[alberg30] Battery storage-drilling holes in liner pan

[Alan P. Kefauver]

My boat has 4 floor panels forward of the engine. The first three are deep the last is shallow. Hull #152. I have put the starter battery closest to the engine and used two large deep cycle cells in parallel with one in each box forward of the starting battery.Two large batteries will not fit in the same box. Additionally, the speed transducer is the second one forward and I wanted to keep the battery away from that. Each battery is strapped down. I drilled 1 " holes with a hole saw and a half inch drill between all three boxes. My 3/8" drill bogged down. The partitions were about one and a quarter inch thick! I have used a West battery combiner between the two banks and connected the alternator output directy to the house bank.  Never have blown diodes. Both banks run to an emergency parallel switch that will allow both circuits to start the engine if necessary, but other than that they are completely separate. The charger (shore side) also feeds the house bank only. When the combiner sees a voltage above a certain level it opens and charges both banks simultaneously. I used 1/0 battery cable for the runs. The automatic bilge pump is also tied directly to the house batteries and separately fused with an emergency cutoff. Both the House and starter circuit have a 100 amp fuse block in the positive battery line. 

For those who are interested, I am using a Blue Sea 13 breaker panel with meters. That and a Blue Sea master switch panel and parallel circuit fit in a a 9.5 inch by 21 inch by 7 inch deep teak box that sits across the top of the engine compartment below the companionway just under the old compass well. I hinged it on the right so it could swing out for maintenance.

I have had to drill a number of holes elsewhere in the boat for new electrical cables. Gosh, these boats are built! Just about everything is twice as thick as it was on my Cal 2-29. Structural integrity is amazing. Have fun, but don't try to drill that hole with a cordless 3/8 drill.

Alan
Andante (almost done) #152
(engine coming back May 8th)
*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********

On 4/25/2000 at 11:58 PM alberg30 wrote:
About a month ago we discussed placement of additional batteries in the A30. I plan to have one starter battery, and two deep cells.I want to place the deep cell batteries in the second well space forward of the engine compartment (thats the big sloped well in the newer A30). I will make a flat spot and the mount the batteries there, then run the cables aft.

My previous setup, had all the batteries in the space just forward of the engine. Three batteries won't fit there now.

Question: Can I drill a hole through the fiberglass liner/pan partition that divides these two wells, in order to run battery cables aft to the engine and electrical panel? Does anyone know, is that partition just fiberglass, or is there any sort of metal grid reinforcement maybe in the liner pan?

Holes will have to be kind of big ( maybe 1") to allow #4 cable or bigger.

Thanks in advance;

Joe #499
"One Less Traveled"

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