View Transcript

Hide Transcript

Transcript is auto-generated.

[Music]  [Music]  you  all right so this is the first  introduction to this schematic this  conceptual diagram of what a boat  electrical DC system looks like we're  gonna revisit this slide multiple times  throughout the day and as we do many of  these things are gonna start making more  sense you'll notice that I'm not  actually showing for the purpose of  clarity I'm not showing any negative  returns obviously circuits are paths in  return right it's a circuit for the  reason most of the complications or all  the devices are generally on the  positive side of the circuit and so what  I'm showing here is really the different  ways of recharging your batteries and of  distributing power I'm gonna often talk  about oops sorry let me go back I'm  gonna often talk about unsweet  distribution switch distribution and  what I'm doing with the arrows shows  that sometimes obviously you got to  think about a wire is really like sort  of a pipe a pipe does not tell you the  direction of the flow right you think  about water water can go one way or the  other way but some circuits on boats are  really more of a unidirectional like for  example a charger never pulls power it  always provides it same thing with an  alternator an alternator is never a draw  of power it only provides us so the  arrows are a way for us to express the  concept of what a device does but  interestingly a combiner can both  provide power or take it right and so  we're gonna go through all of this and  it might be and I'm and the reason I'm  showing this right now is I want  everyone in the room to get a sense of  what we're gonna cover and as the day  progresses we're gonna revisit that  slide many times today and we're gonna  go through every single one of those  devices and understand what they do and  why you would have one on your boat this  is a another what I call a conceptual  diagram this time on the AC I'm not  showing the neutrals you'll see pretty  much everything except other than the  galvanic isolator which I'm kind of  indicating with a green wire  pretty much everything again is what's  called the one line  you wouldn't build your electrical  system on this but you would build the  concept of your electrical system on  something like that shows you one panel  a second panel we've got inverters what  does an AC do you could run an AC fridge  AC outlets microwave you could run a hot  water tank you can run a charger that's  basically a AC for the most part and on  the bigger boats it could be air  conditioning it could be some people run  AC water makers it could be all these AC  big ICI appliances that you'll baby  encounter on a boat okay but again we're  gonna revisit that multiple times today  conceptually that's where you're looking  at you've got an generator you might  have two generators you might have three  generators right it's possible you've  got sure you might have Ford Shore  offshore right and then you gonna have  an inverter and some boats have multiple  inverters but at a simple kind of  electrical AC system that's sort of what  you're looking at and it can grow from  there all right so with that we're gonna  start with batteries batteries are for  me the heart the beating heart of an  electrical system for boats that are  probably I'd say up to about 90 100 feet  once you get to a certain threshold the  boats just running on generators the  batteries are just there to start the  engines run maybe some loads for a few  hours maybe but when you talk about the  big hundred footers 150 footers that we  work on those boats are running  basically generators non-stop port  starboard running and then at night the  loads drop down and they run off a  generator a small generator called the  night gen for them their generator boats  but for most of us were basically  running our electrical system in large  part from batteries and we'll talk about  the different ways of recharging  batteries but they're really at the  heart in the center of your electrical  system on your boat so we'll talk about  and I'm showing this slide to  demonstrate all the different battery  types and sizes that are possible on a  boat there's a lot of selection and  we're gonna make sense of what the  selection is like so the first thing  you're thinking about is and this is  where battery started really I mean it's  they were cranking batteries batteries  were you know you think about a hundred  years ago batteries were installed on  boats to start the engine and they were  and that's what we have in our cars  they're cranking batteries but also they  can be used a good cranking battery  example would be also a thruster a  thruster is a device that demands a  large amount of current for a shorter  period of time so a thruster would be a  very similar type of battery as cranking  battery right ultimately needs to be  recharged there's some issues on some  boats where thruster battery banks are  actually not getting recharged unless  you're back at your power and that's a  problem will cause premature failure of  the thruster because the batteries are  brought down under use and they're not  getting a charge until you connect back  to shore power and they're not left it  designed to be left on charge you know  generally a flooded lead-acid battery  wants to be charged on a flow charge or  used regularly and that's something else  we'll talk about a little bit and I'll  emphasize that point and this is key  batteries are built for a purpose I can  tell you that I every summer probably  between about a half a dozen boats I get  a phone call from a distressed owner  that a battery exploded on their boat  and generally that battery that exploded  was a starter battery used in a deep  cycle application because starter  batteries are less expensive than deep  cycle batteries somebody decided to cut  a corner buy and install a starter  battery in a deep cycle application use  it for a couple seasons and at the end  of the day the battery was cycling so  hard that literally the water the  distilled water the the the electrolyte  evaporated the batteries got dry they  warped that warped caused the plates to  touch the batteries full of hydrogen gas  and that explosion is not a firecracker  it's a real explosion on one boat it  actually removed the hatch on the back  deck and threw it literally off the  hinges like it liked the battery box  exploded the hatch went completely  flying and it's terrifying so when  you're thinking about batteries on your  boat batteries are built for a specific  purpose really important  and when you buy those batteries you're  buying them in basically what are called  cranking amps or cold cranking amps CCA  so it's the ability of the battery to  deliver an amount of amps for a short  period of time so here's an example of  an 8 D flooded lead-acid battery okay  notice the fill caps at the top for the  distilled water deep cycle batteries  lots again lots of choice lots of choice  we'll talk about that deep cycle  batteries for me and I'm always thinking  about analogies because I got to make  all this technical jumbo jump stuff  makes sense to me  what is it it's basically a marathon  runner right and a starter battery is a  sprinter they're both athletes but they  have completely different physiques this  battery deep cycle battery is meant for  a long slow discharge where the amps  aren't too high and you're gonna be  using that battery for a discharge for  maybe 24 hours it could be 