Trolling Battery

[Brett's_daddy]

Here’s the situation, my trolling motor battery charges but fails the cranking test at Auto Zone. Since this is a battle solely used for the trolling motor would it be okay to use? They told me marine batteries only last/are warrantied for 1 year while regular auto batteries are warrantied for 5 years…is this true? Do all of you replace your boat batteries each year?

[GreenPig]

 My Duracell AGM'S 31s have been installed in my boat 5 years last month and work like they're new. ??

[gim]

34 minutes ago, Brett's_daddy said:

They told me marine batteries only last/are warrantied for 1 year

They’re warrantied for 1 year but they should definitely last longer than that. I get 3-5 years out of my deep cycles and got 6 out of my previous cranking battery.

[Jig Man]

Some batteries don’t last but most do.  How you take care of it is very important.

[Brett's_daddy]

I always bring them inside for the winter.

[WRB]

What battery brand, size and type?

Tom

[Bird]

Never had a deep cycle battery fail under 5 years....... keep them charged.

[airshot]

All my boat batteries are 4 yrs old, just starting to show signs of wear..  

[Brett's_daddy]

The starter battery is probably 5 years old…got it new a couple years before Covid so probably 2017ish and the trolling motor battery came with the boat when I bought it in 2016 and the guy i bought the boat from said the battery was pretty new (under a year old). These batteries haven’t gotten heavy use at all but I guess that doesn’t make much difference to the lifespan.

[Junger]

If it's a deep cycle lead battery, it may not have the appropriate cranking amps to pass their test. What symptoms are you having that made you take it in to AutoZone? If it's not holding a charge, they should have put it on a load tester to see if the voltage would drop significantly from like 12.8v to 12.1v or lower.

[Brett's_daddy]

10 hours ago, Junger said:

If it's a deep cycle lead battery, it may not have the appropriate cranking amps to pass their test. What symptoms are you having that made you take it in to AutoZone? If it's not holding a charge, they should have put it on a load tester to see if the voltage would drop significantly from like 12.8v to 12.1v or lower.

All I have is a trickle charger at home and I know AutoZone tests batteries and charges them for free so that's why i brought them. The first battery, my starter battery they put on charge and it started leaking hydrogen they said and it's definitely bad and he said he wouldn't put it in his boat. The second battery is my trolling motor battery and they set it to the correct amount of marine cranking amps and it failed.

[Alex from GA]

Buy an 8 or 10 amp automatic charger and charge your trolling motor battery when you get finished using the boat for the day.  The speed your trolling motor pushes/pulls the boat is a good indication of it's charge and also how long it lasts during the fishing day.

[Brett's_daddy]

1 hour ago, Alex from GA said:

Buy an 8 or 10 amp automatic charger and charge your trolling motor battery when you get finished using the boat for the day.  The speed your trolling motor pushes/pulls the boat is a good indication of it's charge and also how long it lasts during the fishing day.

I have something like this installed...

 

https://www.cabelas.com/shop/en/bass-pro-shops-xps-proseries-marine-battery-charger

 

mine is from Cabelas back before they were bought out by BPS. I'm not 100% certain it's amperage without checking it out on the boat though. I'll check tonight.

[airshot]

13 hours ago, Brett's_daddy said:

The starter battery is probably 5 years old…got it new a couple years before Covid so probably 2017ish and the trolling motor battery came with the boat when I bought it in 2016 and the guy i bought the boat from said the battery was pretty new (under a year old). These batteries haven’t gotten heavy use at all but I guess that doesn’t make much difference to the lifespan.

Regular use and recharging of a battery is actually better for it !!  Just leaving it sit, even though fully charged will shorten its life !!