Electric Trolling Motor on a Canoe?

[40calruler]

I wish I could help you with that, sorry. The smallest battery I ever used was a standard lawn tractor starting battery in my 13' Smoker Craft. I used it for lights/depth finder and a bit of 27# thrust Minn Kota, never wore it down much and recharged immediately. Discharging and re-charging starting batteries will kill them quick. And now a full size 27 series for the bigger boat/w 55# Minn Kota. The main reason I posted on your thread was so you don't make the same mistakes I did with charging. I used a charger that didn't provide what the batteries needed and got about half the life I should have from two of them.

You may want to look into an AGM (Absorbed glass mat) deep cycle battery seeing as they are a bit lighter than flooded batteries, but $$$. Figure out a way to secure it midships and you wouldn't have a problem with the weight. Your problem is, the longer the running time, the heavier the battery!

Mike

I paid 125 a couple years ago for my deep cycle battery and it holds a good charge and has yet to make me have to use my backup battery. It would be heavy in a canoe though as it's at least 30lbs

 

[Mikej]

I paid 125 a couple years ago for my deep cycle battery and it holds a good charge and has yet to make me have to use my backup battery. It would be heavy in a canoe though as it's at least 30lbs

30lbs doesn't seem heavy, my 27 series weight I think 67lbs. A 30lber could be alright in a canoe if it were held in place well. You're going to need a certain amount of battery capacity to have any time on an electric. It's a trade off, weight-vs-run time. But don't canoes usually run with "Paddles" anyway?

 

[The Heretic]

http://www.jegs.com/p/Lithium-Pros/Lithium-Pros-12-Volt-Lithium-Batteries/1770167/10002/-1

 

[40calruler]

30lbs doesn't seem heavy, my 27 series weight I think 67lbs. A 30lber could be alright in a canoe if it were held in place well. You're going to need a certain amount of battery capacity to have any time on an electric. It's a trade off, weight-vs-run time. But don't canoes usually run with "Paddles" anyway?

30lbs was a guess per me carrying it myself but I am guessing it is closer to what you say yours is as it is one of the larger rv batteries that I could have bought. I suppose it is probably more like 50lbs when I consider my wife trying to carry it.
We use the 10ft boat by loading it into the back of my truck and strapping it down with just my cousin and I but when I think about it anyone but my cousin has not been able to help me load up the boat or lift the battery up and over the side once it is in...and I have had a few guys like brothers in law, father in law try...thinking I underestimated weight by a bit and overestimated my inlaws.

But i am running 2 kids and a wife sometimes or me and my cousin which is about the same weight as the 2 kids and wife in a larger heavier boat than a canoe. A 30lb thrust with a smaller battery would scoot a canoe along just fine I think or even smaller trolling motor. As the other fella said though...Whats wrong with paddles? That is what I have always used in a canoe and am always able to sneak up on fish pretty darn well. Hell my 74 year old grandfather still canoes in the ocean to fish with just paddles...against my advisement but he has seniority that negates anything I can say.

 

[STUKA]

"As the other fella said though...Whats wrong with paddles? That is what I have always used in a canoe and am always able to sneak up on fish pretty darn well. "

I think he is referring to your terminology..Oars are a more proper term,I suppose.
On a side note-I run a 1968 vintage 3.5 horse Eska outboard on my also 1968 17' Alumicraft canoe..

 

[Mikej]

"As the other fella said though...Whats wrong with paddles? That is what I have always used in a canoe and am always able to sneak up on fish pretty darn well. "

I think he is referring to your terminology..Oars are a more proper term,I suppose.
On a side note-I run a 1968 vintage 3.5 horse Eska outboard on my also 1968 17' Alumicraft canoe..

There's a blast from the past....I had the Eska 7.5 on the "Van topper" boat my dad and I fished from when I was in my early teens. He'd given me the "Package". I'd put it in the back of my pick-up. Dependable, but noisy, smoky, and no reverse. You had to turn the power head 180 get reverse. LOL! Fished that on the Willamette, Tillamook Bay and East Lake.

 

[40calruler]

Oars would be the accurate term I would call them or my grandfather might smack me upside the head. I use a single oar in my fishing pontoon and scoot along fine....I fly across the water with my electric motor on the pontoon though. The nice thing about the Minn Kota and such is when there are signs that say no gas motors you are still good to launch your boat and fish.
All the talk about my fishing stuff is getting me all worked up for Salmon and Steelhead. Tried last weekend with no luck but it is early yet. I cannot wait to battle a summer Steelhead again. Nothing more fun than watching that big fish do back flips trying to get off the hook....and then standing over the traeger a few hours later.

 

[salmonriverjohn]

Oars would be the accurate term I would call them or my grandfather might smack me upside the head. I use a single oar in my fishing pontoon and scoot along fine....I fly across the water with my electric motor on the pontoon though. The nice thing about the Minn Kota and such is when there are signs that say no gas motors you are still good to launch your boat and fish.
All the talk about my fishing stuff is getting me all worked up for Salmon and Steelhead. Tried last weekend with no luck but it is early yet. I cannot wait to battle a summer Steelhead again. Nothing more fun than watching that big fish do back flips trying to get off the hook....and then standing over the traeger a few hours later.

Getting YOU worked up?? You dirty no accounts and this entire post are the reason that I just went and picked up a new to me 15 footer! Had one when I wore a younger mans clothes, and all this talk about canoes, stealth fishing and all that had me salivating like one of Pavlov's puppys,, well I just couldn't help myself. I tried I swear, but I couldn't. Thanks for rekindling that old flame fellas. Tight lines!

 

[jbett98]

There's an aluminum canoe upside down on some saw horses in a back yard that hasn't moved in a long time.
I can see it as I drive down I-84 every morning.
I think I will try and pin point the exact house and make an effort to knock on the door some evening and inquire if it might be for sale.

 

[40calruler]

There's an aluminum canoe upside down on some saw horses in a back yard that hasn't moved in a long time.
I can see it as I drive down I-84 every morning.
I think I will try and pin point the exact house and make an effort to knock on the door some evening and inquire if it might be for sale.

If it is just sitting it deserves a lot of nice lake trips. I bet they would take half what it is worth just to get rid of it.

 

[teflon6string]

Hope you can snag it and float it jbett. Aluminum canoes are cool. They remind me of WWII fighter & bomber aircraft, and Airstream trailers.

I've had a few aluminum boats that all seeped a bit of water along one seam or another. Same thing with this one but very little, probably half a cup total in an hour afloat. Found a can of clear Flexi Seal at Fred Meyers (not black or white, which I would never put on this handsome boat). I shot a thin stripe of it along the outer centerline and rivets. Totally invisible, and it should be watertight as a duck's *ss. We'll see!

 

[jbett98]

I need to make a post-it note reminding myself to look at the house as I drive to work.

 

[teflon6string]

With no prior experience, my family went on a week-long Canadian ocean kayak adventure in the 60's. Our "guide" had a huge beard, kayaks, tents and a map, so he obviously knew more than we did. I wonder now how much expertise he actually had (or if he could re-enter the US that year without getting nabbed), but we survived it and had a lot of fun too. Anyhow, his logic was that kayaks and canoes use paddles, and boats that can be rowed (with oarlocks) use oars.

 

[salmonriverjohn]

Agreed teflon. I do know someone that knew a thing about paddles, my mother! Now boys, don't make me call my mother into this argument, not only did she know how to wield a paddle but she could take you flat out with a shoe at 30 feet!

 

[teflon6string]

Battery Update:

I ended up buying a Bluetop Optima because I like the idea that an AGM battery can flop on its side in the boat or the back of my car without leaking or damaging anything.

With full recharges between outings (13.13V), I've run it down as low as 12.12V.

Concern:

How low can it go and continue delivering juice to the Minn-Kota? Is there a certain low voltage I should try to remain above? Or can automotive/marine deep-cycle batteries handle total rundowns because they're designed for it?

None of this was ever a worry with my oldschool military ATC and law enforcement radio batteries. But now I fly RC planes, and I've learned (the hard way) that newfangled LiPo batteries are VERY fragile, suffering permanent damage if I run them even a minute too long.

Can this also happen with my expensive purpose-built deep-cycle boat battery? I have no use for a 40lb paperweight, even with that nice handle on it.

 

[salmonriverjohn]

We in the communications industry down here on the coast use sealed units very much like those. They will sit and charge until needed during a power outage and then kick in and fly along for up to 12 hours or we can get a generator to the site. They get changed out supposedly around every 4 to 6 years, but I know of many units that have carried on for as long as twice that so I think you should be ok.

 

[teflon6string]

Absolutely John, I've had car/truck and motorboat batteries last 6-8 years because they were constantly charging off the gas engine. But the electric Minn-Kota on my canoe is the only motor and it just sucks from the battery the whole time I'm out with no recharge until I take it home and power it back up to 13.13 volts in my garage.

As I drain the battery (Optima Blue Top Marine), how far below 12.12 volts can I expect it to keep delivering power? That's the lowest I've seen it so far after a couple hours of intermittent puttering along a lake shore with minimal breeze to resist.

Is it bad to run a marine deep-cycle battery too low? I know it's designed to discharge and recharge, but I wonder if there's some low-voltage limit I should stay above?

Maybe not. I just don't want to destroy a new $200 battery by assuming anything.

(Yes, I carry paddles - kayak paddles.)

 

[mkwerx]

I never measured the voltage at the end of the day - but I ran a blue top optima group 37 (iirc) as primary batt on my tin can boat - and starting with a full charge I would get about 6-7 hours of fishing out of just that battery, running both the 30lb thrust Minn Kota and a Humminbird fish finder. Once the motor really started slowing down, I would switch the motor over to the back up battery - a lead acid group 27 exide (eh) and could get another 4 or 5 hours out of it before calling it quits for a day. It depended on how much long "high speed" travelling I did vs "low speed" maneuvering and trolling or just working a shore line hunting fish I did. This was in a 12' aluminum v hull boat.
The props will turn with surprisingly low charge in the batteries, but there does come a point of draining it in which you can paddle or row faster than the motor will push on max power. That's pretty low.

 

[Mikej]

Cycling batteries were made to withstand being discharged and re-charged. The lead plates in them are thicker than in starting batteries. As I understand it......We'll say a deep cycle battery was rated to give you 100 cycles, from fully charged to fully discharged before it was toast, gone, used up, time to give it to the recycler.. That would mean then, that you could get 200 cycles if you depleted the battery only 50% each time you went out, and conversely 400 cycles if you only used 25% of the batteries storage capabilities each time out. Make sense?

As was mentioned above, batteries that have a constant charge going to them like in a vehicle never suffer from being discharged. That is the way they were designed, the thinner plates in a starting battery allow the battery to give a LARGE amount of current at once to run the starter motor....And then are recharged immediately. Where depp cycle batteries have thicker plates allowing them to deliver much lower current over a longer period of time, like for the trolling motor. Leaving any lead acid battery in a discharged state will shorten it's life. It's important to recharge a battery to a fully charged state as soon as possible after use as letting a discharged battery sit will cause the plates to "sulfate". http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/sulfation_and_how_to_prevent_it.

Deep cycle batteries have different charging requirements than starting batteries, and different deep cycle batteries (flooded, AGM, gel) need slightly different types of charges. http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/charging_the_lead_acid_battery
You really need to have a charger that will give your AGM battery what it needs or you really will have a $200.00 paper weight in way less time than you should. I know this from personal experience!

http://www.optimabatteries.com/en-us/support/battery-care/charging/

Mike

 

[Knopfplayer]

The articles verify what we do with our communications batteries. 13.2 V is not enough to charge a battery to 100%. 13.8-14V is more like it. After you take the charger off, the voltage will slowly drop to a lower value. For site use, we don't like to draw our batteries down below 11.5V. 11.0 V (on a 12v system) has been done during an emergency, but it really kills the batteries. The less you draw down, and the less time they stay down, the longer they last.

I don't remember reading here about a battery box. You don't want battery acid (or the terminals!) touching your aluminum canoe.