12 hours it  could be on my boat it could be for four  days based on the battery bank size  right slow discharge and the capacity of  that battery is measured in amp hours  and we're gonna revisit that later and  that's sort of a sort of like a kilogram  or a kilometer it's a unit that is  definable how many amp hours do you have  in a battery bank so there's really two  types of lead acid batteries on board  there's what we consider and are  commonly that we had all in our cars  maybe 20 years ago which are called  flooded lead-acid batteries right and  you can buy a flooded lead-acid battery  for a starter application a deep cycle  application or what's called a dual  purpose right sort of like you're  neither good at one or the other I  generally don't recommend using a dual  purpose battery there are some  exceptions every rule most rules have  exceptions this has very few of them  generally if you buy a battery buy it  for a specific purpose you know it's  like winter tyres buy winter tires for  winter summer tires for summer  by all seasons if you live in a place  where you actually have a winter and you  have a summer you're not gonna put an  all season tire it's it's a compromise  so that's why I'm not a big fan of dual  purpose batteries and then the second  type of battery are what are called  sealed valve regulated batteries svr and  a lot of people are going to use that  word interchangeably with the word gel  because gel was the first svr battery to  come out and I often find boaters  telling me Jeff I have gel batteries  what they mean to say is I haven't svr  battery seal valve regulated battery and  in actuality their battery is an AGM  battery AGM batteries are extremely  prevalent Mercedes BMW put them by  default in their cars now so it's not a  crazy futuristic battery a GM stands for  absorbed glass mat battery so that means  that there is no way to fill the  batteries there's no way there's no  maintenance the electrolyte is actually  enclosed in a glass mat and a gel  battery the electrolyte is enclosed in a  gel you could literally drill a hole in  it puncture it nothing will come out in  a flooded lead-acid battery you  literally have sulfur cassadee in a  liquid state within that battery now the  plates are all that acid here okay we're  limiting our conversation for today for  this seminar we're talking about lead  acid batteries and the other battery now  is an enhancement on lead acid AGM is  the carbon foam AGM which is the Firefly  battery so what do we know about flooded  lead-acid batteries lettle acid  batteries are I'm putting one dollar  sign and we'll see the multiples of  dollar signs depending on the size of  the battery because the cost of the  battery changes with the amount of lead  you buy in the battery right it's pretty  linear they're the least expensive  batteries now that is under the  assumption that you will follow through  on the maintenance of that battery  religiously without exception regardless  of the excuses that you might be able to  come up with over time so in actuality  for most voters what  weapons is they'll start off there  digitally to replace the electrolyte but  over time they forget the delay and  eventually that delay causes premature  damage so the battery is in a liquid  elect a state electrolyte right so we  see that all the time  you need and this is very important if  you have flooded lead-acid batteries you  can just have a tray you need a battery  box but not just a battery box you need  a battery box that does not have holes  in the bottom of it it needs to be a  lily liquid tight container I give the  privilege and honestly I think it's an  honor I probably do about 500 electrical  audits a year that's besides the  thousand projects we do I do maybe ten a  week sometimes fifteen and when I do  electrical audits I see commonly what  are the problems on boats and I would  say more than half of you have a battery  box and that battery box has holes on  the bottom because when the owner  whoever put that battery box in it  didn't come with a manual and whoever  put it in looked at the box and said  well how am I gonna hold this battery  box down most people don't like reading  right remember that theme I was saying  do it like a pro meaning educate  yourself most people don't like that  just get it done do it just do it they  drill four holes in the four corners of  the battery box did they feed the whole  purpose of the battery box and they  think the battery box is some sort of  cover to hide the batteries it's not a  battery it's not to hide the batteries  it's actually a battery box or flooded  lead-acid batteries it's actually to  contain them so that's really important  if your battery box is magically held  into place and there is no sides on it  like we use a lot of aluminum sides on  the size or like for example grand max  will actually have wood on the side of  the battery box and then they'll have a  strap so the battery box can't move  laterally and then it can't jump up if  your battery box looks like it's just  there and somehow held in place  magically that means that you probably  have four screws in the four corners and  the whole purpose of the battery box was  defeated by the Installer  you've got to top-up with distilled  water only right really essential  you can't put tap water so you know we  find that in pharmacies all the time you  can buy distilled water in a probably  gallon jug and here's a really good  point a flooded lead-acid battery will  self discharge by about 15% a month  that's why people that have the  privilege of living down south like Mike  for example my folks have a little place  in Florida in the summer when they're  not there someone actually drives her  car once a month and they do that to  maintain the batteries if they left the  car in the parking lot for six months  the car battery would be dead if it's a  flood of acid battery a lead acid  battery will self discharge even if  there are no loads you could have it in  your garage on a shelf it will solve  this charge by about 15% and here's an  important very very very important point  and this is where the distinction is key  okay I cannot emphasize this enough with  batteries what you see is what you get  because with a flooded lead-acid battery  your practical available or useable  battery capacity is about 35% why you  never want to discharge below 50% to get  a reasonable amount of cycle cycles is  the number of times you can use that  battery and realistically when you're  charging it unless you have endless time  but you're charging with an alternator  or a generator or whatever it is you'll  never get a but it takes forever to go  above 85 to 100 so you're useful  bookends right between 85 and 50 is  about 35% so when you look at a flooded  lead-acid battery bank you're only ever  going to be able to use 1/3 another way  to describe that is if you have a 600  amp hour battery bank you're only  getting about 200 of useable amp hours  out of that battery bank because that  top-end takes forever to recharge okay  so that's why I give this all a lot of  times people always ask they say Jeff  why such a big battery bank well I'm  like because that's what we need right  we're not thinking we're not just  throwing batteries and hoping it works  we're gonna do the math how much do you  use and we'll talk about that and we  sighs that battery bank on use okay so  with a flooded lead-acid battery  remember and we're gonna again revisit  that later you only have about 