2nd leisure battery under drivers seat

[Fishinbrine]

Good afternoon, I currently have a 95ah leisure battery in the rear of my T6.1 and Victrin B2B charger supplied with its own 16mm cable from the starter battery, also Victron Solar charger, Victron Shunt and a Sargent fuse box with the charging function disabled.
What I would like to do is add a 2nd leisure battery underneath the driver's seat but am unsure of the best way to wire this with my existing battery, especially considering the distance between the 2 proposed battery locations.
Do I just put in a busbar under the driver's seat and split the power from the vehicle battery there? Or so I just wire the 2 batteries together as if they was right next to each other? Would I need a second smart shunt? How would the solar be able to maintain the 2nd battery?

Any advice would be fantastic as always!

Thanks all!

 

[Fishinbrine]

Or actually, am I just better off upgrading my existing leisure battery to a lithium 300ah and then running a separate power to under the driver's seat as a connection point for things I would like to power from there to save fiddly cable runs?

 

[Bigsidavies]

If you're going to have 2 batteries connected together in parallel then they are supposed to be identical, including age, so I'd just get a lifepo LB.
If your current 95Ah battery is lead acid then even a 100Ah lifepo will double your useable capacity, so maybe keep costs and size down and get a 200Ah lifepo. Only you know your power requirements.
I'm not sure what you are trying to achieve when you say running a seperate power to under the driver's seat. Surely anything you want to power in the van from the LB would be run from a 12v fusebox to wherever it's required.
It also sort of implies that you are thinking of putting another LB under the seast so you can have some sort of bastardised system where you have the 2 batteries connected togetheer but run different things from each battery.

 

[Fishinbrine]

Yeah in fairness I think your right and having gone over it more in my head I don't know what I'm really thinking of!
I'm just gonna go for a lithium LB in place of my AGM battery, if I could delete this thread I would!

 

[Bigsidavies]

Mate you have to kick these ideas around to come to a conclusion. It’s not a stupid post and it’ll probably help someone else somewhere down the line.

 

[Fishinbrine]

This is what happens when you're sat in ya garage on a Saturday afternoon, find a load of 10mm and 16mm cable, a busbar, spare midi fusebox and ya want something to do!

Fairly obvious that i should just upgrade my existing LB and use the existing fuse boxes i have in the van!

Sunday morning now........ what should i do with this spare carpet and dodo mat i have found.......................