[shep]

Century have a 100amp deep cycle battery that is also over 800cca. It is a marine battery. 2 year warrenty.

The second battery in my jimny is a din53 size battery and is 600cca and 60amp deep cycle. It runs my 9500lb winch fine, have recovered heavy twin cabs without issue

[shep]

The one in my jimny is a exide with 48 months warrenty and cost $100

[got_bar_work]

Are they sealed or wet cells

[shep]

Maintance free wet cell.

[ZUZUKI]

Lots of batteries are marked with CCA (Cold Cranking Amps) A/h (Amp hours, at the 20 hour rate) & RC (Reserve Capacity).
The 2 we are most interested in is CCA for starting & A/h for deep cycling.
Just because they list these ratings, doesn't mean they are designed or 'happy' to be used in the alternative manner to what their main task is.
fordem has the goods again, about 5 post earlier.

Wet cell batt. designed for cranking has many thin plates = large surface area, able to provide high CCA. Hates being deep cycled, will have a shorter life when discharged to 10.5Volts often.

Wet cell for designed for deep cycling, has fewer, thicker plates & higher lead content. Can safely provide CCA, but not as high a rating or efficient at doing so, compared to a cranking batt. Is not really 'happy' to be discharged to 10.5Volts, but will cope with it & give an acceptable service life.

This is why you see cranking batteries with up to 48month warranties - the manufacturer knows what it is going to do, start the vehicle, get 'recharged' almost immediately by the alternator, so is kept at or above 12.6volts all the time & has a service life in that application of maybe 5-7years (depends on lots of other factors, but you get the drift).
A deep cycle battery will only have 12-18months warranty, as the manufacturer doesn't know if you are going to drag it down to 10.5volts every 2nd weekend, running an 80litre fridge set to freeze - that sort of use will shorten it's service life. Typically, a wet cell deep cycle will give you 3-4years of acceptable use. It might continue for longer, but at reduced capacity, so instead of running your fridge for 3 days like it used to, it now only runs for 1-1.5 days. That might not meet the owners expectation, so it is replaced for a new one.

A 'spiral wound' AGM (Optima or Exide Orbital) give great CCA, but is compromised in it's ability to provide A/h (the 'strips' of lead, wound into a coil, just don't have the density/thickness to hang onto the charge as well as a flat plate design can) - but, because the plate strips are so tightly wound, swaddled like a baby in a blanket, they can't go anywhere & don't distort. Lowish A/h rating aside, they can act in a deep cycle usage with same/similar service life to a deep cycle wet cell - but do need that high (14.2Volt+) charge rate, to pick them up from a deeply discharged state & do cost roughly 1/3 more than a wet cell.

Rgs, Michael

[Qthefun]

ok I don't want to start a new thread so will ask this here

want to run a winch (9500 lb runva) not super concerned with replacing battery's every few years or planning on using it every weekend but would love for it to work when needed.
so should I get just 1 kick ass battery or look into duel?
Not getting a fridge at this stage but looking at a smallish led bar as well.

Cheers in advance

[Gwagensteve]

You need more alternator.

[ZUZUKI]

You are not going to stress a EWX9500 on a Jimny - unless you go recovering other, bigger cars, in fact, it might be a struggle to fit in the bar.
As well as ideally needing more than the stock 70amp alternator, the battery is best off being the biggest Optima you can make fit.
Then it all comes down to how stuck you get & how long you want to winch. If it is a long slippery hill, you might spend 5minutes winching to 20minutes above idle (1000+ rpm) to put enough back into the battery to go another 5 mins of winching.
If the winch motor is struggling, (slowing down the cable/rope retrieval rate) when it shouldn't be, then you are running out of amperage in the battery & could harm the winch motor if keep winching.
Bigger or more battery/ies will mean that you have longer initial winching time, but once they are down on juice, they will take longer to recharge.
Optima's accept a charge quickly compared to flat plate batteries, due to low internal resistance, as long as the charge rate (voltage) is over 14V & ideally 14.2+V.
Rgs, Michael

[Reubs]

I don't think you need either a larger battery or alternator.

There are plenty of winch and spotty fitted Suzukis driving around at night with 50A alternators and standard batteries without issues.

If you don't run additional lighting when at idle and only rarely use the winch there is little benefit to either upgrade.

[shep]

Runva needs 600cca to run properly. I run mine through a second
battery with a 100amp isolator. Have winched a few heavy shitboxes
out of bogs without issue.
My battery is a exide deep cycle/ cranking battery. 40+ months warrenty
and cost $130 in Katherine so Prob under $100 down south.

[Gwagensteve]

There are plenty of winch equipped cars that do have problems due to undersized batteries and alternators. It's particularly bad with EFI cars that need adequate voltage at the fuel pump to get them to restart.