35  percent of usable battery capacity we're  gonna talk about that it's gonna come  that's on one of my slides so here's an  example a really popular battery that we  use is called an L 16 and I'm trying to  demonstrate here how batteries come in  all different sizes all right and this  is a flooded lead-acid battery sort of  like a big golf cart instead of being  about 11 inches in three-quarters it's  16 inches high and it offers generally  about double the amp power capacity okay  of a golf cart battery so gel batteries  gel batteries are now we're in a  different type we we just talked about  flooded lead-acid batteries  now we're talking about gel so gel is a  svr battery seal valve regulated battery  and remember when people are gonna say I  have gel on their boat what they  probably mean is a GM but gel came first  so everyone thinks that as VR and gel  are the same word we talked about that  there's seal valve regulated no  maintenance is required  there's no cats there's nothing that's  it  you know you're not involved for  maintaining those batteries now here's  the catch and this is critical gel  batteries aren't that popular and  there's a reason they are very sensitive  like every battery to overcharging and  the problem is a stock alternator and a  Stark battery charger that charges at  about a 12 volts 14.4 volts will  overcharge that battery and within a  week or two weeks that battery will be  dead so if you go on blogs and I  remember reading on blogs in 2004-2005  people were really dismissive of gel  batteries they thought it was just a  direct replacement I have a flooded I  put a gel is just going to work it  doesn't work like that  everything has to be tailored on the  charging side to a gel battery and so  that's the challenge with that battery  is that it's not easy to retrofit about  with gel because you need to make sure  that the alternator is an overcharge so  that means you need an external  regulator which we're going to talk  about  you need to have a battery charger that  has a gel setting and gel settings vary  a lot from battery manufacturer to  manufacturer so you need to have one  that coincidentally aligns with what the  manufacturer wants  it's a overcharging a battery is a  really really quick way of killing it  under charging is a slow death but  overcharging is a very quick death all  right now here's the interesting point  only self-discharge about 2% a month now  that's interesting  because that means that that battery can  be left unattended for a period of time  right and so for example one of the big  projects we did one year was we  basically converted all of the DFO's  Boat Department of Fisheries and Oceans  from lead acid batteries stage my  because the bat the boats are left in  hangars in different places and the  operators would come on board and they'd  show up in the battery would be dead  because someone forgot to turn the  charger on but with AGM the battery  doesn't self discharge as much or gel  and so they'd come in and the battery  would be good enough to start the engine  so that's why they went with AGM now why  55 percent of usable capacity  well because under bulk charging you can  go all the way with a reasonable amount  of cycles to 30% the floor is 30% so  your range is 55 now ok 55 versus  flooded an acid battery was now 35 so  that's a big game because 55 over 35 is  about a factor of one-and-a-half so just  by going to gel you're actually having  needing less batteries to do the same  amount of work so you only need a 400  amp hour battery bank versus a 600 for  flooded lead-acid okay AGM batteries so  that stands for absorbed glass mat  battery it's another seal valve  regulated battery the purchase cost  about twice the price of a flooded  lead-acid battery again seal that  regulated so commonly people might have  their batteries on for example it  happens a lot on sale boaters under a  bed they might have it under a cabin if  you have it in one of your cabin under a  bed you need to make sure if it's the  flooded lead-acid battery  you need to make sure there's gonna be a  lot more venting of hydrogen gas when  it's charging this one still does it but  it keeps up to five atmosphere of  pressure within the battery so it does  gas but it gas very little so that's a  good choice for and I have this up in  all the time where people are installing  batteries not in the engine room but  they're actually installing the bed the  back the batteries under a bed in a  cabin and so a GM would be a good  application for that you still need  ventilation but you need less of it no  maintenance is required that's a big key  and again the self discharge is only 2%  so that's a good good point again  luckily because it's still valve  regulated you can also get 55 percent of  usable battery capacity okay so here's  what an AGM battery looks like and this  is a group 31 battery you'll notice the  top of the battery there's actually no  no fill caps right and I can't emphasize  this enough and I was that Nigel called  her stocks maybe some of you were there  two years ago and he came I was actually  right here wasn't it and he had the full  auditorium and he was talking about let  acid batteries don't die they get  murdered and he agreed and I won't agree  with him of course is that everyone  starts on the best intentions with a  flooded lead-acid battery everyone can  promise themselves that they will  maintain that battery religiously and  they will do everything that is required  by that battery that's easy to promise  but to literally do it to fulfill that  promise  over four five six seven years and  remember the battery doesn't understand  and will never forgive regardless of  what your excuses are oh my daughter got  married oh I went to Europe for three  months oh I was sick oh I got busy at  work all those reasons don't matter to  the battery if ever the plates get  exposed you cause permanent damage to a  flooded lead-acid battery and then  that's the same story goes oh I wonder  why my batteries don't last long right I  have unfortunate some boaters are  stubborn they're like no I'm not feeling  I'm not feeling it now their batteries  don't last five years they last two  years but that's what it is they need to  be maintained to keep that cost down  so now we've got another battery which  is another version of an AGM which is  called the Firefly battery huge  proponent I've installed it on my own  boat now mine use three times the price  up front then a flood of the acid  battery three times but why would you  spend three times the price of something  and here's what we're gonna find out  leak proof obviously we talked about  limited gassing maintenance-free now  this is a killer on the Firefly you can  actually go and we'll talk about charge  rate the charge rate is basically almost  limitless it's three C meaning three  times the battery capacity which is  means it can take whatever you throw at  it  okay a normal AGM is about between forty  percent this battery there isn't you'll  never be able to recharge it at max  speed there's no charger you can so if  you have for example a three hundred a  power imagine a four hundred amp hour  battery bank for just four golf carts  pretty standard right it's not a big  battery bank it could take a 1200 amp  charger eight now think about 1200 amps  where are you gonna get 1200 amps so  basically what it says is the battery is  sort of like lithium lithium is does the  same thing it can take a high charge  rate whatever you can