I see everybody jumping on the 16V band wagon.. Spending hundreds of dollars to convert their batteries and chargers and alternator over to 16V.. which got me to thinking about this and other than being the hip.. popular thing to do.. I just dont understand why people will want to fork over the money for something that isnt needed.

During my recent upgrade to a larger motor with 15:1 compression.. it was obvious my little 12V system wasnt going to cut it, specially when the batteries become weak.. My car, as will many other racers.. has two 12V batteries, each paralleled together.. I started pulling wires.. relocating solenoids and turned my system into a 24V system.. but the 24V is only to spin the starter motor over and is not used for anything else..

The first 12V battery still runs the lights, fan, pump and all the electronics.. the second battery is completely isolated and is only used on the starter circuit... at 24VDC, it spins the motor over mighty good too... almost too good.

Knowing that it wont.. but fearing that it might.. I went ahead and lowered the voltage for the starter, I have since swapped the second 12V battery for an old Volkswagon 6V battery.. which makes the voltage to the starter now an 18V system.

The first 12V battery will still be charged by the alternator and will still get a "top off" with the battery charger in between rounds.. But according to my math.. I will have to charge up the second 6V battery once.. maybe twice thru out the year, since the starter motor only spins over for a matter of a few seconds each time.

I'm not suggesting this mod for everyone.. but if you have the knowledge to draw up a schematic on how to isolate and run the 2nd battery.. think about it and see if you can come up with any flaws..

Back when I was running every weekend with my Daytona (8.60's@150mph) and on my second 16 volt battery I made the switch back to a 12 volt Sears Platinum battery. The car ran exactly the same ET with both systems even without an alternator. Both set-ups were with one battery. In the Duster I use the same battery but since have added an alternator. The only benefit with the 16 volt system that I ever noticed was that the engine turned over faster. Now I get over 6 years out of my batteries before i use them for something else. The 16 volts were good for about 3 years and I couldn't use them in anything else that I owned.

We are running 2 red-top 12 volts in both cars and the black dragster,and one 16 volt in the red dragster,no alternator's on any of them.We will be replacing the 2 red-tops in each to 1 16 volt for the weight savings.1 good 16 volt will do the job,but don't last as long and the 16 volt chargers don't charge the battery back up as fast as the 12 volt chargers.
Would really like to know which is the best battery for a race car.Everyone seems to think one is better than the other or it does not matter at all which battery you run.The new $1200.00+ batteries are out of the question.
What about using something like a motorcycle battery as the 2nd one in place of a 6 volt?
There are a lot of good mind's here on Moparts maybe if we put all our minds together we can come up with what's best!

Hike! - A few things to keep in mind: Overly complicated electrical systems = trouble. Charging batteries between rounds is NOT for door slammers. Find out what your ignition system likes is key. Ever wonder what your ignition system is seeing at the end of a run if you need to charge your battery when you get back to the pits?? Things that were ment to run between 13.8 and 14.2 volts ( lights, electric motors, solonoids, relays, batteries,etc.) will have a shortened life span if you try to run them out of their design parameters.

If your car is wired and grounded properly a 12volt system works, I re-wired my car using the spaggetti Mender wiring syestem and everything worked way better,fuel punp, fans, etc, They don't even recommened 16v check'em out great peaple,

No alternators.....the battery going below 12 volts during the run is my reason at the present for running the 16 volt battery.Running alcohol in both the dragsters and the faster the engine turns the better they crank on alcohol.But if someone has a better idea,better choice in batteries I'm all for it.

12 volts works fine until the voltage drops below 10.5 during cranking and your MSD quits due to low voltage. Under normal circumstances this never happens. But, have you ever forgot to turn the fuel pump on or anything stupid in a late round and spun the motor over and the car did not start. Well it happens.

My reasons for going to 16 volts were simple. I liked the way new cars light the highway. My old bulbs do with 16 volts. I like the fans, water pump, and fuel pump spinning harder. I also noticed a battery voltage drop when turning high RPM with 6 large nitrous soleniods open. With a 16 volt system your battery is basically dead at 13.5 volts. So little things like MSD never get low enough to quit.

I had considered switching back to 12 volts. Then some things changed at work that made me rethink this.

We have many 12 volts systems at work that were simply giving us a fit. DATA radios eat battery like crazy. They have surge protection that eats .7 volts. So you loose .3 volts and people go crazy. Electronic guys will quickly catch on to why that would be. So when you are on backup you quickly can be under 11.8 volts and declining fast. 11.5 and the Radio quits. We loose power quite often in storms and just normal power company service work. We can't have the safe passage of our freight stopped because we are hard headed and stuck in a 12 volt world. We now run 16 volts on these systems. Just like race cars we have to be careful and not overcharge our batteries. Not due to the battery health but the equipment they feed.

Leon

According to my racepak my voltage never went below 12.6 volts during a quarter-mile pass with a 60 amp alternator.

what about weight savings? are 16 volt batteries lighter than "standard" 12v car batteries?

in a vehicle with an alternator, is there a lightweight 12v battery that you can run instead of going 16v?

what's the cheapest, lightest battery out there? the guy I'm helping is NOT going to be spending hundreds of dollars on a battery.

Not sure who you are asking but there are some very light batteries out there, some being VERY expensive. Here is the info on the batteries my son and I have been using in our cars with lots of good luck. It says it is 60 pounds.
http://www.sears.com/diehard-platinum-automotive-battery-group-size-65-price/p-02850065000P

32 pounds but probably a lot more money.

http://shop.turbostart.com/16-Volt-Racing-Audio_c3.htm

Most guys I know have the battery in the rear of the car
so the weight isnt really a bad thing(but yes, weight
is weight).. I've never had any issue with the 12v
system and I dont plan on going to the 16v... I've
tried multiple things when it comes to the charging
system over the years, no alt, alt with a switch on
the field to turn it off and it never made any difference...
I havent even put a charger on my car in years...
the last time I did was when I unplugged my alt output
to plug my timing light in and I forgot to plug it
back on... now I use the Flaming River light so it
has its own power
NOTE
that same battery has been in the car for at least
8 years

But what is the most powerful of all batteries?Most of us may can get by with out the strongest battery,but all of us really need the strongest & best battery that's made.Lets start with a clean sheet and focus on only the battery nothing(not voltage,charging system,using or not using alt.) else and see which volt and name battery we end up with.

Well still happy with my boring plain old 16V XS Power batteries...They work great for me but maybe I need more compression.

If Mopar guys would get out and race and test more instead of constantly looking for that next TRICK part out on the market we as a group would be a lot better off. I've done it too but probably the most stupid thing that we as racers do is remove the alternator in hopes of going faster. Sorry folks, it doesn't work. Here's a list of what I am running during a pass with a 12 volt battery and maintaining 12.6 volts. (60 amp one wire alt)
starting engine
electronic ign with MSD 7 and misc. rpm boxes
Racepak and electronic dash
electric water pump
electric radiator fan (left on during pass)
electric tranny fan (left on during pass)
electronic shifter
BG400 fuel pump
rear taillights (at night)
tranny brake
delay box
line-loc

I think that's all.

I could not decide 12v or 16v and at the time my 12v were ok . So I went and bought a 12v/16v alterntor that way I can make the choice later