What Leisure Battery Do I Need?
Choosing the right leisure battery for your application can be a challenging task if you aren't sure what you're looking for. There's always a risk of choosing one that doesn't provide the correct amount of power that is needed for your applications. However, there's always the possibility of going overkill and getting a battery that's too big for what you need.
We've put together this article in an attempt to help you choose which leisure battery will be best suited to your needs.
Leisure Battery Applications
There are many different applications that a leisure battery can be used on, for this article we will be focusing on three, these are motorhomes, caravans and electric fences.
Motorhomes and Caravans are essentially the same when it comes to the leisure battery, as a motorhome will have a separate starter battery to start the engine. It all depends on what appliances are on the vehicle, and how much power they require.
Types of Leisure Battery
When it comes to the actual leisure batteries, there are three different types we will look at, these are standard lead-acid, AGM (Absorbed Glass Mat), and Lithium.
Lead-acid leisure batteries are definitely the most common type of leisure battery that you will find, with the most common sizes being 110Ah or a smaller 85Ah.
AGM batteries are still lead acid, however, they are made up of 6 glass material plates and are an upgrade to a standard lead-acid battery. These batteries are perfect for applications that need more power but don't have any more physical space for a bigger battery.
Finally, the lithium leisure battery. These are going to cost a considerable amount more than a standard or AGM leisure battery, but they sure are worth it. These batteries are quicker charging and longer lasting than standard batteries and can even come with handy bluetooth features.
Which leisure battery do I need?
Photo by Chris Slupski on Unsplash
So taking this into account, what battery do you need for your application? Let's find out!
If you're running an electric fence, you have quite a lot of options, starter batteries are even a possibility. You'll need to judge your battery on how big your fence is and how much power it needs. For more information on this, we recommend having a look at this article.
Moving on to motorhomes and caravans, it depends on the applications that will be running from the battery and how much power they need. A 75-85Ah leisure battery will more than likely be suitable to power just lights.
The most common battery found on motorhomes and caravans are 110 size leisure batteries. These tend to come as standard for most caravans and campers to power all of the usual applications that you may find, such as lights, fridges, cookers etc.
If a 110Ah battery won't quite cut it, a good solution would be to upgrade to AGM. AGM leisure batteries offer low self-discharge and faster charging, they can also provide up to two times the cycles of a standard lead acid leisure battery.
And finally, if you're still wanting more, you can always upgrade to lithium. As previously mentioned, this does come at quite the cost as the batteries are more expensive than lead acid and a change in the charging system would be required. Lithium batteries use almost all of their capacity before they are unable to provide power, whereas a lead acid battery would use around half of their capacity. For more information on the differences between lithium and lead acid leisure batteries, take a look at the links below.
Lithium vs Lead acid - What's the difference?
So there is a basic guide on choosing the leisure battery that is best suited for you, we hope that this article helped you out in one way or another. If not, our team of battery experts are on hand to answer any battery queries you may have! You can contact us here.
Or why not have a browse of some of our other articles?
You can also find our range of leisure batteries here, or browse the full range of Fuller Battery leisure batteries here.
