Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

I am still in the frame building stage and about to buy a water tank that mounts under the belly of the camper and it got me to thinking. Since space is at a premium, why cant I mount the battery under the camper in the same fashion. I was thinking about putting it in one of those black plastic snap tight battery boxes then building a cage around it, that can be unbolted in some way (much like mounting a fuel cell in a race car). According to Walmart's website, the battery box is the same height as the water tank.--in thinking about ground clearance. Has anyone done this? Does anyone see any real draw backs? Thanks for the help.

I built my own cage from galvanized slotted angle that I picked up at Lowes. I cut it to the lengths that I needed and just bolted it together. My battery is about 8-3/4" tall, so my cage is about 10" or 11" tall if I recall.



Then cut a hole in my floor, and bolted it to the floor. I got a battery tie down from Advanced Auto, which hooks onto the cage. I cut a piece of plywood that rests in the bottom of the cage, for the battery to sit on. Then I made a cover for the hole that has foam tape to seal out the weather, and it screws down tight to close off the hole. Gives me easy access to change the battery or check the water levels.



But, the underside of my floor is built up 3" from the trailer frame, so it gave me extra room to do this. I still have plenty of clearance, but you might not.



Nothing is needed to "protect" the battery. My battery gets dirty.... but who cares?

Oh, almost forgot.. since my floor was only 1/2" plywood, I wanted to reinforce it where I attached the battery cage. So I added a strip of the perforated flat steel down each side of the hole. And yes, its strong.



Once I placed the carpet squares in, you dont even know its there. And I have a 4" mattress, so its entirely hidden.

Awesome! Well its definitely happening now, thanks!

Battery boxes are to keep vented hydrogen, and spilled acids contained. That is all. I like to keep dirt off the tops of the batteries, but that isn't always possible. One of my tractors loves to pack one end of the top of the battery compartment with mud.

Just me, but I'd at least put a piece of 1/4" ply on the front portion of the battery. Depending on just how many gravel roads you travel and your speed, might be handy to protect the battery from any potential rock damage from the tow vehicle. Doug

doug hodder wrote:Just me, but I'd at least put a piece of 1/4" ply on the front portion of the battery. Depending on just how many gravel roads you travel and your speed, might be handy to protect the battery from any potential rock damage from the tow vehicle. Doug

Great idea Doug. I think I'll be doing that as soon as the weather warms up a bit. Some of the trails I take are really off the beaten path.

Mine is mounted under very near the axle. Its made over 11,000 miles last spring and summer without any issues. I was lucky a neighbor had a battery box he had made at his work years ago laying outside and unused for years. Looks like 1/4 inch aluminum yet still lightweight. Its too rainy here today to take a pick but I'll post one if I get a chance.

I mounted a tongue box on the front tongue and build a frame high for battery to be mounted and tongue box cover side lip locks black battery box cover from having access to battery unless aluminum box door is open.

I've been mounting under-floor battery boxes for years! What I typically do is form some 14-16 gauge sheetmetal into a surrounding "pan" framework with 1-1/2" outside lip on the top and 1-1/2" inside lip on the bottom and deep enough to hold the battery and allow room for a lid. I cut a hole in the floor big enough for the pan surround to fit, trim down the cutout so that it makes the floor in the pan, then drop the pan into the hole and screw into place (making sure everything is sealed up real nice & waterproof). I make a lid for the box out of scrap plywood and trim it with T-molding. I also use gel-cell batteries so I can lay them on their sides and keep the pans as shallow as I can, as well as minimize the potential of offgassing. I've placed the the boxes in the floor under the cabin (as close to the axle centerline as possible) and I've also put them in the floor under the galley counter, and I've never had a problem with the boxes dragging the ground (except in extreme off-road situations, and then they were going so slow that no damage was incurred, and box did exactly what it was supposed to do ... protect the battery!

I'd much rather have the battery under the floor, close to the axle centerline, than on the tongue of the trailer where the extra weight might be an issue (but, I won't get into tongue-weight ... that's a whole 'nuther can of worms ... ...!).

Good Luck, and as always ...

CHEERS!

For a Cargo trailer Battery mounting it might not care, but for a teardrop "You bet ya'll".
I will try to post pic of tongue battery mounting.

More tongue mount pictures on album.

Mine will have a bamboo floor so doing that will be pretty hard without an access hatch showing like a sore thumb. But if I do solve that problem, I would add an external access panel that would have 2 posts ( Pos and Neg ) that I could use to attach jumper cables to jump the car or clip on an external batt charger if the need arose.

halfdome, Danny wrote:This is how I've been doing it.




Available HERE.
I make a removable hatch in the floor for access.

Danny

Danny,
Is your battery also removable from under the trailer? And, how much ground clearance do you normally have under the trailers?
Thanks,
Steve