Connecting to battery terminals

[JHC]

I'm gathering the parts for my Capt. Loki rig for tent camping. I've bought everything but the battery and battery box.

ISSUE 1: I found a Carstart 1000 jump-starter at my house, and was thinking that I'd try and see if it worked OK for a CPAP before going ahead and buying the U-1 battery. To save money, but also to save wiring and complication. I understand that a jump-starter is not what I should choose if I were starting with a blank slate. Everything online says that the Carstart 1000 has a 12V cigarette lighter plug behind its flashlight, but when I took the flashlight out all I could see was empty space and wires. Am I missing something, or do not all of them have that 12V socket?

ISSUE 2: Anyhow, assuming I'm getting the U-1 battery, I'm wondering how I can have alligator clips on the posts and still have the battery box fully closed to prevent shocks and shorts. I'm concerned about it getting knocked over or getting soaking wet since it'll be in a tent.

It would be mighty convenient to use the little bolt-in ring connectors, but only if I can leave them connected. Could I actually leave the wires from the charger, AND the wires to the cigarette lighter plug (which the converter will plug into), both permanently bolted to the posts? Or is that just asking for trouble? I understand that I'd have to prevent all four wires from touching either wire to the opposite post, directly or via something conductive.

Does anyone keep EITHER of those, or both, bolted to the posts?

[palerider]

I'm gathering the parts for my Capt. Loki rig for tent camping. I've bought everything but the battery and battery box.

ISSUE 1: I found a Carstart 1000 jump-starter at my house, and was thinking that I'd try and see if it worked OK for a CPAP before going ahead and buying the U-1 battery. To save money, but also to save wiring and complication. I understand that a jump-starter is not what I should choose if I were starting with a blank slate. Everything online says that the Carstart 1000 has a 12V cigarette lighter plug behind its flashlight, but when I took the flashlight out all I could see was empty space and wires. Am I missing something, or do not all of them have that 12V socket?

ISSUE 2: Anyhow, assuming I'm getting the U-1 battery, I'm wondering how I can have alligator clips on the posts and still have the battery box fully closed to prevent shocks and shorts. I'm concerned about it getting knocked over or getting soaking wet since it'll be in a tent.

It would be mighty convenient to use the little bolt-in ring connectors, but only if I can leave them connected. Could I actually leave the wires from the charger, AND the wires to the cigarette lighter plug (which the converter will plug into), both permanently bolted to the posts? Or is that just asking for trouble? I understand that I'd have to prevent all four wires from touching either wire to the opposite post, directly or via something conductive.

Does anyone keep EITHER of those, or both, bolted to the posts?

That is all covered in Capnloki's choosing a battery thread.

[JHC]

I've started searching through the board for "bolt" and found this so far, which is very encouraging and is a consummation devoutly to be wished, if it pans out in my case:

Capt Loki wrote:
>The BatteryTender should come with a cable that has a red and black ring connector on one end and a "quick connect" on the other. Bolt the red to "Pos" or "+" and the black to "Neg" or "-"; the quick connect can attach to the BateryTender for charging, or the the socket for running the cpap.

[I bought a slightly cheaper charger at Wal-Mart, but this would be a reason to go back and get the BT Jr.]

[CapnLoki]

Jumper cable style clamps are evil! They're dangerous enough when you're standing looking at them while they're used for 5 seconds; don't even think of using them all night unattended!

There's are reasons why I've been so emphatic about BatteryTender brand chargers. Mainly, they are of the highest quality, and you'll find yourself using them for years. And the quick connects form a family of accessories that make it easy to put together a system.

Your jump starter has an 18 amp-hour battery in it. This would probably cover a couple of nights depending on settings, but its obviouly half the power of a U1 battery.

[JHC]

I'm a lawyer, and I'm used to looking for what people AREN'T saying -- when I went back to look over the old threads again, I saw you saying the Battery Tender had something that seemed to mean that you could have ONE set of wires permanently attached to the battery, and those wires could connect to the Battery Tender and could disconnect from it and attach to the AirSense 10 converter. (A point which I obviously completely missed the first time around.) But I didn't explicitly see where you said the BT Jr. could do that too. Can it?

[Jeramief]

Hello,
JHC yes you theoretically could only have one wire attached to the battery as The Battery Tender Brand of products come with a proprietary connector that all their accessories and chargers use I use a battery tender JR on my motorcycle and it has a lead to the batteries that I unplug the charger from and reattach a rubber protector to the connector. They make a cigarette lighter adapter that plugs into the charge port going to the battery.

[palerider]

I'm a lawyer, and I'm used to looking for what people AREN'T saying -- when I went back to look over the old threads again, I saw you saying the Battery Tender had something that seemed to mean that you could have ONE set of wires permanently attached to the battery, and those wires could connect to the Battery Tender and could disconnect from it and attach to the AirSense 10 converter. (A point which I obviously completely missed the first time around.) But I didn't explicitly see where you said the BT Jr. could do that too. Can it?

There are a multitude of connectors one can use for a battery, "Anderson Powerpoles" are very popular with amateur radio people. You can wire things up any way you want.

[CapnLoki]

I'm a lawyer, and I'm used to looking for what people AREN'T saying -- when I went back to look over the old threads again, I saw you saying the Battery Tender had something that seemed to mean that you could have ONE set of wires permanently attached to the battery, and those wires could connect to the Battery Tender and could disconnect from it and attach to the AirSense 10 converter. (A point which I obviously completely missed the first time around.) But I didn't explicitly see where you said the BT Jr. could do that too. Can it?

The BT Jr is the one I have - it works fine. As far as I know all the BT chargers have the same connector so you can mix and match freely.