TOPIC: On-board dual battery charger.

I'm adding a Noco dual bank battery charger to my Chris-Craft. The boat has 2 batteries currently with a battery switch and isolator. I've attached bank 1 of the charger to one battery and bank 2 charger leads to the other battery. That is what the instructions indicated, and for once I've read them!

However my question is concerning the wires connected to the one of the batteries. It was my understanding that with a battery switch all connections should be made at a junction block, not on the screw post of one of the batteries. Is this anyone's experience? This is my first dual battery setup. I've not traced out what the two small wires connected to the positive post are.



Note that the charger is not mounted and the wires are not tied. I just have it in there to test connections. If you look at the next pic I'm planing to mount the charger to the bulkhead to the right side of the picture near the small round indentation. Then, i'll use that indentation for the AC power adapter. You would lift the seat next to this compartment to plug in the extension cord. What do you think of this placement?

Where you place the charger/maintainer is strictly for cosmetics and convenience. Just make sure it's easily accessible. As for the hookup I'm only guessing here but does the charger isolate both batteries while connected? If not you are just connecting the batts in parallel and charging both at the same time. Assuming your battery switch is the 1, 2, Both, Off, configuration I would do like the directions call for and connect "bank 1" to the Batt 1 of the switch and "bank 2" to Batt 2. That way you would could just plug the unit in and switch to whatever battery you want. The "bank 1, bank 2" would be a little redundant. In your picture I do not see a "both" button on the charger.

I believe the charger isolates the batteries because it has two charging banks. One bank connects to each battery. The charger does not have a both button. It has 2 separate sets of +/- wires. It monitors both batteries separately and does the charging cycle required by the individual battery.

The switch is 1, 2, Both, off as you assume. When I'm charging I set it to Off since the charger banks are directly connected to the battery.