Worst case scenario- manual transmission car driving whilst assist winching on a long hill. Driver stalls the car (common when trying to juggle winch controller, avoiding driving over the rope, and with high electrical draw making the car doggy off idle.)

Now car is dead, won't restart, on a hill, on the winch.

That's a bad day out, particularly if you're by yourself. (Not that anyone should be 4wding alone, but it seems to happen.

[shep]

Hence why I winch from a 600cca battery ( recommended size) that is set up as a second battery.
No issues as my battery's are only joined together if the cranking battery is above 12.8v. Winch can
flatten the battery and car will still operate as normal.

[Qthefun]

Have a 900cca jumper pack behind the seat, so might just run a kick ass single if I find winching with the factory battery a problem.

High speed winch and driving an auto so should be less of a headache

Cheers guys!

[Gwagensteve]

I don't understand why people run a winch they expect to rely on and yet feed it with a tiny alternator. It's like having a
500hp motor feeding it with a fuel pump that can only deliver 200hp worth of fuel.

Get a dc clamp meter and see how much amperage it takes to run your car. Then work out how much is left for charging your battery. Then take about 70% of that figure as the maximum your alternator can deliver. You'll be surprised how long it will take to recharge a battery heavily discharged by winching.

Denso alternators only deliver their peak capacity cold. Get them hot and output drops dramatically.

I've heard 50A denso alternators struggle to deliver 35A when hot.

[shep]

And yet it still works and continues to run my fridge without issue. Maybe I am not silly enough to think that a low mount winch has a 100% duty cycle.

[Gwagensteve]

Well fridges consume about 4A not 400A.

I'm not sure how long your hills are in the NT, but it's not unknown to have to winch for multiple full pulls of the cable here in Vic, and the duty cycle of a winch at relatively low load (lets say 100A) is pretty high, but 100A will still kill a battery pretty quick if you're only putting maybe 20A back into it above base load when you're not winching.

[got_bar_work]

My old vit had a falcon alt and 2 enersys extreams joind by a rotary switch.35ah and 18ah
With the 12k tiger winch the highest batt current i had was about 135a. The highest charge current was about 35a

[Qthefun]

Gwagensteve wrote:

I don't understand why people run a winch they expect to rely on and yet feed it with a tiny alternator. It's like having a
500hp motor feeding it with a fuel pump that can only deliver 200hp worth of fuel.

Get a dc clamp meter and see how much amperage it takes to run your car. Then work out how much is left for charging your battery. Then take about 70% of that figure as the maximum your alternator can deliver. You'll be surprised how long it will take to recharge a battery heavily discharged by winching.

Denso alternators only deliver their peak capacity cold. Get them hot and output drops dramatically.

I've heard 50A denso alternators struggle to deliver 35A when hot.

I am not looking to do "hard" lines nor comp just (hopefully) once a year a 20m winch out of a tricky situation.

Everyone looks for different things when "out" there not just trouble

Cheers for all the info and to the op for asking!

[Gwagensteve]

I completely understand, but when you have a less capable car, you rely on recovery a lot more. We regularly come across people in less modified cars than us doing epic winching exercises because they get on a hill and it's not safe (or desirable) to turn around. These are hills we just drive up.

You're also less likely to hit things hard (enough) because of the risk of damage in a more standard car, so you'll winch sooner and further to get where you want to go.

Winches are so powerful and cheap now - ten years ago no-one would have ever considered a 9500lb, 475A winch on a 1200kg car. 9000b winches used to be only for land cruisers with 120A alternators, (which used to melt and fall apart with heavy winching, incidentally.)

[Qthefun]

I think my car will be more than capable, just the driver I am worried about

That being said I recon my recovery gear and mods will get me out of anything I am silly enough to get my self into

Ok enough of me getting off track!

Thanks to the OP's question and every one for the info as always!!!

[Marko_SJ]

Gwagensteve wrote:

Well fridges consume about 4A not 400A.

I'm not sure how long your hills are in the NT, but it's not unknown to have to winch for multiple full pulls of the cable here in Vic, and the duty cycle of a winch at relatively low load (lets say 100A) is pretty high, but 100A will still kill a battery pretty quick if you're only putting maybe 20A back into it above base load when you're not winching.

Around Manton, as well as the initial run down the Daly river way where a few 4wders go it gets very hilly. Its no dividing range but you could get yourself into multiple pulls very easily.

However, most winching would be pulling cars out of bogs when people drive them where/when they shouldn't (pretty much can be straight off the black stuff in the wet except for Suzukis).

[shep]

Haha the NT is much bigger then a 150km radius from Darwin

[Marko_SJ]

shep wrote:

Haha the NT is much bigger then a 150km radius from Darwin

I wouldnt have guessed. I thought things went Darwin-Berrimah-Adelaide with nothing in the middle or the side .

Edit: no shame in only talking stuff I have personally driven, you can fill Steve in on the rest.