Battery Charger Recommendations?

[thataway]

See my post about a "Tale of two fans".
The Group 31's are physcially larger and considerably more capacity than a group 27.

The Gel battery is extremely sensitive to voltage over 14.0 volts. I had an 8 D gel cell on an RV--I used it only for ham radio and a back up for the golf cart house batteries/start battery. I only charged it from the inverter, on the gel setting. I sold the RV with the caviat that the Gel cell never be charged from the main engine alternator--less than one week later the buyer called saying that the gel cell was no good. Yep, he had switched it on to charge from the alternator for about 3 hours--end of gel cell. The major advantage of Gel Cell is low self discharge--but the AGM is also low self discharge. If the boat is stored remotely, buy a small solar pannel for trickle charge.

Batteries and lights? LED's are the answer. We have several portable white LCD clusters we use specifically for reading. Basically we don't use a lot of lights on the C Dory (or on any boats)--if so we use Alpine glow lights (super effecient). Don't use red lights unless you have some specific use for them. We don't normally run red lights at night, even on ocean passages. We have a couple of very dim red flashlights and one red chart light used only when necessary. Last Sunday night we ran for 3 hours on the ICW, and up Perdido Bay--not the use of one red light--just not necessary.

Chain. For small boats, only a small amount of 1/4" or 3/16" HT chain is necessary. Even for larger boats HT chain makes sense. I don't have any more chain with a windlass than the depth of the water in which I will be anchoring (exception is world cruising boats). For a 22 C Dory, without a windlass, only a few feet of chain is necessary.

We didn't use refigeration on the 22. We have a freezer/refigerator chest type on the TC 255. Most of the food is kept in coolers--but entrees for longer trips will be in the freezer. Ice is cheap--refigeration and generation and storage of electricy is expensive. Many of the small refigerators are too small for practical use anyway, so you end up with coolers and ice. Again--size the appliances to the boat--bigger boat more appliances, smaller boat less appliances and simpler. Makes life much better!

[TyBoo]

Mike -

I was going to stay out of this one, but there are just too many things in your last posts that I can relate to. Like budgets being spent, needing more light as time goes on, and wanting more stuff on the boat. Sounds just like home.

As for the battery system, well, I guess I am a simpleton because I could never understand the need for all the sophistication on a trailerable boat. I have two Costco marine dual-purpose batteries (about $50 bucks each), a WM 50 amp combiner with VSR (about $30 on sale), analog voltmeters (about $15 each) and an RV style charger that was on board when I got the boat. I never have a problem with it and I never worry about it. The VSR combiner has a switch to turn it off, force it on, or run it in auto. The windlass is hooked to the starting battery, and everything else inside is on the house batt. I always start the motor and disable the combiner when I use the windlass so the electronics don't take a hit, but beyond that I never worry. And if the house batt is below 12.5v, I run the motor when starting the Wallas but turn it off after the stove ignites. No worries. Nor do I fret about the house battery voltage dropping below the recommended level - in fact I have my Garmin low-voltage alarm set for 11.8v and never worry about it until it beeps. The refrigerator and everything else I leave on when on board with the motor shut off will run all night and half the morning without draining the battery to the beeping Garmin point. It and all the other expensive stuff inside is OK down to 10v, so I never worry about it. The VSR combiner will protect the starting battery from draining, and even if it did I can always get the motor started. The kicker will bring the main battery up high enough to start the big motor in about ten minutes if I had to, but I never have. I replace the batteries after two years, and can even get 1/3 off the price by trading in the old batteries (3 yr. warranty and no questions from Costco). I have less money in my whole battery system than one of those Link10 gizmos costs (excepting the charger - but it came with the boat). And I never have a problem. Furthermore - I even use a low-tech inverter to run the TV and DVD, and the kids have it on most of the time. Never a problem. The only thing I am hurting with this is the batteries, and they are still strong when they are replaced after two years of their three year life.

[oldgrowth]

Mike – I tend to agree with you. The C-Dory is a basic and simple boat. I believe when items are added to my boat, I do not want to complicate the task by trying to get the last 10% out of its usage by spending three to four times the money I would spend to get the first 90%. It just does not seem like a good return on my dollar.

[Sneaks]

Hey Mike, good thinking for a guy who is so low tech he keeps horses --- ostensibly for his grandkids, but Dodge Ram owners do need occasional backup protection ....

I had AGM batteries installed, ONLY because I hate battery acid. When it came to chargers I figgered the Bass Boat trolling motor guys were smarter than me about small boat chargers, so I picked up a Minn-Kota three stage two bank charger for under $100 bucks. Frankly, because of the length of time AGM's hold their charge when not in use and the bigger alternator on my Yamaha outboard, the charger's only been used twice in two years, other than the times I chose to run all my electronics while testing things in the driveway. When the AGM's go, I'll prolly switch back to flooded - only because I discovered the nice clean easy to use auto-fill system they sell for RV's.

