Bongo Fury

You don't need heavy duty cable.

I used 27 A cable, you can see it in the photo of all the bits and bobs I used. Also there's a photo of the made up cables with their inline fuse holders

I did use a heavy duty cable to connect the -ve post of the leisure battery to the chassis but that's really more to do with when I connect up the internal loads. I'd recommend you do the same.

In the big superstore Halfords in Exeter they have these leads. If you can't find them at Halfords try your local motor factors, that's where I got mine from. You can buy them pre terminated with battery clips and eye terminals

Don't use solid copper cable - it's likely to fracture with vibration

I really like Corblimy's wiring, a really neat job. I mounted the VSR under the bonnet to keep the cable runs as short as possible but at the expense of tidyness.
Have a look at my wiring and installation in the "BEP voltage sensing relay" thread of a few weeks ago for pictures and an alternative way of connecting to the battery via the main 12 volt rail on the fusebox.
And now a question of my own:- where is the alternator charge light? I don't think I have one, unless the bulb has blown.
Cheers,
Tim

To reroute the various circuits to operate from the secondary battery does require wires to be cut and reconnected differently. No way out of that.

My idiots guide (no, I'm not the idiot) really makes it easy to do.

Regarding cables/relays:

The problem with using really thick wire (as in starter motor) is that it is too thick to connect to the relay terminals.

pippin

On 06/09/06 BF user Searchers said:

...the low tension side of the relay(small spades) is run to the fuse box that is live when ign is on and the other connection to earth
step two

the + wire is then run into the cab next to the fuse box by the steering wheel then ive fitted a new fuse box to the panel under the steering wheel, put the power wire to one side of the new fuse box(looped from one spade to the next),on the other side of the new fuse box i ran seperate wires to the car fuse panel removed the fuses from the car fuse panel that i want to run from lesurie battery and pluged the new wires into the bottom half of the fuse holder (very small spade connectors)make sure you use the right size fuses in the new fuse box.
this is what I have done the reason i did not want to cut the wires on the loom dont know if there is a better way but this WORKS FOR ME im no leccy so its up to you if you want to try this...

Has he got his wires crossed (groan!) or does it look like he found a way to do the job without cutting wires? If he has, I'm keen to do likewise but I dont know exactly what small spade connectors he used. The link in my posting at the start of this thread is to a Word doc which shows some connectors that might be the right type. Waddya think? Could it be a goer?

Mike

For what you want to do Mike, I'd follow the Pippin instructions. They're easy to follow and you won't have any difficulties at all.

Not wanting to be cheeky, but if you need to ask..., I wouldn't be aiming for splicing into the fuse panel itself via spades... You'd be making what you want to achieve more complicated than it needs to be

As for complicated, I have three leisure batteries in my Bongo, with relays to automatically switch the van acc and permanently live circuits to my leisures when parked (as 2 of them approach 15v due to the smart charger when running which would damage the stereo's etc) along with my 24v circuit for my heater...

Thanks wrster - I'll take that on board. Pity though as I still don't like the snip - its a superstition thing.

Mike

I'm with wrster on that one, it is not difficult at all to follow my method.

Don't be such a wimp Mike - it's easier than wiring a plug!

corblimey wrote: Got mine off ebay from discout towing supplies. They've got one on the go at the moment 190047041645

Or you can get what appears to be the same one from towsure:
http://www.towsure.com/product/1828

Thanks dudes. I ordered one from ebay yesterday and will make a visit to Halfords for the other bits.

I'm in the process of speccing all of the parts/components I need to fit a leisure battery, helped no end by the posts on this subject.

Can someone confirm something for me ?

Does the leisure battery need to be a lower amp/hour rating than the starter battery, even with these VSR' S. It says so in the members area fact sheet, but I see here that most are using 110a/h batterys - if so, what is your starter battery rated at (I thought Bongos were standard with 85 or 95) ?

TIA

I spotted that and asked the same question too ParkerNorris. My battery tray was bought off ebay from a guy who makes them specifically for the Numax 110Ah. I asked the BF experts the same question as you, and no-one could see why that advice was in the BF Fact Sheet i.e. it shouldnt matter. But just to revisit it, do the experts think there is a possibility that the split charge relay (or whatever) may not recognise the full capacity of a battery that is of higher Ah rating than the starter battery?

Mike

Hi Parker

AFAIK there's no reason to use a smaller battery and have not seen any sensible argument to suggest otherwise. I think the fact sheet should be amended. As always, please correct me if I'm wrong.

I'm using a 110 AH battery. I went for the biggest one I could fit under the bonnet.

Incidentally, charging your battery via a split charge set up will not give your leisure battery a full top up. For that you really need a charger circuit with some built in intelligence. Don't let that worry you, it's not really an issue for me and the way I intend to use my van and I expect it's the same for most people. As ever it's a compromise that's more than adequate for me.

If you need in depth help or info on this or other technical topics it's always worth checking out http://www.sbmcc.co.uk There are some clever bods lurking on that forum.

No. That fact sheet is nothing of the sort ...

There are some funny bits though, like 15 mins to charge a leisure battery...