throw at the  battery under bulk it will take it  that's a big big advantage with the  Firefly here's killer is the battery has  12 times the battery life of a flooded  lead-acid battery have the same floor  discharge like they like so if we go  apples to apples at 50% depth of  discharge a flooded lead-acid battery  will give you around 300 cycles and  Firefly AGM will give you thirty six  hundred cycles 36 versus 300 I joke  around when we install it on boats I say  it's almost a family heirloom you know  you're gonna install it and one day  you'll pass it on to your children and  you'll like here you go I didn't get a  chance to use it all but why don't you  have it now that's basically a Firefly  battery and the L 15 battery is 4700  cycles at one point it's sort of like  you might not live forever but if you  made it to a thousand that's probably  closer  you know that's the advantage of the  Firefly battery it was invented by  Caterpillar well they didn't invent it  they basically create an R&D project and  now it's bought been bought out but it  was invented for actually Caterpillar so  3,600 cycle versus 300 that's a big deal  now think about some of you don't vote  that much you might not use that or  you're gonna change your vote soon but  if you love your boat and you're gonna  use your boat a lot or you're gonna go  you know for long cruises this battery  is the last battery you're gonna end up  putting on your boat and if it wasn't  good enough and you're like well this is  just ridiculous and when I saw all these  pros about six seven years ago I was  very doubtful I didn't do it  I was like this is too good to be true  this is ridiculous I mean honestly you  could have had me at twice better three  times is still ridiculous the big center  with that battery is it does not age at  a partial state of discharge all other  batteries kiss of death why they never  do what the battery says on the label is  that a battery once it's discharged  needs to be recharged 100% the moment  it's this charge that's called lab  testing right you take a battery from  100% you bring it down and then the  moment it's done they don't go for lunch  they don't wait a week they recharge it  right now and then they'll do another  test and that's how they figure the  number of cycles you can do the reality  on our boats is far from that when is it  that we discharge a battery and the  moment we get to 50% we're like oh  you're gonna get recharged right away  back to 100 and I'll never keep you in a  partial state of discharge meaning from  50 to 85 85 to seventy seventy to ninety  90 back to fifty you know we're always  oscillating when we're cruising when  we're out using our boat we don't get  the advantage of plugging in every night  to bring back the battery to 100% most  of us and so that's the real big benefit  of a Firefly battery is it can live in  this partial state of discharge without  aging two sizes group 31 and L 15 plus  and the other gets better is that the  usable battery capacity for bulk charge  is 85 to 20% so again with that battery  you need less batteries to do the same  amount of work okay so you need only a  300 battery a power battery bank to give  you 200 amp hours of usable battery  capacity so let's let's stop for a  second and just think why does that  matter  well you could have a boat where you  have limited battery space but you want  more capacity like I have a lot of cell  boaters they can only fit X amount of  batteries I was on as you know just four  days ago when I say I I don't mean I I  mean my team but the owner had  limitations wanted more battery capacity  and how do you add more battery capacity  on a boat that is completely physically  constrained there is simply no space  other than mounted on the floor where  are you gonna put the batteries it's not  a barn I can't just add more batteries  in a corner I have so much space and how  do I give more capacity to a boater that  now is cruising and less less of dock to  dock well one ways to go with HM and  you've got a GM the normal vanilla which  gives you about 55 percent or you go  with Firefly gives you 65 percent so  effectively you can have more battery  capacity by not increasing your battery  bank but by just changing to a Firefly  battery or you could also have I have  other boaters that say to me Jeff weight  matters I want to save weight I you know  they could be racers I wait I my boat is  heeled too much on one side even on big  boats trawlers I have too much batteries  on this side you can see it I don't want  to carry LED I like to plane I don't  want to carry all this weight in the  back can I have the same usable battery  capacity but save the weight and now the  list on my boat that's offset because  I've added too much batteries over time  I can reduce that battery weight by  going to Firefly batteries and not have  to offset the weight by putting LED on  the other side of the boat so these are  what they kind of look like you've got a  to only two sizes no golf carts I know  it's disheartening but it is what it is  you've got the L 15 which is a tall one  and then you have the Firefly the other  one the group 31 so this is an install  we did you can see six of them they're  all in parallel here's a good way to  tell right the jumpers are going  positive to positive to positive so it's  a 12-volt bank notice as well I just  want to make sure I do this right notice  we've got a decent-sized battery strap  the cables are at opposite ends of the  bank you know you've got a positive here  and the negative over there and we've  got a temperature sensor in the middle  of the battery bank we'll talk about  that but those are really important  takeaways so that's a 660 amp hour  Firefly battery bank all right so how do  you go about and this is what I do when  we're doing what I call scope outs or  electrical audits with other motors it's  like well Jeff how do we go figuring out  we just don't want to throw money you  want to make sure we do what is right  for our boat so when we sized a battery  bank the first thing we ask ourselves is  what is your daily power needs we've got  to have a sense of what your budget is  gonna be budget means how much money for  example a good way for battery capacity  I always like to relate to money because  it's it's sort of a very limited thing  it's hard to earn it  you don't want to be - you want to be  tricky you don't want to spend it -  easily you want to be able to store it  and so that analogy really carries well  with batteries so first thing is how  many how much do you use in a day what's  your typical add power budget and what  I'm trying to say on this slide is  remember it might vary depending on when  you boat same boater in for example just  myself when I boat in the fall I use  more power in the fall or even worse in  the winter because in the winter I'm  using heat the lights are on longer  right all those things are drawing power  on my batteries same motor boating in  July in desolation sound is going to use  less power than the same boat or in  desolation sound like Christmas where  the light is only maybe eight hours a  day and it gets to five degrees Celsius  in the winter time okay so that's really  good so think  about a my just doing your amp our  budget a my budgeting my batteries to  just do summer or am I going to do them  fall and spring or am I also gonna look  at my batteries for winter as well  here's the typical battery usage I'm  using this as you know how sometimes  people