Leisure Battery Life

The average Leisure, deep cycle battery, is rated at around 100-105 Amp. Hours. As is well known by now, these type of batteries , although built for regular discharging, should not be discharged beyond 60% when utilised on an application that involves daily discharging and recharging (such as for a Solar System or a Wind turbine application). 

However, for the average 4x4 application, or for stand-by power, the less frequent use of these batteries enables them to be discharged to a deeper rate without significantly affecting their overall life span.  Thus, for the average 4x4 installation we could expect to cycle them down to 75-80% without incurring too drastic a shortening of their life span.

A 102 Amp. Hour battery could thus give us some 80 amps of usuable power  -on an infrequent basis. This equates to around 1000 Watt Hours of available power.  This would be sufficient to power an average 12V Fridge of 5 amp.hour consumption for around 16 hours (1-2 days of operation depending upon ambient temperature, content, as well as the number and time of door openings).

The average battery can not be charged much beyong 20% of its rated capacity.  Therefore, you could only expect to get some 25 amps per hour into a 100 amp. hour battery.  In wattage terms this equates to some 325 watts, per hour of charge.  It is evident that, if your alternator is supplying you this amount of charge (25 amps), then it would take some 3 hours of driving at fairly high speeds to recharge the 1000w of discharged power.

The only way to increase the recharging rate is by employing a booster regulator, such as the MXS from Plan My Power.  The MXS will increase the charge rate by between 20-35% - depending upon the system employed.  This is particluarly effective when travelling on Game Drives where the average speeds tend to be in the lower range.
Also remember that when you are driving at night, in the rain, wipers on, and your spotlights on; there is not much surplus power available to charge up your auxiliary batteries!  Obviously, upgrading your alternator to around 120-150 amps will give you a much better ‘surplus’ quota that would then be available for charging up your auxiliary batteries – even at lower speeds.

More about leisure batteries:

	Click here to find out about Optima High Performance batteries for industrial, leisure, and marine use
	Click here to find out about Deltec Battery
	Click here to find out about Royal battery

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