Battery Question

[UncleJerm76]

Just did a quick lookup, the Interstate 12v batteries appear to be the 12VGC, they are 20hr rated at 155Ah. The 6V Trojan T-145 is 20hr rated at 260Ah! The physical size of the Trojan's are almost exactly 1/2 of the Interstates in WxD and height is nearly identical. So in theory it would not be too hard to swap out the eight 12v with sixteen 6v and massively improve your run time. Some run time would be lost due to the weight of the extra lead on board, I but it should be a drastic improvement in both run time and pack longevity.

The less you run down a pack between charges the longer that pack will last. The drastic improvement in Ah means you'll be running the pack down a lot less in the same distance. Only issue I see is weight & cost; Sixteen T-145's would weigh about 1152lbs compared to eight 12VGC @ 516lbs. I dont want to even think about the cost of (16) T-145's - maybe you can get a bulk discount?

[passthru]

It will be expensive for sure. And heavy. Hope it has a heck of a frame.

[jjance]

You can't just go by AH ratings when comparing different voltage batteries. You need to compare the KwH ratings of the battery. With your numbers: A 12V battery rated at 155AH would be 1.86KwH. A 6V battery rated at 260AH would be 1.56KwH. So at least in this case the 12V battery would be better.

[Sergio]

I am sure he did not say replace 1-12v battery with 1-6v battery, so 2x6v would be 2x1.56KwH which is much better than the 12v battery.

[jjance]

I was just talking a one to one comparison.

[UncleJerm76]

Originally Posted by jjance

I was just talking a one to one comparison.

Sergio is right - you need two 6v to compare to one 12v no matter how you look at it.