Rotronics Dual Battery Setup

Paul

Disconnect the winch cable from the Auxilliary battery and attach it to the Starting Battery. You are never going to get enough sustainable charge to aux battery if winching from it.( My winch cable is not attached to any battery but I can connect it to the Starter Battery when needed)

I had a similar Rotronics system at one stage but it snuffed it after 2 years(just out of warranty...lol). I now rely on a simple solenoid to isolate batteries.


Cheers

Hi Paul,
I have the Rotronics and the winch is connected to the Aux.
I haven't had to do any extensive winching yet only when i run the cable out to lube and check it. This has never been a problem for me. I have a cranking battery as my aux if that is the difference I don't know....

I installed this about 5 years ago and I have spoken to Rod? Street (the designer of the system) at Rotronics by phone a couple of times. It may be worth a call to see why he set it up this way and whether the system will cope with that load on the starter Battery side. He is a very approachable and friendly guy.

G'day Paul,

I have a Rotronics system installed on the Landcruiser and so far, after 7 years of operation am very happy with how the system works. Initially, I installed the system as suggested, but after several winching operations, I did what Willem suggested and swapped the winching power cables over to the starting battery, which goes against the principles of protecting the aux battery, but gives a far greater amount of power for winching.

So far, no problems with the alternator, but I am very careful to do it all in small bursts and not overdo anything. The upside is that the circuit now protects everything else from the winching operation including my HF radio which is connected to the aux battery.

Cheers,

Mark

Not the same as yours, but I have a 3 way Rotronics (Main, Aux and Camper batteries) I also spoke to the manufacturer and like Wayne I found him to be excellent to talk to. The problem with a lot of newer vehicles is the electronics and alternator - not so much overheating but electronics. I have had it for 5 years and its never missed a beat. There is also a "winch recovery" switch that allows the winching battery to recharge quicker. Their system also stops you from running both batteries flat.

The control circuit of the winch is controlled via that switch through a relay. HAving it setup this way also helped protect against unwarranted use of the winch to flatten your car!

If you wish to bypass this, simply bypass the relay. This will allow you to use the winch off the AUX whilst it is being charged. However, I would advise you install another isolation switch so that some low life cannot come and short the contacts out and use the winch cable for no good.

Thanks all for replies. I will either just switch the cables to the starter battery or may just look at the relay option. Either way it should work the way I need it too.

Thanks again!

I have a three way Rotronics, (car, aux and camper). I have never used the winch in anger. I have used it to move some 30,000 lt tanks (empty) and pull on some trees out of the way after felling them. I cannot imagine these would have been any different to pulling a car out of trouble. After all how much winching do you have to do?