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"Robert Hayes Jr." <rhayesjr@carolina.rr.com> wrote:
> Also considering some additional lights, but not sure if I need to
> go with 24 volt stuff, or tap straight into one of the batteries.
You do NOT want to tap 12V off the bottom battery... that WILL cause
the top battery to fail quickly.
Using power from just the bottom battery (especially with the high
currents required by lighting equipment) will cause the bottom battery
to discharge much more than the top battery. This will cause the top
battery to become over-charged, and begin boiling off electrolyte.
Eventually, it will fail.
You can only successfully pull the tap-off-the-lower-battery trick in
vehicles like the CUCV, which have a separate, independent 12V
alternator for each battery. Most MVs (including the HMMWV) have
single 24V alternators, which charge both batteries in series.
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Jun 01 2000 - 22:37:11 PDT