Looking 4 Battery and charging system for Motorcycle camper.

[rlphoto]

Hello guys, I am building a Pop up motorcycle camper out of a HF 48"x40" trailer and a Kamp-rite double cot tent. I am outfitting it with 12V Led lights and a couple 12v taps for charging cell phones, ect... No heavy draw stuff.

I want to keep the battery to a minimum for weight. I can get a 12v 8 ah for 20 bucks. Now I want to charge it while I am on shore power. I also want to charge it from my bike in transport.

I have been looking at the WFCO 8725 unit. I realize it is over kill, but it would be a nice unit to have it for my other camper also. Would this 8ah battery be destroyed by the 8725?

On the other end, here is a harbor freight on board battery charger.

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/d ... mber=93258

How long would it take a 1.5amp float charger to charge an 8ah battery from like 50%? would it work with such a small battery? As far as charging it from my bike, I just need to run a hot wire from the bike battery to the trailer battery?

Thanks in advance!

Randy

[Dale M.]

Connecting bike battery to trailer battery for charging means bike will sit there idling for a while to charge trailer battery... IF bike is off, lowest battery (trailer) will come up to partial charge and bike battery will drop to partial charge so in end you may have two half charged battery....

Batteries will only take as much charge as the are capable of to reach float voltage as long as float voltage of charger is in range of full battery charge....

Only problem with small sealed cell is the you can only charge it a percentage of its amp hour rate to keep from damaging it... IF the recommended charge rate is 10% then for a 8 ah battery it would be .8 amps (800miliamps)

Also see this message thread......

http://tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?t=25786

Dale

[wridley]

Another thing to remember - most bikes at idle are barely able to charge their own battery let alone another one. Depending on the bike the charging system may not be able to charge it at all even while running at highway speeds resulting in two have charged batteries.

[rlphoto]

Never thought of that. Thanks! What about an isolator?

[bobhenry]

Ask your buddy at the bike shop what motorcycle alternator repair would cost! You will then probably find another way to charge.

[bobhenry]

If you want to do it all for about $100 bucks this is worth looking into.
120 v AC and 12 v DC power where ever you want it. A utility light an air compressor and you can jumpstart with it too. I have used mine in the house during power failures and inflated tires and flotation toys. You can get 4 hours of ac running a large color tv I do know that.



http://www.blackanddecker.com/productguide/product-details.aspx?productid=15591&toolview=2#details

[rlphoto]

Ask your buddy at the bike shop what motorcycle alternator repair would cost! You will then probably find another way to charge.

Hi Bob, thats something to think about, I have to pull my gold wing engine to get to my stator on the back of the engine. Only weak point on a gold wing.

You know I have thought about the power unit. Might end up getting one. Still want to try to get seperate pieces for more reliability and versatility. Dont want all my eggs in one basket you know.

Thanks!

[Alphacarina]

Since we're only talking about an 8AH battery, it's going to be really hard to beat the simplicity you'll have by mounting a 10 or 15 watt solar panel on the roof - No need for hooking to shore power to charge, no need for hooking to the bike to charge - Just ride on and forget about it all . . . . your battery will always be nearly at 100%

Don

[Steve F]

Yep, go solar, an 8amp battery will charge from flat in about 3.25 hours with a 35W panel, monocrystalline are quite small. My 35w is 50cm by 50cm roughly. A 10w will do it in about 11 hours and 15w in about 8. Any of these would do if you only plan to draw an AH or two each day

If you can only put around 800MAH in it then the 10W or 15W would be perfect.

Cheers
Steve