[mikeporterinmd]

Long rambling post warning:

[thataway]

In the middle of the night I was thinking about this thread--and agree 100% with TyBoo. I think that you are trying to make the 22 too complex a boat. Don't spend a lot of $$ on a fancy charger--for Dtol with a C Ranger 25--the Xantrex XC series makes a lot of sense. But with your anchoring out--it doesn't. How are you going to charge the batteries when anchored? Only option is some generator--and that is going to cost a bundle--and the noise and fumes which no one likes. The power factor of the XC series may require the larger Honda 2000 (I don't know what the requirement is--so you need to check on that). With our little group 24's on the C Dory 22 we would go 10 days to 2 weeks with no other charging than the outboard as we went from place to place--and some times we would stay at the same anchorage for several days. I did carry a U1 battery (garden tractor) which would start the engine if the others were run all of the way down--and had a small portable digital volt meter to occasionally check the battery voltage. Where would you put a battery in the bow of a 22---especially if you have 100 feet of chain? I think that our 22 had a windlass (appeared to be a bolt pattern which had been filled)--and it was taken off. We never saw a need for one. (Plus you never should try and pull the boat to the anchor with a windlass--use the engine, and the windlass to take up the slack).

I guess one of the negitives of down sizing is that we are used to some of the things we had in larger boats--but I look at it as having less systems to go wrong.

[mikeporterinmd]

Well, for one thing, the chain is leaving - well except for 6-8 feet. Unless we keep it for
ballast. I haven't checked the anchor locker extensively, but it seems relatively
large. I wouldn't put a grp 24 up there, though.

Will I put a windlass on? I don't know. Probably depends on if my wife gets
tired of pulling up the anchor. I doubt I will ever want to install one. Generator?
Really unlikely. I do have a small 1200 watt generator, but I can't imagine I'd put
it on the boat. Small 400watt inverter - definately. Need it to run the
blender. Of course I'll have a small DVM on board.

Fridge - I don't know. Check out the new Coleman cooler that uses a Sterling Cycle
engine. Appears to be new since there are almost no customer reviews I could
find. One downside is that the cooler is supposed to sit level. Is a boat on plane
level enough? Anyhow, if there is interest in discussing it, we could start a new
topic.

Fans: we have this little white fan with big blades and no cover. It was relatively
expensive, but we've had it for years, and it stores really small. Works well.

As for big bucks...well, the XC3012 was $345, I think. Its front can be remoted
and it comes with one temp sensor. So, unless you want to use one of the
really inexpensive chargers, it's not too pricey. It costs about $45 more than the
Xantrex 20+ with remote and temp sensor.

I want the remote display because: a) I want the the remote display
b) I want to mount the charger in some really out of the way location where it will be
hard to see. Perhaps up next to the Wallas, if there is room and not too much heat
from the Wallas. In other words, I want to use some piece of dead space that I
wouldn't normally be able to use for storage. Note that I went with the XC3012,
not the XC5012, which is much more expensive (30 amp vs. 50 amp). I would
have bought an XC2012, but there is no such thing.

Bob, thanks for thinking about this in the middle of the night

Mike

[mikeporterinmd]

[Dora~Jean]

One comment on the windlass. I'm on boat #15, 7 sail, 8 power, all trailerable. Never had a windlass on any previous, always wanted to pull up the anchor by hand, seemed more 'nautical' or personal to just do it that way. That is until this boat. I used the same anchor I had on my last sailboat, a Delta 22 lb with 18 lbs of chain (28'), had no trouble pulling it up and letting it down for 6 years, and during the Bahamas trip, oftentimes multiple times each day.

After about 6 months of ownership on my CD25, the wind and waves came up while at anchor, we decided to move (about 15-20 kts of wind). I sent my son and daughter (14 and 20) up forward to retrieve the anchor while I moved the boat forward to take up the slack while keeping it pointed into the wind. Bad situation, C-Dorys have a great tendency to NOT want to track into the wind, especially moving less than 0.5 kts. Everytime the bow would fall off the wind my son had to quickly cinch up the anchor rode on the forward cleat and wait for the boat to swing back into the wind. This was a very dangerous situation for fingers, arms, everything. The windlass was purchased that next week.

This experience taught me that some boats are just better to have a windlass. I know the forces are greater on my 25 than say a 22, but the windage situation is about the same. I smile everytime I use my windlass.

[thataway]

I am all in favor of windlasses in larger boats--and I suspect that my back problems come from pulling anchors in 25 thru 45 foot racing sailboats by hand. When we started cruising full time--we found a windlass was an essential--with a good set up, if the anchor didn't seem just right, or the boat wasn't in the best location--just up and move. I remember one night off Costa Rica we moved three times during the night as the wind shifted to get the best protection--not a bid deal with a good windlass. Mike, it sounds like your experience was the minority--or that for some reason you got a bad unit. If the factory supplied unit I have goes South, I'll buy a better one--but so far it seems to be working well.

[mikeporterinmd]

Oh absolutely. I'm sure windlass's in general work well. Whoever made the unit
I ripped out was so embarassed with their effort, there was no manufacturor's
label. Or perhaps it fell off. Anyhow, it did not look like anything sold today.

Mike