think about salaries are thinking  oh I hundred K 50 K right we can start  relating you know we're not talking  about I make a hundred million I mean  those numbers don't make sense to any of  us but you say oh fifty K you know 100 K  okay that's tangible relatable in power  budgets the numbers really range between  for the most part maybe 85 to 500 amp  hours at 12 volts okay 12 volts for the  most part  now I've I been on a boat that uses 500  amp hours at 24 yes of course there's  always outliers right but in the  majority you know you're thinking about  sailboats you're gonna be maybe you're  really efficient you don't even have  refrigerator right on your boat well  then your app hours are gonna go way  down you might only be using 40 amp  hours refrigeration is the number one  draw the way I describe it it's like  having a Vancouver mortgage you might be  frugal and everything else in your life  but if you have a mortgage in Vancouver  most of your money's going to your  mortgage on a boat you might be frugal  at everything you do  most of your power goes to refrigeration  regardless of the boat size the bigger  the boat the more refrigerators they  have and that's what it is and the  fridges are just bigger in the galley  and then there's one in the salon and  there's one on the fly bridge and then  one of the aft ACK so there's just more  and more and more refrigerators on a  boat and that's the number one power  draw on a boat if you can live without  cold anything it's sort of like being  mortgage free in Vancouver Power is  really then not a big issue okay so  alright we figured out what your daily a  power budget but the next thing you got  to figure out is like how long am I  gonna use my boat for without recharging  because that's the amount of batteries  you need to carry some boaters are  fortunate they have a generator and  they're gonna run their generator twice  a day well so they're only going to need  their batteries to last them half a day  other boaters gonna say Jeff I want to  use my boat and I don't want to recharge  my boat for two days before I recharge  so then they need twice what their daily  a power budget so for example at a  minimum when I'm trying to say there is  if you've got a daily a power budget of  200 and you're saying I want two days  you're gonna need to have four hundred  amp hours sir like traveling you know if  you need going somewhere and you  spending $200 a day and you're going for  two days you need four hundred dollars  in your pocket tell us two days so  that's how you figure out what is gonna  be your total target that you need for a  battery bank  and that's so I know it sounds a lot  tedious but you know what there's a  method to the madness this is why it all  works it comes back to planning to  design to doing things with thought not  just saying oh well there's four  batteries on my boat that's what I need  no sit back think why right and if you  do it right you do it once and then it's  gonna work so recap we talked about  what's called the battery floor right  that how deep can you go on a battery  you can go maybe with a firefly AGM all  the way to 20 percent and it flooded  it's higher it's 50 so if you are  figuring basically these are the numbers  that we talked about right flooded  battery has 35 percent of usable AGM gel  55 and if you end up with Firefly you  even have more you have 65 of usable so  here's a recap of all of this  I don't do jail not because gels aren't  good as just there's very few people  that actually have gels very few they're  great batteries but it's just more  tricky to improve your boat with gel  generally if it has gel will keep gel  but to switch to gel is more expensive  so that's why we normally don't do gel  so I'm trying to recap here you can see  the dollar signs right so if you're  gonna buy an AGM Firefly battery don't  be don't be surprised by the cost is  gonna be three times more than a normal  battery but why would you spend more for  something and I used to try to have a  hard time expressing that well that to  me I was thinking about it it's value  right what you pay and what you get it's  not about just the cost of something  because something that can be cheap can  be probably the most expensive thing  you're gonna buy right so you've got to  ask yourself as a boater  where does this all make sense to me  right am I gonna be able to follow digit  like to the team i maintenance of a  flood to let acid battery is in a place  where i don't care about gassing is it a  place where i am actually gonna use it  all the time and i don't care about self  discharge all those factors are gonna  help you decide which battery is right  for you as a voter yeah correct yeah  yeah so with AGM you can really use them  for both and that's a good point you  know with a flood at last a battery you  got to say am i buying a deep cycle  battery or am i buying a starter battery  with AGM you can use it for both so  basically what flooded you got to  multiply times three so if you need two  hundred a power batteries i've usable  you'll need six hundred amp hour battery  bank if you do AGM gel you only need  four hundred if you go firefly you only  need three hundred so you actually need  less batteries if the better the battery  is right or you spend you buy more  batteries but you have more capacity so  that's the trade-off right what are you  gonna do with that available space  you're gonna save weight or are you  gonna take more weight and have more  usable battery capacity so you can stay  an anchor longer or run more loads so  what I'm trying to emphasize here and  this is a really important takeaway  people get we all assumed I did the same  thing when I started off people think  that oh I have a golf cart battery that  can be AGM oh I have a a.d it's flooded  all batteries come in different  chemistry's okay so first of all there  are known dimensions sort of like wood 2  by 4 2 by 3 4 by 8 it's a physical  someone came up with a battery size and  then everyone else mimicked that size  and it's a known battery size so when  you buy a golf cart it could be a golf  cart from Easton deca it could be a  Kenyan tire Guard cart it could be a  Costco guard cart golf cart it could be  whatever lifeline it doesn't matter what  you buy it's all one golf cart size  so they're interchangeable in terms of  like when you take them out you can put  another golf cart in its place so that's  the first thing the second thing is that  you can buy most of these batteries from  large manufacturers in different types  of chemistry's do you gonna buy it in  flooded AGM gel and then for flooded  batteries remember you've got to buy it  for a purpose  never fall trap and if you've bought a  used boat that's been sitting for a  period of time and the owners not that  engaged and you're dealing with someone  that is looking to make problems go away  I've often seen boats especially when  you buy them for use where someone the  batteries are dead they're trying to get  rid of the boat they're trying to keep  costs down and so they're replacing the  batteries and when they go to a battery  shop and they see a deep-cycle battery  that is twice this price of a starter  let acid battery they're going to go for  a starter battery because they look the  same they absolutely look the same on  the outside and they'll put them in and  they're like oh I have new batteries but  whether or not telling you is they took  a corner they they they basically  they're they're your they're