Coach Batteries Stolen April 13, 2014, 05:38:27 am Yahoo Message Number: 145740Hi Ray. Sorry to hear about the damage to your coach. I have a '99 TKB. If you have a Ford E350 chassis, your '97 should be nearly identical to mine. Funny thing is I've been planning to do this exact thing to mine intentionally. I never liked that the battery tray didn't slide out all of the way. A little battery acid over the side into the ball bearings has made the slide out situation worse. The stiffness of the cables makes it hard to pull the batteries out, and hard to get the bundles into the right location to push the battery tray completely in. The vanity storage cabinet can be made shallower without losing too much storage. (I've done the following in my prior coach). I planned to cut out the back of the vanity cabinet and put a copper 3/8" buss bar plate in to tie all of the plus side wiring together. Another plate to tie all of the ground potential wires together. The 100 Amp resettable circuit breaker would be relocated out of the battery box. A welder friend has donated some finely stranded 2 Aught (00) welding cable that is relatively flexible. These two cables would go from the buss bar plates into the battery box, suitably color coded black and red. Only a single cable to each battery terminal. The series jumper between the batteries could be stiffer as it was. I planned to replace the old drawer slides with full extension drawer slides, rated for 200 lbs each pair. A new battery tray that would protect the slides from acid drips would be made, powder coated. Slide 'barrel bolt' locks to keep the tray in position. I hope to have enough room to put in T145 taller batteries and still be able to service them easily because I could pull them all the way out to see into the battery caps. I was possibly going to put a whole house inverter in that space also connected to the buss bars. Wiring to the power panel just next door under the refrigerator would be easy. Cooling air vents on the side of the cabinet into the doorway area could have small quiet fan forced air cooling when the inverter was on. I just haven't got to this yet, but it looks like you have the motivation to do it now. You would have to be comfortable working with high power, thick cables and 12 volts. Insulation and proper metal and connection techniques required. A good place to start a fire if it wasn't done just right. I already have the 'pure sine wave' 400 watt inverter, and many of the parts I would need. If you elect to have it repaired like it was, the mother ship would be a good choice. With my mods, it would be even easier to steal the batteries again. The thief may even be waiting for new batteries to show up. Six volt deep cycle batteries are sort of rare (unless you own a golf cart) and heavy too. The thief didn't bother anything else? A better lock would be worse. The painted access door probably would cost more than the batteries and cables. My Sympathy of course and I hope this was helpful. RonB
Re: Coach Batteries Stolen Reply #1 – April 13, 2014, 09:36:27 pm Yahoo Message Number: 145752Yep, mines an E350 as well. You've sure given me a lot to think about, maybe it's time to turn this into an opportunity.Thanks for your input, I'm going to weigh my options and start making phone calls tomorrow.Thanks again, Ray
Topic: Coach Batteries Stolen (Read 8 times)
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Topic: Coach Batteries Stolen (Read 8 times)
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