The Right Way to Wire a Battery Bank

I mentioned this on last night's ham club net tech session, and it is something worth knowing:

The Old Tech Guy: Electronics - RV - Ham Radio, Solar, and Batteries

The first eight minutes are about how to jumper between batteries in a bank properly, and the last fifteen or so are about cheap batteries vs. good deep-cycle batts.  It's the first part that is most enlightening.

Data point: I've run the last two weeks' nets at 75 watts FM, powered by the same two deep-cycle batteries, starting from the same fully charged state.  Last week, the system voltage from a fully charged battery bank would dip as low as 12.2 volts.  Re-wired this week, all else the same, the voltage only dipped to 12.6 volts when transmitting.  Much better!

Also, wiring things this way opens up the possibility of thinner gauge jumper wires with more reasonably-sized fuses.  I'd been working under the impression that heavy jumper wires were needed to properly balance a bank, but with this connection method they are not.  If 12 gauge wires will carry the maximum load from the bank, then only 12 gauge wires are needed within the bank.  That alone is quite a cost saving.

Hm, interesting and useful facts abound on the internet, if you look in the right places.