Do I need to exchange my battery?

[Juniah87]

So I went to Wal-mart a few weeks ago to pick up a battery for my 30 pound thrust minn kota trolling motor. This was my first trolling motor, and I had no idea about any battery stuff, so I just went to the person at the auto section by where the batteries are sold, and told him I needed a battery for my trolling motor on my pontoon. This is the one he told me to get, so I bought it. After doing some research online, I found out about deep cycle batteries, and such. The only reviews I could find online were for this battery, but a version that was only 600 and some odd cranking amps. The reviews of people using that battery were very low, and most said the battery would not take a charge after about 1 to 2 years of use, and some even less. Luckily this was a new purchase, and I did keep the receipt, so I need to know if I need to return this and pick up a different type. I'm not even sure if Walmart carries a deep-cycle battery, as I wasn't looking for anything specific when I was there, just going off of the recommendations of someone I thought knew what they were talking about. I included a picture of the battery specs.

[hlindsay]

Short answer, yes. I think you already figured out that you need a deep cycle. A starting battery is not made to be run down and recharged over and over. I am sure some one else can give you greater details on what to look for. In fact I am sure I have read other threads on batteries on this site.

[Amx]

https://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=Aw ... -tab-web-t

https://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=A0 ... -tab-web-t
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why a deep cycle;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_cycle_battery

[G-Man]

It would help to know what the specs on your motor and how long you far you intend to travel on one charge . For small lakes and ponds, if you can swing the cost, I'd go with a smaller sized marine gel battery with a true 50 to 75 amp hour rating. The battery label in your picture shows an amp hour rating that is misleading. The standard rating is for a discharge over 20 hours. For example if a battery has 100 AH, it will discharge 5 amps per hour for total 20 hours. Gel batteries are practically spill proof, don't really need to be kept on a trickle charger when stored and can take being drawn down to near complete discharge without the risk of sulfanatition. The other option I'd look at is a smaller AGM battery. They are quite heavy for their size, but you get a great power to weight ratio and are totally spill proof. And if you have money to burn, go with a Lithium Ion battery as they are lightweight, spill proof and contain built in circuitry to prevent damage due to overcharging, short circuits, heavy load, etc.

[BentRod]

Yes, take it back. G-man provides some great advice. You have some options to choose from, but the cheapest will be a lead wet cell group 24 deep cycle "RV/Marine" battery. Specs will vary. You'll also want a good charger and, if you go with a lead wet cell, learn about % discharge/battery maintenance to prolong the life of your battery.
Read the "12 volt side of life" on the web (parts 1 and 2). Its based more around RVs, but the core concepts are the same.

[spokey9]

Walmart does sell deep cycles but they aren't the greatest from my experience. Be sure to keep your battery on a trickle charger unless you go with a gel, agm, or lith model. I learned that the hard way lol

[Juniah87]

The motor is a rear mount 30 pound thrust minn kota, and is my primary source of propulsion on my single-man pontoon. I do not have money to burn, I'm on disability and saving for college, my monthly budget is less then some of the batteries I've seen for sale on the market, lol. No point in buying a killer battery if I can't afford to put gas in my truck to go anywhere afterwards. I wouldn't be shopping for batteries at walmart if money weren't an issue, haha. Smaller won't really work for me, as the primary propulsion source, I'll be using this thing for several hours at a time, depending on whether I am trolling or not. I'm just looking for something cheap, easy to maintain, that will keep my motor working. It never seemed this complicated when we were getting batteries for our trolling motor back in the late 90's and early 2000's.

It looks like my battery would have been fine if it were the deep cycle instead of the starter battery, so instead of the 24MS I should be looking for just a normal 24 group size that states it's a deepcell, and the highest amp hours I can find for the cheapest price.

[spokey9]

Call budget battery. I think I got my last deep cycle there for under $70. It seemed like a decent battery til my cousin unplugged the trickle charger to charge his phone in my garage without telling me.

