Its Time To Check Out Your Caravan Battery
As people know who are regular caravaner’s will know most up
to date modern caravans are equipped with three sources of power, these are
gas, the 12volt battery and the mains electricity that can be found on either
at home or on the touring caravan sites.
If the caravan owner runs out of gas or the mains
electricity are not available, then they have will have their 12volt battery to
fall back on. This will power the caravan lights, and water pump along with
your other 12volt appliances, obviously providing that your leisure battery is
in tip top condition and has been looked
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| This caravan will be fitted with the larger 110 amp leisure battery |
Caravan owners will realise that they have actually got at
least two 12volt batteries, they have a car battery and the one that they use
on the caravan (some have more than one). The car battery is different to the
leisure battery that you will have fitted in the caravan, as it is primarily
used to start the car using CCA (cold cranking amps) and because of this the
car battery has different plates inside the battery. These plates are
perforated to give a larger surface area, which gives the battery more power
when starting your car.
The caravan battery is supplied with thicker plates for more
power storage;
this storage can be
used at a later time, say in the evening to power the 12volt electrical items,
such as the TV or radio. Although it is generally recommended not to use the
leisure battery for starting your car, we know of late that people with 4x4
vehicles have started to us the 110 amp leisure battery as a starter battery and
a winch operator and they say that they work fine. You learn every day as they
say.
In the past five or six years a new breed of leisure battery
has come onto the market and has been heavily publicised at the large caravan
and touring vehicle shows, up and down the UK. These batteries come in the
trade names of Numax and Lucas are developed by the giant battery company
Johnson Controls of America. These batteries have now stood the length of time
that to me proves there worth and in my opinion I think that they are an
excellent product and should be considered if you require a new leisure battery
for you caravan. These batteries come in different sizes to suite your caravan’s
capacity requirements, and have replaced the more expensive AGM batteries.
The AGM batteries though are coming back in fashion because
of the increasing use of caravan owners using solar panels to re-charge their
batteries and this enables them to go to more places that may not require the
electric mains to charge up their batteries. The AGM battery has a far larger
capacity to charge and dis-charge and is indeed known as a Deep Cycle battery
and is more suitable for the use with solar power panels. These batteries are
old technology and are made by many different battery companies, a popular one
is the 70amp battery, and anything above this is a very heavy battery to move
around. The weight of the battery should be taken into consideration, when
buying your new battery as some are as much as 30 kg in weight.
The size and weight of the caravan battery are very important
This is due to the fact that most modern caravans have
integral lockers and this may restrict the size of the battery that you can fit.
The size of the locker would also depend of the size and make of your caravan,
but it is still worth checking your size restrictions before you buy your new
battery. The older caravans would put
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| Smaller rigs like this vintage VW will usean 85 amp caravan battery |
You will usually find that most caravans come with an 85 amp
leisure battery. In my opinion this battery is adequate for the regular
caravaner that goes away for long weekends and a couple of weeks holiday a year
and the weight of this battery is easy manageable, if you have an awkward place
for the battery to fit. If you have one of the larger caravans and have more
electrical gadgets then you should go for the 100 amp leisure battery or the
110 amp leisure battery, bearing in mind that these batteries are heavy to
lift.
Here are some examples of the power that some of the common
equipment will use.
An average fluorescent light tube 0.75 amps current for 5 hours uses 3.75 amps per hour
An average colour
TV 3.00 amps current for 2 hours uses 3.00 amps per hour
Two reading lamps (his and hers) 2.00
amps current for 2 hours uses 3.00 amps per hour
Water pump 7.00
amps current for 0.25 hours uses 1.75
amps per hour
These figures are just a guide and may slightly differ from
one caravan to another. For more information …http://www.campingandcaravanningclub.co.uk/helpandadvice/technicalhelp/power/your-leisure-battery/
Eric Roberts
Hi I would like to introduce myself. I have worked in the
Garage and tyre and I am MD for online battery companywww.batteriesontheweb.co.uk. I have worked for a couple for national tyre
companies in my younger days, before starting my first business. I now own a
garage and MOT testing centre, here in the UK called Pellon Tyre and
Auto-centre, and I am a keen blogger about anything to do with cars and their
related products that will help my business. We are members of Point-S and
Motor-Codes and are also a Unipart Car Care Centre and of course Tyre-safe.
