Battery Connections Illustrated

Elsewhere in the blog page is a post about battery safety. I have a couple of battery photos to illustrate what I was talking about the other day, easily making battery polarity easier to see.  The old 24v battery strings have decent cables, grease to seal out corrosion, but they are a bit dirty and it is hard to see the polarity, should I need to reconnect anything.  You can see where I marked the 2 gauge cables + and –. 

The batteries do get cleaned up every time I add water and it is about that time.

 Here’s the new set for the 48v system, with painted corners to mark polarity, color coded heat shrink on the 2/0 cable terminals, dates on the batteries, grease on the seal and the terminals.  This is much easier to identify things.  In lieu of shrink tubing, you can get electrical tape in different colors, too.  Batteries are the SUN230 golf car style from Sun Electronics. 

 When the new wall goes in for the power room, I will build a proper battery box to keep out the dust and dirt.  I use plywood and 1×2 strips painted with latex paint.  My last battery box was nearly 30 years old with no acid damage because latex paint is acid resistant!  The original battery rack was steel and was in pretty bad shape after those years.  I have gone to wooden racks and they seem to work well.  I’ve never had any worry about fire, but lining the box with latex painted drywall will ensure that nothing burns. 

The floor gets painted with latex, too, and I put in a layer of vinyl flooring.  I leave a dusting of baking soda on the floor, just in case, and keep a box or two of baking soda around to neutralize any acid spill.  Of course, John sells sealed batteries if you want to avoid that issue. 

By Neal Collier