[hewesfisher]

Cranking amps is a useless spec for an electric trolling motor, what you need to pay attention to is reserve capacity stated as RC. As stated above, the amp hour rating on your Wal-Mart battery is very misleading. G-Man gave the amp hour rating that is more meaningful, but even then, you need to know your amp draw to compute usable capacity. For your application reserve capacity is most meaningful.

Reserve capacity (RC) is how long a battery will continually discharge 25amps @ 80° before voltage drops to 10.5v. That's a meaningful number if you know what your continuous discharge rate is. A 30lb thrust Minn Kota Endura will draw 30amps at full thrust.

For sake of discussion, let's say your trolling motor pulls 25amps at full thrust and your battery has an RC of 100, theoretically speaking, it should last 4hrs @ 80°. In reality, it will probably be something less, like 3 - 3.5hrs depending on water current, wind, waves, weight in pontoon, etc. Will the motor produce the same amount of thrust at say, 11v, as 12v? Of course not, it's designed to produce peak thrust with a fully charged battery.

Since you have a lightweight pontoon, and need to be conscious of weight, you'll need to compromise battery capacity vs weight unless you want to buy high dollar lithium batteries. Decide what max weight you can comfortably add to your pontoon, choose a battery that provides the highest RC at that weight, then choose the battery with longest warranty for the price you can afford.

Don't get caught up in terminology. You'll see and hear terms like, RV/Marine, deep cycle, dual-purpose, and more. Either select a true deep cycle, which you probably won't find at Wal-Mart or other similar outlets, or choose a dual-purpose battery which is the next best option and combines the attributes of start AND deep cycle batteries. Most RV/Marine batteries are dual-purpose and usually, but not always, can be identified by a threaded and standard battery post.

Need to clarify a few things. Gel batteries are a unique chemistry and not the same as absorbed glass mat (AGM) though many people do confuse the two (not saying G-Man is). True gel batteries typically require a different charge profile than AGM which readily accept the same profile as any lead acid wet cell because the AGM is a lead acid battery. Gel and AGM batteries use sealed, valve regulated cases. Some battery manufacturers are now using those same cases for wet cells.

Gel and AGM options will probably not be an economical choice for you. I have a pair of Centennial DC24MF for my 75lb 24v trolling motor bank - $108 per battery. They are traditional wet cell batteries in a sealed, valve regulated case - cannot leak and cannot add water. RC is 140mins per battery, combined that's 280mins and I can run my 75lb thrust bow mount all weekend without recharging.

[Juniah87]

Will something like this work? https://www.batteriesplus.com/battery/m ... m/sli24mdc

Listed as 75 AH, no RC listed unfortunately, from what I can see. One concern is that under the "Specifications" tab it states "Product Sub Category: Starting Lighting And Ignition." It does state that it is a deep cycle battery, and has both threaded and non-threaded terminals. I'm assuming this is one of the dual-purpose batteries, but cannot tell by any of the specifications that are given. I sure wish these people co uld just tell you what you are getting instead of trying to convince you to buy something.

[Sideburns]

Your right, batteries were less complicated 20 years ago. 95% of our big retail chains sell chinese made (exide and JCI) batteries that are pure junk. I think they might even be half hollow inside! There is just about no way for an inexperienced battery buyer to win. You've been given a lot of good info, but I'm sure your head is spinning!

The battery you linked to looks like junk, but the specs sound ok.... I wish I had something used to give you to hold you over until you can get something worthwhile. The budget battery idea could work out, but some of their batteries dont have much life left in them, sometimes they are golden.

The 100 dollar Centennial battery hewesfisher uses would be a good value, at half the price of a decent small agm. The other similar quality, good value brand to look for is Deka (east penn). I have a tiny 2007 deka motorcycle agm battery Ive been abusing since 2007, for trolling, starting cars etc...