not gonna  pay the price you will over time so I've  seen so many boats with AD s where the  starting batteries are using a deep  cycle application and that's those boats  where the batteries explode  and you can imagine what happens to  electrolyte that explodes in a engine  compartment full of metal I mean this is  not it's not confetti right it's not  just oh well let's just clean it up it's  no big deal like it's a life event yeah  yeah only with the flood and so one  takeaway from this presentation is when  you go back to your boat if you have  flooded lead-acid batteries make sure  that those batteries are built for the  purpose you're using them okay so here  we're talking about the ideal charge  rate a big issue that I see a lot of  times and we get calls about this all  the time people are basically thinking  that whoever designed their boat  future-proofed it for all innovations in  all directions so whoever built their  boat in 1985 put in for example and  you'll see this this is the  where all the builders do they always  install a charger to be 10 percent of  the battery capacity that's the formula  that's the minimum that's what they do  so if you have 400 a power battery bank  deep-cycle you'll have a 40 amp charger  right 10 percent of 400 is 40 amps great  now you decide that you're not satisfied  with 400 amp hour battery bank you put  an 800 amp hour battery bank that  charger it's not about time right you're  like well it's just gonna take twice the  time if you don't have the ability to  bulk charge at the right rate of charge  you will cause a slow death to your  batteries your batteries will die  prematurely not suddenly but they're  gonna sulfate every time you charge them  because you don't have enough pressure  right because of the apps you're gonna  charge a fraction of a fraction and your  batteries will die prematurely so don't  get too excited when you change your  battery bank you guys think is my  charger capable of charging that battery  bank at the right rate of charge and the  minimum is 10% as you get better and  better batteries they can take a higher  rate of charge like lithium can take  some batteries can be up to 3 C so 3  times capacity Firefly is the same  now nobody practically is ever gonna be  able to do that you can't find a charger  that outputs 600 amps it's not gonna  happen but you can start maybe taking  advantage of two chargers one that does  150 you know one that is 100 to get 250  amps right so there's abilities of  reducing your charge time by what is  what we do commonly is called daisy  changing chargers meaning putting  multiple Chargers in one battery bank to  reduce the genset runtime so your  generator instead of running for maybe  on some boats and this is quite common  they're running the generators eight  hours a day and after we're done they're  running the generators 2 hours a day I  mean that's an emotional response from  an owner like to hear a generator run  eight hours a day I personally would  leave the generator running all the time  at one point it's just white noise I'm  just giving in I'm like I'm going on a  generator boat but they don't want to  eight hours is just annoying enough  instead of doing four hours in the  morning four hours at night they're  doing an hour in the morning an hour a  night or other owners think I'm only  running the generator  every other day for a couple hours and  you do that by adding more chargers and  if you go with AGM batteries you can do  that alright so here a bunch of things  that you need to worry about when you're  installing a battery bank and because  I'm not going to cover all of them but  at the end of the day we talked about  what's really important you need to have  for sure a leak proof container if  you're gonna have pled to let acid  batteries right that's really important  make sure that that battery box is gonna  stay in place so how are you going to do  that you're gonna put maybe aluminum L  guards around the battery box put a  heavy-duty battery strap make sure the  battery is actually physically gonna  stay there not in the dock when  everything is benign but when you're out  boating and you're in following seas and  all your dishes are flying everywhere  and it's the worst you cannot have a  battery bank that weighs 400 pounds 800  pounds a thousand pounds start moving in  your engine compartment okay they need  to be latched down you want to also make  sure that all leads going to the battery  are fused and we're going to talk about  that that is essential no exceptions  your previous owner  there's no I'm never well never but  almost 99.999% seen a boat from the  factory that is done unsafely just  doesn't happen I don't care what brand  it is there's just too much liability  they're gonna go out of business you do  that at the factory level you get sued  you lose your shirt you're done no  factory is ever building a boat unsafe  what happens is the previous owner has a  time crunch once again it done what's  approved himself that they can do it and  they just are happy like a grew up where  they just tap into the power lines no  circuit breakers no nothing whatever  doesn't matter there's never going to be  an accident and they don't fuse and  you'll often find on a boat that has had  multiple owners where the battery bank  becomes this craziness of unfused wires  that provide the functionality you want  but in the event of a problem like a  seat belt it's going to be useful when  you get in an accident right doesn't  mean you have it and you haven't used it  that it's useless and that's the  important thing we'll talk about fusing  later but fusing is absolutely  so here are some mother battery banks  that we've done that was on actually an  85 footer so we replaced 12 2 volt cells  right so these are those gin Tallis's  you know like the beautiful boats from  the 70s 12 2 volt cells or 6 2 volt  cells I mean and we replace it with a  battery bank we have one on port and  starboard so this is a big boat and then  here's another one that's about another  the most we've done on one boat is 32  now that boat the owner didn't want to  think about power so we're like this is  my type of problem I got this and they  were very happy the book goes on charter  and the Charter is don't want to think  about anything so they're like okay  we'll do it so that's sort of like and  these are a group 31 batteries here's  another example you'll see I'm using  heavy-duty stainless steel straps as a  sailor I'm going I'm going crazy  I'm thinking I want obviously with a  powerboat you can't do that but on a  sailboat I'm like the boat can be  inverted I don't want the batteries to  move because around the battery might be  it through all and if you have 200  pounds of weight 300 400 pounds of  weight that land sideways on your  through haul is your through haul gonna  hold do you want to have a hole in your  boat I don't know if you've ever opened  a through hole in your boat just for the  fun of it and not have a pipe connected  to it and see the rate at which water  comes in through your boat on a half  inch through all it is terrifying like  bilge pumps are not there to save you in  case you have a hole in your boat it's  just for nuisance water right so I'm  always thinking and it's all I was  thinking about safety right like what  happens if and so you can see right here  like I've got aluminum all around the  battery right straps like I want this  thing to be there forever I don't want  them to move so here's a