Leisure Battery size

Hi Everyone,

We have been to Wales in our Auto Sleeper Cotswold EB.  Lost two days having to travel to Cardiff, firstly to the Webasto agent for him to find out why we did not have hot water or heating and the second trip was for him to service the unit and replace the fan.
We have had a 120 solar panel fitted on the roof, now the leisure battery has improved to 12.8 volts, but runs down overnight, and as we don't often use h/u the battery will have to be changed.
Would like to know if I can fit  a 135 amp leisure battery The book suggests 110. A friend was horrified, said we could cause it to overheat and catch fire. Our own dealer contacted A/S who have said it will be ok. Quite new to this so need advice please!

Your friend obviously knows nothing about batteries. Fit as big as you want, that will go in the available space. May not fully charge/take along time to charge though, depending on the charger capacity that you have.

It'll be fine, as long as it fits and it's the same type, i.e. don't fit a gel battery where there was a flooded or AGM one. The difference between 110AH and 135Ah won't make much difference to anything really.

Check though, that the rating is under the same conditions. For instance a battery which is 100Ah at C20 (20 hours discharge) may be a 130Ah battery at C100, so you might be getting the same battery really. Cheap leisure batteries are often rated at C100, whereas you might find a real traction battery rated at C5 or C10.

This is a reasonable explanation:
http://www.engineersedge.com/battery/capacity_battery_ratings.htm

Sorry to confuse you

Thanks to you both, that at least will be one more problem sorted.

Hi Gadabout.  Our Broadway a 2009 model had a 110 l/battery fitted when we acquired it. Even with a 130 watt s/panel fitted it soon went "downhill" when daylight went.  I purchased a Banner 135amp l/battery which just fitted in the wooden box underneath the bench seat/bed. All I did was to ensure the  elec hook up was off and disconnected and removed the fuse from solar feed, and the fuses near to the l/batt and solar charger. Best wishes  Ed.

Many thanks for replies.  'van going back to dealers because everything was cutting out even whilst on h/u.  We have been told that the consumer unit is overheating and may need replacing!Luckily vehicle is under dealers warranty!

Gadabout wrote:Many thanks for replies.  'van going back to dealers because everything was cutting out even whilst on h/u.  We have been told that the consumer unit is overheating and may need replacing!Luckily vehicle is under dealers warranty!

Is this when on hookup with the solar panel in sunlight, with a Sargent panel?

There's a firmware update from Sargent to stop it misbehaving with a larger panel (i.e. over 100W). I should be able to remember the details as I had the firmware on my EC328 updated when I fitted a solar panel, but I can't - there's a thread on it somewhere on this forum though - from about 2 years ago?