PROJECTS - RV's and Boats

Recreational Vehicles (RV’s), Motor Homes, Caravans, Boats and Kayaks

Lithium Batteries Australia manufacture a wide range of custom batteries for both land and sea based “vehicles”. These batteries are manufactured for both “house” power as well as “electric propulsion” for boats and kayaks. Batteries are manufactured most commonly in 12V, 24V and 48V and are charged by vehicle alternator / generator, solar panels and back up 240V charger. Lithium Batteries Australia generally design and provide complete systems so as to ensure full reliability of the system.

Caravan and Motorhome Specific Batteries

So why would you buy a an Australian made lithium battery from Lithium Batteries Australia instead of the lithium batteries now supplied by many of the caravan manufacturers? The answer is simple. Our batteries are far more powerful, reliable and provide superior performance since all of the caravan manufacturers simply buy poor quality, cheap batteries from China and put their own company labels on them. These batteries are all very low discharge rate “consumer use” sealed (non serviceable) throw away batteries. See our NSFAQ page for more information about the reasons why sealed consumer use (CU) batteries are inferior to fully serviceable professional grade (PG) batteries.

First and foremost it should be noted that caravan manufacturers are experts at manufacturing caravans. They are not experts at lithium batteries. Likewise we are experts in the design and manufacture of lithium batteries and are not experts in building caravans so we leave building caravans to the caravan manufacturers.

Chinese made lithium batteries as sold by many of the caravan manufacturers use extremely low power welded tab cells. This is why many caravan and motor home manufacturers will mislead you by trying to tell you that their lithium batteries are not able to be used for engine starting. This is purely because of the very poor quality and low power cells and BMS used in the manufacture of these batteries. We manufacture our batteries in many different power output levels to suit the customers exact requirements. Some van owners may only require a very low discharge rate battery and BMS because they only run low power appliances such as a few LED lights and a fridge while other owners may require a very high power battery for back up engine starting, running a large electric winch or perhaps a high power inverter. We have manufactured batteries for many customers from all over Australia for over 10 years now. We have been doing this for much longer than the caravan manufacturers knew anything about lithium batteries. In fact we supplied a LiFePO4 battery system for a Kimberley Karavan owner 4 years before the caravan manufacturer themselves started to sell low power Chinese made batteries for their vans. At the time of this writing (Novemeber 2017) we are in the process of manufacturing a LiFePO4 battery for a Bushtracker caravan owner. This 12V 250Ah military grade LiFePO4 battery will be rated at peak discharge of 2,500amps which makes it several times more powerful than the inferior batteries supplied by the caravan manufacturer. With this extremely powerful battery the van owner will literally be able to jump start almost any 12V vechicle, truck, etc. on the road as well as could run up to a 7kW inverter if they so desired.

So in a nutshell caravan and motorhome owners come to Lithium Batteries Australia to manufacture a custom battery for their van or motor home which may be much higher in storage capacity since we can manufacture a battery to make the most of the space available in any battery compartment as well as being much more powerful for engine cranking or running high current demand electrical equipment such as winches or large inverters. Some of the caravan manufacturers will fit three, four or more batteries in their vans. This is so that when the batteries are connected in parallel the total battery power output (continuous discharge rating) can come up to an adequate level so as to be able to power a moderate power inverter. They have no choice but to use several batteries together because by themselves the individual batteries are extremely weak and can only provide a much lower dicharge rate than even a lead acid / AGM battery.

We constantly receive complaints from many caravan owners about the problems encountered with the lithum batteries which were supplied by their caravan manufacturer. We have seen so many people loose their money when we have seen these batteries fail extremely prematurely (due to several reasons) and we feel very disappointed to see what are in most cases “grey nomads” waste their money in this way on very poor quality batteries. It is also very disappointing to see many of the caravan manufacturers cutting corners to save money by fitting unsuitable lead acid chargers for charging lithium batteries and also in some cases  not fitting any battery management system. Often it is left up to Lithium Batteries Australia to rectify the shoddy installations and problems caused by the original installers of lithium batteries who are clearly very inexperienced in this field.