FreedomYachts.org

I'm about to purchase a 1987 Freedom 30.

The boat currently has one size 27 starting battery and one size 31 house battery.

I think a bigger house battery bank is desirable.

Has anyone installed additional batteries in their F-30?

If so, how large a house bank did you install, how many batteries, and where did you locate them?

Thanks

rvivian

Hi,

I originally had two Lead Acid batteries on start and one house. Start was about 50 AH and house was 70. I found myself constantly monitoring SOC and was pretty restricted in term of power use when on a 10 day cruise. If I was on the hook for a day I was engine charging. Batteries were located under the chart table cabinet pretty much standard issue Freedom 30. I wanted to keep this layout when I did an upgrade in 2007 so I tried to find batteries that would maximize my capacity but still fit in the relatively limited space. I wound up selecting 3 110 AH Lifeline AGMs. One for start and two for house. I took the opportunity to upgrade the master switch to an isolation type master which completely isolates house from start unless one overtly decides to connect the two for emergency start or emergency house as the case may be. I also installed a battery charge monitor and an upgraded Balmar alternator.

This has been a terrific upgrade. I've been happy with the battery performance and my ability to easily monitor SOC and discharge rates. I also feel more comfortable that I can't screw up the master switch and discharge my start unless I really really try.

There are downsides to everything:

An additional 120 lbs of weight - which requires attention to tie downs and reinforcement of the cabinetry - God forbid these beasts got away from you in bad weather
A lot more wiring for temperature monitoring, discharge monitoring, etc.
And, perhaps most importantly, attention to Lifeline's statement that their AGMs must be fully recharged whenever recharging is accomplished. This was not called out as a requirement when I originally bought the batteries in 2007. I used them for two years before this statement showed up on their web site. Of course I did not follow this charging regimen until it showed up so who knows if I've damaged the batteries in some way. I would typically charge for whatever duration the engine was on so we'll see if performance is impacted in the long run. For now I'm pretty happy.

I have a lot more information on what I did and the parts I used. If you would like to PM me I can get you some pics and more details on components. I can tell you it all fit nicely in the space available and cost about $1500.00 for parts and materials in 2007 from JackRabbit Marine which is now, sadly, defunct.

Here are the photos of my Freedom 30 set up. Sorry, they are not on the site here, I didn't have time to edit the pic size. Let me know if any probs seeing them.

Mike

http://picasaweb.google.com/wmcunningha ... icalSetUp#

Like Mike I also upgraded my F30 with 3 batteries, in my case 2 105AH Lifeline AGM batteries for the house and an Exide spiral wound AGM for starting. Put in probably the same battery select switch (only parallelling house and starting circuits in emergencies), and a relay that connects the batteries when voltage is over 13.5, i.e. when charging. I also upgraded to a Balmar alternator (100A) but not so sure that was necessary since I installed a 130 A solar panel with a Blue Sky controller and battery monitor. This does a great job of keeping my batteries topped up. The big load on the system is the refrigerator (Frigoboat with keel cooler), but even when using it the batteries only discharge to about 90 % overnight and it usually takes only 2 hours of sun to get them back to full charge. So I don't need to run the engine to charge (I am in the Bahamas).
I shopped around quite a lot, got the solar panels from one place, the batteries another, and a Truecharge 20+ shore power charger from Jack Rabbit (this was 2 years ago, didn't know they were now defunct). You need to have a sophisticated charger since you don't want to fry the AGM batteries.
Am very happy with my system. I also replaced the DC panel with one from Blue Sea with more circuits and digital readout.
Paul