Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

I have an extra "automatic" 12 volt charger I want to install on my Party Hut. I have a 3 position pergo switch (Off/bat 1/Combine). Where is the best place to wire the charger into,,, and do I have to turn the switch to "comb" to get all three batteries charged ( I have one starter battery on one circuit and two accessory batteries on the other). THanks

You'll want to mount it as close to the batteries, that is if you have the room.

Google "how to wire a 3 way switch" and you'll get lots of hits.
Best of luck.

Thanks for the quick reply,,,,,will have a look

Seon wrote:You'll want to mount it as close to the batteries, that is if you have the room.

Google "how to wire a 3 way switch" and you'll get lots of hits.
Best of luck.

oooooo-man,,,, I did a search,,clicked on images and my brain just started bleeding ,,, OMG I was hoping for a " just tape the wire on ,,,bla bla bla" sort of fix. I'm not much on e-letrisity,,,, . but thanks for the help, and I will give it more effort LOL

You have to be careful in that situation. The charger may not have the amperage to charge all 3. To do it safely, you really need a 3 battery charger (it will have leads for each battery).

Keep in mind, there are thermo-couplers on the battery leads (you will not really see them, they are embedded in the cable) . If it sees excess heat it will shut the charger down preventing a fire. So don't cut the ends off that go to the batteries and splice onto them.

I love re-purposing things and rigging things up with wiring and electronics, but this is one situation that I spent the extra money and got the correct charger for the application.

You could use the charger that you have on the starting battery. Then buy a 2 battery charger for the house batteries. Keep the perko switch OFF when charging.

You guys got me thinking here,,,, maybe not a good time to Jerri-rig and get the right set-up. Thanks, better safe than sorry !!!

So ya got me thinking ,,,
I should look at a three bank programmable charger cuz I have two deep cycle and one starter battery. The manf.'s all talk about how important it is to separate each battery for several reasons,,,, type, amount of discharge, bla bla bla,,,,
Then it hit me,,,,
When then engine is running, and the alternator is charging, it does none of those fancy things the 200 dollar chargers claim is so important to do !! It does not know the type of battery or how far down it is or when it reaches full capacity,,, so WTF do I need to worry about it at home when charging???
School me please !!

i am by no means an expert but my understanding is that unless all the batteries are identical and the same age, etc., that they won't be maintained properly as a single battery charger will see the 3 batteries as one great big battery. a good multi bank charger will maintain them separately. you are correct that the alternator doesn't know the difference in batteries, but i think thats different as you are talking about full charging for relatively brief periods vs. long term maintenance on batteries. imho, the best way to charge you batteries would be to have a bank for each battery and then make sure and isolate each battery when off and charging. i had to add an extra switch to my ACR system to permanently isolate the batteries. i only have 2 and each bank is wired directly to each of the 2 batteries. i turn the master switch to off and hit my isolator kill switch and then turn on the charger. i agree, getting the wiring right is a daunting task. i spent lots of time and posted lots of diagrams before i wired up my system. it was a pain, but it is one of those jobs that if you do it right, you won't have to touch it again for a long time.

Good post,,, I see what your saying as far as at home on the long term verses the time on the lake under power. If I'm gonna maximize the battery life I should optimize the maintenance,,, thanks again,,