By Tom Neal
Bigfoot Trails Basecamp | Independent Adventure Media
I've spent a lot of years around vehicles, motorcycles, RVs, and equipment, and batteries are one of those things you don't really think about until they don't work.
A dead battery can turn a perfectly good motorcycle ride into a walk.
It can leave a truck sitting in the driveway.
And in a motorhome, the battery system isn't just about starting the engine. It's part of what keeps the entire thing livable.
So over the years, I've tried different battery technologies and different approaches. Most of my fleet has settled into a pretty boring formula:
Use what works.
The Baseline
For years, I've had good luck with Interstate Batteries, and they've become something of a known baseline across my vehicles.
My wife's Kia Sorento has one that's about two years old. The Jeep and K1500 OBS got replacements last year. The motorhome has its chassis and house batteries, and the Harley got a fresh battery before I stopped riding it regularly.
That doesn't mean I think Interstate is magically better than every other battery on the market.
It means I've used them, they've generally worked for me, and I know what to expect from them.
That's a pretty valuable characteristic when you're talking about something whose primary job is not leaving you stranded.
Then I Tried Lithium on the Harley
The Harley was where I decided to experiment.
I replaced the conventional battery with a lightweight lithium setup. On paper, it made a lot of sense.
Less weight. Modern battery technology. Strong cranking performance.
But it wasn't simply a matter of dropping a lithium battery into the bike and forgetting about it. I also changed the charging/tender setup to accommodate the new battery.
At first, everything seemed great.
Then winter showed up.
Real-World Testing Doesn't Always Look Like the Brochure
I was riding the bike regularly—even through some absolutely shitty weather.
Rain. Cold. Ice. Snow.
The motorcycle would run fine after riding it. The problem showed up after it sat overnight in the cold.
I'd come back to it and find a dead battery.
Charge it.
Ride it.
Park it.
Come back the next day.
Dead again.
I went through the process multiple times trying to figure out whether I had a charging problem, a battery problem, or something else going on.
Eventually, I stopped trying to make that particular combination work.
I went back to a conventional lead-acid battery sourced through a local marine supplier.
And the problem went away.
The Harley could sit in freezing temperatures for extended periods and still start when I needed it to.
That's not a laboratory comparison between lithium and lead-acid batteries. It's not a claim that one technology is universally better.
It's simply what happened with my motorcycle, my charging setup, and the conditions I was actually using it in.
And that's the kind of testing I trust most.
Newer Doesn't Automatically Mean Better
I'm not anti-lithium.
There are applications where lithium makes a hell of a lot of sense, and I'm still interested in the technology.
But I've learned to look at batteries as systems, not just individual components.
The battery, charging system, temperature, maintenance, storage conditions, electrical loads, and actual use all matter.
A battery that looks fantastic on paper isn't necessarily the right battery for every application.
Sometimes the boring solution wins.
Now I'm Looking at the Georgetown
The next battery project is much bigger.
Our Georgetown has a pair of aging 12V house batteries, and they're approaching the point where I don't want to depend on them for full-time living.
That's a completely different problem from starting a motorcycle.
The house bank needs to support things like lights, electronics, the TV, computers, and eventually the larger electrical system we're planning for the coach.
And one of my biggest goals is being able to run two CPAP machines overnight without having to fire up the generator, while still having useful battery capacity during the day.
That means I'm looking at more than simply replacing two batteries.
I'm considering:
More usable capacity
Battery chemistry
Charging capability
Inverter capacity
Solar charging
How the system behaves when we're off-grid
How everything works together without creating an unnecessarily complicated system
That's going to be a project of its own.
And unlike the Harley experiment, I'm not interested in changing technology just because it's newer.
I want to build a system around what we actually need the motorhome to do.
The Lesson
After enough years of dealing with vehicles and equipment, I've gotten pretty comfortable with boring reliability.
I like new technology.
I like experimenting.
But when the experiment leaves me with a dead motorcycle in the driveway, I'm perfectly happy going back to the technology that works.
That's really the lesson I've taken from the battery experiments:
Don't choose a battery because the technology sounds better. Choose the system that fits the application.
I'll keep experimenting with lithium, solar, and newer battery technology as the Georgetown project develops.
But I'm going to test it the same way I test everything else around here:
In the real world, under real conditions, with something I actually depend on.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tom Neal is the founder of Bigfoot Trails Basecamp and an independent adventure journalist. He doesn't go looking for stories. He goes out on adventures, and the stories usually find him.
From motorcycles and road trips to racing, off-road adventures, travel, Basecamp projects, and the occasional questionable decision, Tom writes about the experiences, people, places, and unexpected shit that happen along the way.
