Removing and replacing batteries from boats is an age-old challenge. Batteries are heavy, and they are often housed in small spaces. This combination can make it difficult to handle batteries for DIY boat owners. In this month’s Quick Study, we aim to provide some insights for installing and removing batteries that prove safer and easier for you. These tips are not intended to be universal. Situations vary. Take what you need, and leave the rest.
OEM Straps
Many batteries come from the factory with a strap attached. These straps usually snap in on the sides of the battery. You’ll see the molded-in slots if your boat battery originally came with a handle. The handles are often removed for installation in a boat in order to make more room for cables. Unfortunately, this can make battery removal from a tight space difficult. Know that you can buy such battery handles on the internet via eBay and other sites. Search your battery make and model. You also might be able to get some for free from the battery maker, the battery seller or your boat dealer. Just ask.
Battery Carriers
There are a variety of devices—most often called battery carriers—available from tool stores, auto stores and home centers. These can be used if the handle is missing, or for batteries that have molded-in recesses on the sides for handholds that don’t work well in confined spaces where a two-handed grip on the sides can’t be achieved. Some of these are rigid handles. Others are straps. What these devices have in common is that they grab or hook under a protruding lip or ridge at the top of the battery. When you go to lift, the weight of the battery itself helps provide a good connection to the battery. Be careful that a metal carrier does not touch the battery terminals. Also, do not use any carrier designed to lift the battery by its terminals.
Drop Your Pants
Even if the allotted space is so tight that you can’t fully lift the battery, the ability to partially lift a battery can be combined with a push or a pull, making all the difference in handling batteries aboard boats. This happens to be the situation aboard my own boat. The hatch opening is not big enough to get two arms through at the same time. Furthermore, the batteries sit below the level of the hatch opening. I could “one-arm” the group 24 batteries originally installed. When I repowered with an engine requiring larger batteries, I could no longer apply enough strength to remove the battery with one arm extended inside the hatch. There’s plenty of room in the compartment; it’s just that the hatch opening is tight. Anyway, by tilting the battery forward and looping my pants belt around and under the aft part of the battery, I can use one hand to pull on the other ends of the belt outside the opening while lifting in the opening with the other hand. In this way, I can move the battery to a halfway position in the hatch opening. From there, Robert’s my father’s brother.
Read Next: AGM vs. Lithium Batteries
Relocation
In many cases, as boaters repower with newer engines, more battery power will be required to run the advanced electronics inherent. Sometimes the original location of the batteries in the boat simply might not be big enough—or offer large enough access—to install the appropriate battery for the engine. In these cases, it might be better to move the batteries. If this is the solution you need to employ, be sure to upgrade your battery-cable size. Longer runs means increased resistance, which means you need thicker-diameter cable to achieve the same performance.