common thing I  do these electrical audits right called  on a boat spent about an hour and a half  with an owner and we go through stuff  and I commonly see on a flooded  lead-acid battery this is  a flooded lead-acid battery I see  electrolyte on top of the battery the  first reaction from the boater is no  that's water my battery's moist it's  sweating I'm like okay sure but why is  the rest of your engine room not  sweating because water does not just  locate this is not a microclimate where  only one part of your engine room sweats  and not the other so if you have lead  acid on top of you or water on top of  your battery that's not water that's  electrolyte down electrolyte will never  evaporate it's sulfuric acid and if you  have a battery box that has a holes in  the bottom it's actually gonna leak  through and then go to whatever is  underneath some sort of plywood that's  in glass right and then sulfuric acid  will eat through the wood it's just this  craziness scenario it's really painful  you want to avoid that so again to recap  if you have a battery box make sure  there's it's a container that's the  purpose of your battery box for flooded  lead-acid batteries here's an owner that  refuses to do battery maintenance  refuses just simply and refuses to buy  the AGM now we see him regularly every  two years so that's fine you know Oh  whatever I can't force him to fill the  batteries with distilled water but this  is a battery cap look at what happens to  the plates they've actually literally  breached they buckled and the plates are  touching and that's called a dead short  now if the battery was full of actually  gas hydrogen gas when that happens as  the plates touch you'll have a short and  that's what causes an explosion right  because you have hydrogen gas in a  container I mean that's sort of what a  bomb is right and so never ever ever  ever that's a black and white ever have  your battery placed exposed if they do  get exposed you're basically in a  downward spiral where you're gonna  constantly gonna have to top off the  batteries are gonna basically heat up  prematurely and so you're in a losing  game you're just you can fight it but  that percentage of battery capacity is  going to effectively be lost and at that  point you might as well just assume take  the blame change the batteries and tell  yourself you won't do it again or go to  the AGM  they have a big point  these are l16 batteries of the tall ones  and I mentioned that make sure the  positive and negatives are at opposite  ends of the battery bank that's  essential so your batteries are evenly  charged and discharged I know it sounds  unimportant but it does make a  difference and I'm gonna affect 59  minutes so we're gonna just take a small  5-minute break take walk or the bathroom  and then we're gonna start on power  generation but before we go any  questions on batteries yes well it  depends on ideally yes especially if  there's on the same charger there are  circumstances where on bigger boats  they'll have a house battery charger and  they'll have an engine battery charger  right they'll have what are called  auxiliaries so like for example I was on  a Meridian 490 and the battery charger  for the engines port starboard and  genset is flooded and the house battery  is on AGM but if you want to make your  life simple you should go to AGM oh you  should yeah question Oh in parallel  circuits yeah it's super rare if it's  really close so that's a good question  ideally yeah you you could almost say  yeah it did yeah you're right  practically I've never seen it  theoretically it might make sense and  might but then you might also have you  know fuses are great in a Star Trek  world where you have a sensor on every  fuse and you have a dash panel on the  bridge and all fuses that are getting  blown get a little mini robot that tells  you it's there and it gets changed but  fuses the more fuses you have the more  fuses you have to inspect right and you  have to ask yourself because if that  fuse blew let's say on in one of your  circuits for whatever reason you'd lose  that battery bank right if it's on a  parallel situation and you have to pour  the whole battery bank or a part of the  battery bank would die so I've never  done it I don't think it's I understand  your situation I think that's such an  exception  I personally would advise it but you do  make sure and that's a good point though  that when your battery bank you're doing  a battery bank if your battery bank is  not in one location and you've got a  battery bank on one side of the boat and  another battery bank on the other side  of the boat and they're actually wired  together the big link between the two  that has to be fused so I worry about  fusing for dead shorts not for the  situation that you're talking about  because realistically anyways when that  gel battery died you were gonna change  all your other gel batteries anyways so  because when a battery dies you can't  just that's why batteries aged together  right thank you you have to you can't  after seven years of having a gel Bank  one battery dies goes oh great I'm just  gonna go change one battery you can do  it but that battery will work so hard to  pull the rest of the old batteries so I  I've never seen it  anything's possible but I've personally  wooden to it yeah yeah go ahead yeah  okay lithium I see I know this girl  lithium has an absolute purpose it does  now first of all you got to be willing  to spend money okay so there's no such  thing as being frugal and going with him  unless you're gonna go offshore and if  you're gonna go offshore then that's  fine because it's probably then it makes  a lot of sense so what is lithium do  lithium does a lot of great things first  of all it has crazy amount of cycles so  people are gonna use their boat like  going offshore or their boating like  four months in the summer every summer  for the next 20 years like we're talking  like 3000 cycles 5,000 cycles at like  20% like going from a hundred to twenty  like that's crazy like it's like think  about how many of us we've counted them  number of hours we use or a boat or  people brag to me like oh I use my boat  30 nights this year well if you have  this year if you have a battery bank  that lasts three thousand cycles your  payback period takes a lot of it's a  it's a family heirloom right now makes  sense  think about like in for example in  Scandinavia they've got ferries that are  going they've actually done these  ferries and lithium  they're actually powered Hydra  electrically by lithium now those boats  are being used every day  they're going back to shore right  they're being cycled constantly now that  payback period makes complete sense so  the first thing you got to ask yourself  is a a Mike do I love my boat rule  number one unless you could be one that  wants to brag but that's pretty rare it  happens but most people generally go  lithium they don't care about bragging  they generally love their boat they need  a lot of power in a small compact  battery bank so if you've got a boat  that has limited space for batteries or  where weight matters tremendously that's  another version right because it would  smaller battery size you have less  weight then lithium is a great choice so  really really good for weight because  it's energy energy density it has so  much energy density now all those things  are good besides the cost because the  cost is not for the weak of heart and  I'm talking like easily ten grand for  like an like a battery this big right us  like it's like I've done battery banks  lithium it's 30 grand so you know then  you got to be in the realm of I'm okay  to spend money and the other challenge  is that it's not a drop replacement  because your charger can be changed to  lithium most of the modern ones are but  your alternator needs to then be  regulated specifically for that battery  bank from the charge profile right you  can't the battery at one point will  communicate and if you overcharge it  depending on the type of battery that  you Bob the lithium battery it might  actually disconnect itself and say  because it can't overcharge and so when  you overcharge if you only have one  positive post on that battery some  battery manufacturers will do a low post  and a charged post but if you only have  one post it might actually you might  lose everything on your boat like the  whole bow goes black because you were  overcharging it from an alternator so it  involves more thoughts like we were  designing we're designing a boat for  another boater in the Middle East small  boat and we're doing lithium but it  makes sense you know what we're doing  everything like it that's easy right  like it's like gel for example  ciara yachts might be naming nice boats  they put gel in their boats makes  complete sense they're building the boat  from scratch everything is size they've  got external regulators the battery  chargers are sized perfectly and when we  work on Tierra we change gel for gel why  it's great battery but it was done with  a holistic view a systems view right so  with lithium you're not just buying a  battery you got to think about the whole  system so we do about a dozen of those a  year yes your battery bank or a buying a  battery yeah a battery monitor is the  way  yeah the monitor and we'll talk about  that later a battery monitor is sort of  a counter it tells you what your daily  consumption is or the other thing is you  leverage other people's experience right  so you know like on your boat I can when  we did your boat with Firefly I got a  sense just by seeing the boat experience  helps it's like golf like if you've  played a lot of golf you'll probably hit  the green you know what you're doing on  the approach I on the other hand playing  golf would I mean I don't know if I'd  hit the ball right so so it's all about  experience does pay if you have none and  you have no idea what it is and this is  the first time if you have a battery  monitor then it's empirical it's not a  question and sometimes with boaters that  don't believe me I'm like okay no  problem let's go this because I'm as an  engineer I'm like I'm not gonna force  you to make a decision why don't you  come to the conclusion that your battery  bank is too small let's start with a  battery monitor let's just measure what  you use every day and let's just see if  you have what you need easy first step  they come in and like let's do this  early in the season so that we can  change your battery back before the  season starts and sure enough I did one  boat this summer another big searay  about the size of yours 55 60 footer and  on that boat the owner didn't want to go  right away with changing batteries it  was let's just use what we have let's  see the ping  sure enough went out for a couple  weekends yeah the pain is there now I  need to spend money and if you need to  spend money it's always  painful but it's less painful than if  you think you don't need to spend the  money and so battery monitor is an  essential way to take the guesswork out  of knowing what you use and knowing when  to start charging and discharging your  batteries so battery monitor is the  empirical way to do it yes go ahead  yeah no problem  it's pretty easy I mean you know there's  no end in perfection right like that's  why I love this field there's no end but  at one point you got a ideally ideally  you'd want to have a perfect charger  that you can set the set points and  that's in an ideal scenario and sure it  is better but not everyone has that  benefit right of being able to dial in  the charge per profile for every battery  if you have a charger that has an AGM  charge profile Firefly batteries want 14  for 4 bulk at 12 volts and they want 13  v 13 for 4 float which is a pretty  common setting so you know in an ideal  that's what you would dial in like if I  can go in and with a laptop or put the  dip switches that's what you want in an  ideal world not everyone has the luxury  of having everything perfect yes go  ahead  regulator yeah so the question should  repeat the questions I've been told in  this room so the question is if I've got  it if I'm gonna switch to Firefly right  and I have an alternator that has an  internal regulator will that alternator  with an interval regulator overcharge my  batteries and that's the brilliant thing  about AGM is if any AGM wants something  and wants a little bit more than what  the alternator can do meaning you'll  never overcharge an AGM battery you  might under charge it a little bit with  your alternator but your alternators  rarely ever gonna bring a battery back  100% because you're not using your  alternator 12 hours a day 24 hours a day  and that's not really the device that  brings your battery back to complete 100  percent so the in short again because  there's a difference between what is  ideal and what is realistic  you can easily retrofit an AGM battery  Firefly or not on a boat that has an  internal regulator and you'll be fine  right it's all about compromises  realistic compromises and so yeah an  internal regulator will do fine  with an AGM battery yes that's right  absolutely it's a really good question  the question is lithium is so thirsty  for capacity for charge rate that it's  never it goes from literally empty let's  say 20% to full at full rate it doesn't  even almost do absorption it goes full  throttle and then suddenly it's like  eating a buffet but then your first bite  is like your last fight you're like  ciaochao ciaochao and then something  goes stop at least the lead acid battery  an AGM Firefly has an absorption so it's  only going to do that in bulk and you're  right we often and that is something for  sure it's it's it but again it's about  compromises in an ideal world you would  have an external regulator on an  alternator and we'll talk about that  later and you would dial it in and you  might put a feel vote like so for  example I just did another boat I think  it's a 50 foot Catalina we're doing that  next week we put a high output  alternator we're gonna talk about and a  external regulator but we're not gonna  use the alternator at full capacity when  I was a kid I never understood like why  does my mom's Honda Accord have 180  kilometers an hour  I'm never gonna drive that speed it's a  you don't want your alternator to be  redlined  meaning you don't want generally your  alternator that works so hard on the top  end of the range right you want to dial  it back so if you have a hundred amp  alternator you want it to work maybe at  60 amps 70 amps so there are ways to  dial it back now if you have an internal  regulator your internal regular is gonna  do that on your alternator anyways if  you have an external regulator you might  over work the batteries if you're not  careful if you have AGM but very few of  us have external regulars and we'll talk  about that later any other questions  before we take a little 5-10 minute  break all right excellent alright see  you in about five minutes  you