Want to switch from manual to electric downrigger's, some questions.

[Fishbowl836]

Well I've had enough of the manual downrigger's. I would like to go to electrics next year. My current boat set up is, starting motor in the back connected directly to the motor and a deep cycle battery connected up front to a mini koto trolling motor. The starting motor also powers my fishfinder and both pumps for the boat. From a electrical point of view what do I need to do or how should I change over to electric downrigger's? I believe I understand I will be limited by the alternator in my boat motor as to the amount of current my downrigger's can draw?? I I think I need to total up all of the max current draw of all my electronics stuff and make sure it does not exceed the rating of my alternator?? If I do I will not be able to charge my battery and therefore it will eventually stop running the motor. As you can tell I believe I'm a little fuzzy but I think I'm close. Other things that may be important, motor is a 25hp Yamaha four stroke, boat is a tiller model, and current manual downrigger's are old Riviera's. Don't want anything fancy or fast from a electric downrigger standpoint just want to make it a little easier on my back and arms. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

 

 

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[Big Dave]

The power comes from the battery. The charging system replenished the battery.

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[Xxx]

I use a group 29 strictly deep cycle battery. I have an I/O so I can't charge my deep cycle battery with an alternater only because they need to be charged slowly, and it is very hard on the alternator, you can blow diodes because there is to much resistance in the flow of electricity. The other batteries are duel purpose, so far so good. So I put 30 amp circuit breakers on the positive wire on each rigger. Nock on wood I've never run out of juice!!LOL I just have it in a box in the back corner of the boat. Makes it easy to access and charge with deep cycle battery charger. My charger has deep cycle, 2amp 10 amp and so on. Hope this helps. PAP

[garrymny]

I have 3 deep cycle batteries. 2 are connected in parallel and run the starters, fish finder, fish hawk, and down rigger. The other is connected to the auto pilot which runs constantly all day and is my biggest power requirement. I don't think downriggers are a big powrt consumer because of their infrequent use. I would put the motor starter on a separate battery, because you do not want to be without sufficient power for starting.

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[LakerTaker]

This season I ran my 2 Cannon Mag 10's off a NAPA deep cycle battery using a stand-alone Minn Kota power center box that has a built-in circuit breaker. I found that even after 2 trips of trolling, the battery was still at full charge.


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[J.D.]

I would consider Scotty  Downriggers. They use a gravity feed clutch to lower the weights, only use power when retrieving. I've had the short arm 1099's for a number of years and love them.