Good luck

[hewesfisher]

Will something like this work? https://www.batteriesplus.com/battery/m ... m/sli24mdc

Listed as 75 AH, no RC listed unfortunately, from what I can see. One concern is that under the "Specifications" tab it states "Product Sub Category: Starting Lighting And Ignition." It does state that it is a deep cycle battery, and has both threaded and non-threaded terminals. I'm assuming this is one of the dual-purpose batteries, but cannot tell by any of the specifications that are given. I sure wish these people co uld just tell you what you are getting instead of trying to convince you to buy something.

One of my pet peeves with Batteries Plus descriptions, they do not include RC. The battery you are looking at is a Marine Deep Cycle, which, in a marine application, is also used for starting, lights, ignition, hence the SLI category. I'm not particularly fond of the Duracell brand, though some are decent. This battery has good reviews so for $90 I suppose it would be ok. If you don't have problems with it during warranty period you will have gotten your money's worth.

[Juniah87]

I think I'd rather have it go bad just before the warranty, so I could get a new one for free xD

[Juniah87]

Alright, so i went to return this battery at Walmart. They tried telling me I couldn't return it because I had used it. I told them to bring a manager over, and told him one of their associates was the reason I bought this battery, and I wasn't going to pay for someone else's ****-up. Long story short, I had them exchange it for a 24DC group battery. Looking up the specs of my trolling motor, and the specs of this battery, I'm again wondering if I need to just take this new unused battery back, and get a full refund, or exchange it for their 27DC models. This one has 690 MCA, and it says on the label it has 101 AH at 1 amp. My minn kota draws 30 amps at max setting, and between 9 and 14 amps at the midrange, trolling speed range. Does this mean this battery is only going to last me 7 minutes of runtime? I saw on another forum that this battery will last a lot longer (They had the amps for the motor wrong, but recalculating the numbers based on a ratio comparison to what they thought the amps were, and what they really were, I figured they thought the battery would last 2.6 hours, which would be plenty for me) Here are the specs for the trolling motor that I found, this is info obtained from minn kota manufacturer on the C2 Endura 30 pound thrust trolling motor.

SPEED AMPS THRUST

1 8 4

2 10 6

3 14 10

4 20 15

5 30 30

So basically I took the 101 amp hours @ 1 amp and divided it by the number of amps in each setting, but I'm thinking that isn't right, because there is no way a battery this bulky is only going to run my electric trolling motoe for just over 3 minutes at max speed... if that's the case I'm going to return this battery for sure. Luckily this one isn't used yet, so I should just be able to get a cash refund if needed.

Oh, and this battery has a reserve capacity of 65. I don't even really know what that means, but it was listed on the specs of the battery online.

Went back through the thread, so it looks like the Minn Kota draws 30 amps, and the RC rating of the battery is 65, so I should expect it to last just a hair over 2 hours at full thrust? If so, that may actually be OK for me...

[Sideburns]

ah ratings plummet the higher the the load, so the full power time will be much lower, maybe even by 50%. but you've got the general idea.... The lower power settings should be closer mathematically though.

[Juniah87]

So in theory the 101 AH rating at 1 Amp pull would estimate the runtime of a 30 amp trolling motor to be around 3 hours and 11 minutes when running at full capacity, the RC rating of 65 would suggest around 2 hours and 10 minutes, so I am guessing I should assume it would work for around 2 hours if running on the highest setting, and around 3 on the fourth setting, and close to 4.5 hours at the third setting? (30, 20, and 14 amp pull respectively)?

[Juniah87]

And now the next question, what charger should I get? I'm assuming any 2-5 amp charger with an auto-off would be fine?

[Amx]

No.

Get a 10 amp charger designed for the TYPE of battery you end up with, gel, wet, lithium, or whatever.

[Juniah87]

This look ok? https://www.amazon.com/Shumacher-SE-40M ... ry+charger

Fully automatic sounds better...: https://www.amazon.com/Automatic-Deep-C ... ry+charger

[Amx]

Either one will work.

Shumacher is a good name brand. And that one is also fully automatic.

Two switches for versatility of uses and full automatic charging

Banchee I've not heard of, but looks interesting.

But I'd go with the Shumacher.