Battery Security

[TitanMike]

Having lost two batteries to a backyard thief in the past I decided to make it a little more difficult for them to steal my new batteries with just a pair of diagonal cutters and a box cutter.

Having never faced this issue before the batteries on my old trailer were just secured to the rack with the standard polypropylene belt over the battery boxes. Was washing dishes one morning in my house and when I looked out the window I saw wires hanging. The batteries had taken a walk the night before.

Here's what I decided to do for my new batteries. Since I wanted to incorporate a battery selector switch, and the group 20 batteries wouldn't fit in the factory provided rack, I went with a pressure treated 2X10 with a piece of 1X6 for the switch support.

The 2X10 is secured to the top of the frame with some #12 "Truck Deck Screws" (self drill/tap with wide, flat heads). Boxes are secured to 2X10 with 4 Stainless FH screws and Stainless Fender washers. The final security is provided by a Master Python 5/16" cable lock routed through the battery box lids so the cable is directly against the top of the battery and at the mid-point between terminals. It then wraps around the factory rack below so when snugged tight there is no slack that would allow a 'tweaker' to merely break apart the box and then slide the batteries out through the now slack cable. To further confound a would be thief, the cable on one side is routed through a hole in the base and a screw eye on the other (not enough width in the 2X10 for a hole on that side).

Yes, I suppose one could merely cut the cable but having cut a few cables in my lifetime it's not as easy as one thinks. Not going to do it in just a few seconds with some diagonal cutters or even with small bolt cutters. It takes a "cable cutter" to make a quick cut and someone carrying one through a campground or down a neighborhood street is going to get noticed. Since I have a pad at home behind a fence (no locked), and I don't leave my trailer for weeks at a time unattended in a campground/hunting camp/etc, I figure the batteries will "stay mine" for a lot longer than the last pair.

If this setup works well for maintenance (just loosen the cable and the lid can be lifted then pulled tight after) and security I'll drop the wood setup off at my local fabricator (my Son) and have it re-made out of steel and welded to the frame.

Total cost for the setup was $36 for two Python Cable locks and about $5 for the miscellaneous hardware. The rest came from my wood storage shelf where I put usable leftovers from previous projects. I already owned the battery selector and the cover is just a patio outlet cover with NM electrical box I modified to accept the marine battery switch. I can lock the cover to keep "little fingers" from shutting off my batteries when I'm not looking.



For those see flaws feel free to critique. As for the cables, yes, they are the weakest link but like all security devices, they merely delay all but the most determined thieves. My next project is to add an alarm to the setup and I'm working on some ideas there. Maybe something as simple as a mouse-trap switch with a siren attached to the end of each battery that sounds the alarm when the battery is lifted out of the box. It should at least make people notice or if I'm near then deploy my second security measure