6v 230A Golf Cart Batteries?

[sail4dale]

no box.  I found they fit well and I put a 2 x 4 for and aft that would
keep them both from popping out in the event of a bad roll

[Roc]

Golf cart batteries will fit into a group 24 battery box you buy at WM.  Each 6 volt fits into each battery box, so you need 4 of them.  I cut the little flanges off the boxes with a dremel in order to pack the boxes close together. These are the flanges that you wrap your finger under to carry the box. Had to move the water heater over about 1 to 2 inches to starboard.  Screwed each box to the wood floor with screws using large fender washers.

[Ralph Masters]

Very nice set up Lex.  Looks like you know what you're doing.   

Ralph

[Michael]

We were uncomfortable about not boxing our new golf cart batteries. (Thoughts of battery acid sloshing around the bilge.)

We got two heavy plastic battery boxes sold by Interstate.  Each holds two Interstate GC2 golf cart batteries snugly, end to end.  The boxes, placed side by side in the battery compartment, store the four golf cart batteries that now make up Hali's house battery bank.

We have no technical details about the boxes (because we found nothing about the boxes on the Interstate website but learned about them through the dealer).

The boxes work well in the battery compartment space available (under the aft seat at the salon table, just forward of the galley in our 1997 Mark II), perhaps most importantly by fitting in without requiring re-location of the hot water tank.

The battery box outside length is 21 1/2"  and outside width is 7 3/4".

We didn't measure the height because, in order to fit the boxes into the space available, we cut their height down anyway, to 4.5".  This was a five minute job with a table saw.  A little touch up with a grinder (a file would also do) and, presto, a nice smoth upper edge to the boxes.

We threw away the box lids, which was a shame, as they had good cutouts (as did the top of the boxes) for battery cables. 

The bottom of each box has three depressed longitudinal channels, one down the centre, and one near each side. You can screw the box to the battery compartment floor using wood screws in these depressed channels, with washers to spread the load.  Located in the channels, the screw heads don't come into contact with the bottom of the batteries.  We haven't actually done this yet and haven't decided what we will use to seal around the screws to prevent any spilled battery acid from escaping into the bilge.  Suggestions?

We are still considering how best to hold the golf cart batteries down.  The single 2" x 4" running fore and aft across the top of our old 4D batteries will no longer be sufficient.  The current plan is to cut the 2" x 4" down to a 2" x 3" (so that it will fit between the cell caps of the outboard and inboard batteries and restrain all four golf cart batteries along one edge of each), and then have velcro straps over the batteries and under the battery boxes.  We suppose battery acid may eat up the velcro over time, so one or two more wood retaining bars may be in order.

Pics may follow if the installation looks okay.

[Ron Hill]

Guys : The important this is not being in a box which is better, but being tied down in place.
 
In the early C34s most golfcart batteries are too tall for a box in the battery compartment.  At least tie them down and to protect the + terminals use some heavy duty clear plastic - which you can attach over the terminals with Velcro sticky squares.  This protects from accidentally dropping a tool or metal object on the + & - terminals and see the sparks fly!!

Hank Recla wrote an early Mainsheet Tech Note Article w/picture (mid 90s) on how to make a "tie down cage" for golf cart batteries. 

A few thoughts

[Stu Jackson]

And while you're there, make sure you fuse each connection to the batteries or your PDP.