Battery Wiring Question

[buickanddeere]

How many people here have said it's poor practice and looking for trouble? To take three identical 12V batteries, connect two in parallel and one in series to obtain 24V .
Once again on behalf of several other electrical knowledgeable persons who have willing contributed their time and expertise for free to help you. At the very least prevent short service life of the single 12V battery. And sooner or later prevent a battery explosion in the lone 12V battery.
Would you please tell us why you insist on three 12V batteries on a 24V system?

 

[rutwad]

I have missed so many replies. For some reason my gmail directed the notifications to spam. Let me surmise.

My confusion stemmed from the fact that I knew it had 3 12 volt batteries for years and upon hooking them up my father told me it was a 24 volt system. I went to the internet to see if it was in fact suppose to be 24 volts which I found it was. Then I was able to get 24 volts from 3 batteries, but I never thought it seemed right to have 3 batteries. Then I checked the voltage from the charger leads not hooked to the batteries and it showed 35v. That left me confused again thinking (in error) it was a 36 v charger. Then I asked a friend that deals with batteries much more than me about the 3 12volt batteries for only 24 volts and he sent me a text message with a picture I will try to attach. Then my dad showed me his diagram he drew when he disconnected the batteries, another picture I will try to load. He said there was nothing showing the wiring in the paperwork he got with the lift. Only recently did I find a diagram.

So I will just use 2 of the batteries now. I just went to take pictures and read the voltage. It varied to start and went up to 31 but settled at 26v.

Thank you for all the responses!! I wish I would have been following along.


Note-- I no longer have picture friend sent me but it was a diagram of 3 12v batteries and a 24v trolling motor. If I remember correctly, I believe it was linked to Cabela's. Not sure.

 

[rutwad]

I don't insist at all. I was actually puzzled by the 3 12v batteries and that is why I came here for answers.

How many people here have said it's poor practice and looking for trouble? To take three identical 12V batteries, connect two in parallel and one in series to obtain 24V .
Once again on behalf of several other electrical knowledgeable persons who have willing contributed their time and expertise for free to help you. At the very least prevent short service life of the single 12V battery. And sooner or later prevent a battery explosion in the lone 12V battery.
Would you please tell us why you insist on three 12V batteries on a 24V system?

 

[TomSeller]

Well that answers the question on how they were wired. Take the one on the left out of the circuit and you are good to go.

 

[Xfaxman]

Too bad you didn't ask here first.

They would last longer if they were deep cycle or marine batteries and 4, 6 volt give the longest run time between charging, but I get the feeling it isn't in commercial service anyway, so 2, 12's will work OK.

 

[Aquamoose]

Connecting two battery banks of different amp-hour capacity together in series is a bad idea. The problem is that the battery charging controls will operate based on the average battery voltage and the two seperate batteries (the two in series is effectively one battery in the eyes of the charger) will have very different voltages because their capacities are different. The single battery will become fully charged long before the serial (two) battery. The combined voltage will rise, but by the time the controller turns off the charging sources, the single battery will be overcharged. Meanwhile, the serial battery bank will not get fully charged. When the bank is being discharged, the single battery will go flat and its voltage will fall well before the serial (two) battery. The inverter will eventually cut out but not before the single battery is excessively drained.

In a nutshell, charging parallel batteries of different capacities is no problem. Charging serial batteries absolutely requires the batteries to have the same capacity. While the OP may not have any issues, what's not seen is the fact that the setup has a short life expectancy which requires earlier servicing.

 

[skyhook]

Your bottom diagram shows 4 batteries. 2 connected in series for 24 volts and "another" 2 connected in series for 24 volts, these "2" sets are then connected in parallel for a total of 24 volts coming from "4" batteries. If you were to turn the batteries around "length wise" it looks like you could get 4 batteries in there ==. So actually, you have one battery to few, not too many.:confused2: