Battery in a caravan

Hilly

An ordinary battery in a box mounted on the draw bar's the way to go. You can wire it up to be charged off the vehicle and also connect a female trailer plug to match that on your vehicle. When you stop join it to the van plug and hey presto.

Cheers

Hilly

Al has a battery set up for our van....if you would like to contact us about it..email me at grierson@hotkey.net.au....and I'll send you a pic of what he's done...and try to get him to explain it to you....it runs the lights, the fridge [when travelling], the radio/cd player,

cheers

Lyn

Hilly,

I have to agree with Rosco. If all you are doing is running a few lights then an exide extreme is all you need. Just put it on charge every 3 mnths when not in use, or perhaps get a tiny solar panel to trickle charge it.

Have fun

Andrew

Technically it is illeagal to carry, store or use a battery in a vehicle unless it's mounted in a correctly vented enclosure. On the draw bar in a battery box as has been suggested is probably the most economical way of achieving the result you are seeking.
Deep Cycle Batteries have earnt a bad reputation because of early failure. From what I have read and understand this is because of less than adequate charging and frequent deep discharging, below 40%.
There is an excellent book by Collyn Rivers, called Motorhome Electrics available from Caravan and Motorhomes Books which covers what you need to considerabout installing and maintaining and operating a battery supply for a caravan.
Collyn Rivers advocates a correctly sized and installed solar system as the best way to achieve an acceptable level of power and battery life.
I run a dual battery system in my car and also have a battery in my caravan. I have run heavy cable (> 6 mm square) all the way from the aux battery to trailer plug AND to the van battery to minimise voltage drop. Even doing this I am led to believe the best I can achieve is about 70% charge and if I limit the discharge to 40% the useable power is only 30% of the battery's rated capacity. You need to calculated how much power is need whike you are away playing.

Because I havn't the room to set up a dual battery system under the bonnet, I have set up my wagon/Caravan/Camper this way.
I run heavy duty wiring via a regulator to an Anderson plug in the rear compartment in the wagon(one of the storage boxes) and also one to the rear of the wagon. Both the camper and caravan has an Anderson plug setup on each to take my deep cycle SLA battery. Thus dependening on what Im using, the battery is being charged either in the Caravan ,Camper or in the rear of the wagon.