Outer Limits 4x4 Board

Asking on behalf of a friend, he has a company leased pardo and wants to run duel batterys for his fridge but they wont let him modify the car and all that BS. so i was just wondering can you use somthing like a ctek unit to charge a battery in a case that could be located in the rear of the car and easly removed???

I had a quick look around but couldnt find if the cteks can be pluged in to the cigeret lighter to work or if they only work on 24v power.

any help or idears would be great

I had a unit that was a plastic case with a gel
cel battery inside, had a Anderson plug, circuit breaker and a couple of
merrit plugs and a charge point that you could plug into the cig lighter or use a 240v charger, could also use the Anderson plug outlet to direct charge and it came with a set of HD aligator clip and cable with an Anderson plug to allow you to usethe unit to jump
start, they had a few sizes and the entire unit was portable, cant remember the name but I got mine at a field day

These thumper kits seem ok. Come with all the gear to wire it up to leave the thumper in the back. You can hide the wiriing and such under carpet and trim and the battery just unclips and comes out. Once he's done with the vehicle you'd just need to pull out the cable and no-one would be the wiser. They're a little pricey but are a completely removable system:

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/75-A-H-Thumper-F ... 553wt_1137

cheers

My mate has one of these, with a gel battery:

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Battery-Power-Bo ... 43a1824770" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

He hooks to power via a 12v socket (in the rear cargo area) and one of these:

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/12V-Jumper-Lead- ... 483af00029" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I know another bloke doing a similar thing, but using a RedArc SBI12 mounted inside the top of the battery box.

Both setups are only to run a fridge (no high load), and both setups work well. Another option would be to run some 6mm twin from the battery to the cargo area, fuse and regulated under the bonnet.

I carry an Ark Powerpack with an Optima Yellow Top battery inside.
I keep it charged through either the built in charger in the lid using 240v at home, or run my solar panel into it when I'm camping.
The Optima can be used as either a starting battery, or can be used as a deep cycle.
I have wired an Anderson plug into the recessed handle in the top, so I can plug it easily into the solar panel, but that would also allow it to be easily charged via a lead with Anderson on the end running from the vehicle itself.
It is very highly portable which means that when campsites are bollarded off to keep the vehicles away from the camping area, you can bring the battery across to the campsite to run fridge or lighting very very easily. The box even came with quick release brackets to mount it in the car and release it easily to move it.
The boxes are sold at BCF stores, the batteries are sold most places that sell batteries.

thanks for all the help

coxy321 wrote:My mate has one of these, with a gel battery:

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Battery-Power-Bo ... 43a1824770" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

He hooks to power via a 12v socket (in the rear cargo area) and one of these:

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/12V-Jumper-Lead- ... 483af00029" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I know another bloke doing a similar thing, but using a RedArc SBI12 mounted inside the top of the battery box.

Both setups are only to run a fridge (no high load), and both setups work well. Another option would be to run some 6mm twin from the battery to the cargo area, fuse and regulated under the bonnet.

does he have any issues with the battery not fully charging from just using the 12v plug

No dramas that i know of, both systems have been in for about two years.

I like the idea of using a quality portable battery pack myself. So much more usable than just a second battery. Decent units aren't cheap though.

I've been thinking about this system as well. My only problem is how to secure the battery in the cabin safely so in the event of an accident I won't end up with a 30kg battery in the back of my head.

Tie-down strap onto a factor anchor point or something?

Mine was in a ute and tied into a liftout drawer set up so no problems with flying batteries but a proper anchor point and even better a cargo barier as well would sort that out in a wagon

parr wrote:Asking on behalf of a friend, he has a company leased pardo and wants to run duel batterys for his fridge but they wont let him modify the car and all that BS. so i was just wondering can you use somthing like a ctek unit to charge a battery in a case that could be located in the rear of the car and easly removed???

I had a quick look around but couldnt find if the cteks can be pluged in to the cigeret lighter to work or if they only work on 24v power.

any help or idears would be great

You could... though charging over time destroys the batteries overall charge level.

The CTeks are very good, but only the $250+ ones are really worth the money (the 2500 or 3000+ versions) as they can revive a dis-charged battery without lowering it's overall charge level. they also have a seprate plug so you can disconnect/connect easy.


it could take a long time to charge up with a CTek battery charger though doing a full 8 stage charge up but if your going Gel cell etc then you have very little choice in chargers anyway, maybe 2-3 brands pushing that you can get from autobarn, using a $50 charger on a gel cell will kill them as they generally only bulk charge and nothing else, I thin Gel cell batteries need a low pulse charge then bulk charge above 13.4 volts or something.

If your after real fast charging getting a standard maintaince-free deep cycle battery and buying truck charger would be the way to go you'll spend an hour or so charging it up ready to go.

For an in-car battery you'll want a maintaince free one, that way you don't get the fumes from the battery filling up the cabin, though if your planning to go camping etc you might get away with it by having the battery outside in a battery box or some cover so it doesn't get wet etc.

The trade off as I learned is that once a maintaince free battery is really stuffed then it's a chuck away item and you'll need a new one, also maintaince free batteries only last 4 to 5 years. you can't save them or use battery saver acid as you could with a maintance battery.