12v house batteries in your UA are Group 29 "Marine Deep Discharge". I get mine at Walmart, and get 5 years or so out of them. There are only a few battery mfg'ers out there, so most of the time brand names mean little difference.

As recommended above, take pictures and/or draw some good diagrams before you remove the cables, negative first.

Five years... not bad.. I got nine out of my interstate U-2200's (Six volt golf car in series)

MARINE/Deep cycle are mostly starting batteries and should not be run to 50% soc or lower

DEEP CYCLE are designed to be run to 50%soc which is why I recommend them over the Mulit-use types.

For the O/P.. There is one bit of magic that happens when you install six volt batteries.

you put in the first and it's a six volt battery
You put in the 2nd and it's a six volt battery
You add the jumper connecting the positive on one to the negative on the other and they magically become a 12 volt battery (Size 4D) Ok, there is no magic invovled. But suddenly you have a 12 volt 230 (give or take a few) amp hour battery

Think of each pair as a single 12 volt battery and many questions go POOF.

I suggest one other thing

YOu have wires that run battery to battery.. Ignore these for the moment

You have wires that run Battery to somewhere else

IF those wires are connected to a POSITIVE termainal paint them red (Nail polish, Spray paint, Red tape, Red split loom

Optionally if they are connected to a NEGATIVE terminal. Use black.

Makes it a whole lot easier than trying to figure where this white, yellow, blue, green wire goes or in my case the factory wires are all same color.