I'm the original owner of a 1976 F350 supercab, 460/C6. Truck was ordered with the camper wiring package which included two batteries. Driver's side battery was pretty much devoted to the slide-in camper wiring. I no longer have the camper, and really see no need for dual batteries. I plan to remove the pos & neg battery leads, is there anything else I would need to do?

Thanks

 

I would disconnect all provisions present to charge the 2nd battery from the alt. and leave them in the wiring harness so they can be reconnected in the future if someone chooses to mount a 2nd battery again.

 

Are you going to run a big stereo, winch or off road lights? I know silly questions, but I have to ask. If so then leave it and wire it accordingly. X2 then what Red said.

 

I have no plans for installing any of these items. Thanks for responding.

 

You can basically disable the system by removing the trigger wire from the auxiliary battery relay mounted to the inner fender/wheel well.
From there, once the auxiliary battery is actually removed you simply remove the positive cable from the output side of the relay and toss it aside.

The ground cable should be easy to remove just so it’s not in the way, but I’m not sure where the factory attached it to the vehicle.
Mine was attached to the core support, but probably not the most efficient and it was added by the previous owner.

 

I just unplugged the relay wires and left them in the harness. Where is your ground for your dual battery set up?

 

Simple and straightforward—the kind of advice I like. Thanks for your reply.

 

And before you do disconnect it, please post up a few pictures of the system. I know there were a few out there, but I don’t often see pictures of original factory installs.

 

X2 definitely need pictures!

 

So these two batteries were charged in common but served separate 12v functions (engine vs camper). Is that correct? Thus, you could run down the camper side battery w/o jeopardizing the engine side. That way you could always start the engine and recharge the depleted camper side battery. Perhaps that camper side battery should be a marine type that can handle deep discharging and re-charging, no?

 

I will try to post some pics tomorrow.

 

correct. And the camper battery could theoretically jump the engine battery.

As far as my understanding, mixing battery types can have downsides but your logic is correct. It may need smarter charging than just a solenoid to connect it to the charging system when the key is turned on.

 

Subscribed! I wanna see the pics.

 

I will apologize for quality/utility of the pics, but there are a lot of wires in the vicinity of the dual/camper battery solenoid. I installed the voltmeter early on when I had the camper to monitor both batteries separately--that's the reason for the switch. I keep the switch in the off position when not using the truck to prevent battery drain.
The drivers side battery, i.e., the dual battery, fed the circuits for the slide-in camper when it was loaded on the truck. The camper wiring from the factory was mated to a 7-pin connector to feed the camper's turn signal lights, the brake lights, the back up lights, the front, side, rear and license marker lights (I believe that would be five of the pins), and then the positive and negative power leads to the camper circuit breaker panel (the remaining two pins). The two batteries are isolated from each other when the truck ignition is off. With the ignition on they are connected, and if the engine is running, both batteries will be charged by the alternator. I keep a smart trickle charger connected to the passenger side/starter battery most of the time, but switch it the passenger side every two weeks, since with the ignition off, the charger will not charge both batteries at the same time.

As I reported in an earlier dual battery related post, I've never had any issues with the factory dual battery setup. My batteries have not always been "matched", and they are not a matched pair today.

 

Thanks. And yes, lots of wires!
One other question I had is can you get a close-up of the numbers on the top of the relay/solenoid? Just curious if yours is a standard Ford starter relay, or a separate number rated at continuous duty.
I’m sure the parts books that some of the members here have will show whether it’s the same or different, but I’m still curious.

Thanks!