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Newbie question. I have a 2001 248 Vista, no generator. Battery maintenance question: The manual says to always alternate between using battery one and battery two. My mechanic just told me to keep the switch on both and occassionally idle to use the alternator to power if we are just floating around. For now I have turned off the battery when leaving the boat. Right now I don't have anything in the fridge. Will leaving the fridge on drain my batteries??? (I know I can check the manual, but just interested in what you guys do and have experienced). Thanks.

Your fridge will drain two batteries in a day or so. You really can't leave anything in there if you're away from the boat, unless you have a battery charger and access to shore power to run it. If you don't have a charger and shore power, you should set your switch to Off when you leave and don't leave perishables in the fridge.

When I had a two battery setup, I was a weekend boater. So I simply used battery 1 on Saturday and Battery 2 on Sunday.

In an ideal world, you would have the switch set to Both whenever your engine was running, this charges both batteries from the alternator. When you stop the engines and are just floating around, you would have the switch set to either 1 or 2. This makes sure that the lights, fridge, and stereo will only discharge one battery. The other battery is left unused, so that it will always be ready to start your engine.

Some boats have a battery isolator or battery combiner, either of these try to make this automatic by always charging both batteries when the engine is running. My boat came with a battery isolator, you should check yours. In that case you never need to select Both.

One other use of Both is when neither battery is strong enough to start your engine, Both will combine them and might start the engine.

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2008 V358 Two-tone Blue V/P Dual Prop 320 HP
Lake Winnipesaukee, NH

When I camp at Powell for a week in 100+ temps the fridge never stops running, this will drain a battery in a day. I always hook up to shore power at home and turn fridge on a day before use to cool down before a trip and while camping we use a Honda EU 2000 to charge batterys, run A/C, ect... I do try to alternate which battery I use for the day as mentioned above, want to exercise the batterys. While cruising switch to both so alt. will charge both.
While the boat is at home not in use I switch the battery selector to off as to not drain batterys due to some parasitic consumption (stereo head unit for example), and leave hooked up to shore power for a couple days to charge battery, at least once a month.
In fact, I try to charge (top off) boat, RV, jet ski, batterys once a month, year round. In the off season I keep batterys in the basement and trickle charge each one for period of time. One of the worst things you can do is let a battery get too low, will lose performance.

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2000 248 5.7L DP
'92, '94 SXI 750, '08 STX 15F, '12 Ultra LX 300
Videos

Turning the battery to off, will still supply power to the bilge pumps and carbon monoxide detectors. If the batteries are bad, they will still drain in a few days. You need to shut off the batteries at the switch and with the breaker switch . The breaker disconnects the DC house circuit from the house battery, since turning the battery switch OFF only disconnects the starting circuit from the starting battery. That will insure that the batteries are off and nothing on the boat will drain the power. It is a small switch just above the main battery knob.

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One of 4 Previous (Sold) Boats:
2000 Four Winns 268 Vista

Current Boat: 2004 Chaparral 235 ssi cuddy

Thanks for this post because it also brings up another question. I am use to the 1-2 or both or off battery switch and now I have the other. I did notice what is above, that if I have the battery switch off and the breaker on all my DC units still work. So if I am out somewhere and turn the switch off and have the fridge, some lights and the TV on, and the battery runs down can I turn the battery switch on and still have a starting battery there? I am just wondering how it is protecting me from loosing starting battery. Before I wasn't worried because I figured that it was just pulling from 1 battery and leaving the other for starting but now I'm not so sure. I do have an isolator unit in the engine compartment.

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2000 268 Vista "Reely Nauti"
http://www.facebook.com/#!/rivercruiser

As long as you have the isolator, you will have one battery that will not drain, and can be used for starting.

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One of 4 Previous (Sold) Boats:
2000 Four Winns 268 Vista

Current Boat: 2004 Chaparral 235 ssi cuddy