I am gettin' some Hella 500s. Will I need a strong battery meant for use with accessories?

I might also want to leave them on while the vehicle is off sometimes. My battery I have now is weak. Think I should get a new one?

 

i would.
i got lucky and the po put in a pretty good battery and i have been able to run lights, and radio for 15 min+

 

My usual way of doing things is to stuff as big of a battery as I can under the hood of what I'm driving.... Right now I have Optimas in everything but the '98, and that might soon change...

 

I've got two batteries, I have the second mounted in the trunk, its wired up to my alternator so they both charge. I use mine for Fire/EMS stuff, so sometimes it will be on the road not running with all of my lights going.. thats two strobes and a rotating lightbar. I can keep everything going for around 45 minutes. I also put in an extended idling kit, sometimes it idles for a long long time. Such abuse.

 

Any suggestions on what kinda of battery and what size of one I should cram in there? Money is tight too.

 

I love my Optimas...tried everything else, I'm a fan of them now.

 

Well unfortunately batteries come expensive, and the price only goes up with power. I just went to Advanced and found the highest grade battery and picked two up. I'd suggest saving up for the new battery, or just try not to leave the lights on without the truck running until you can save up for the battery. Whereabouts do you live?

 

Northern Illinois

 

optimas are great. Dont forget a good high output alternator. If your alt can't charge it, it doesn't matter how good your battery is.

 

Okay, you get some rough winters I'd guess. Make sure its got a high cold-cranking amperage. 650+ is usually sufficient.

 

Hell yeah we do. -20 wind chills last night and about 1/2" of ice. Took me 20 minutes to get into my Jeep.

 

screw the battery and lights...i'd be moving SOUTH!!!

 

x2 on that one! I would have freak if i even saw ice outside, ice belongs in the freezer, not outside! (I'm a Floridian, we're coldaphobic..)

Anyways, I ran two fog lights on a cheapo Wal-Fart battery for quite awhile and it worked out well, didn't leave them on without the truck running that often though. I gotta agree on the Optima, I ended up getting one when my system killed the cheapo. They are excellent! The XJ starts in like two cranks now, and the fog lights are alot brighter too. Well worth the hefty price tag.

 

there is 0 reason to get a 150 dollar deep cycle gel battery to run a pair of 55w lights for half an hour w/o the motor running. When you go buy a battery check out the reserve capacity (RC) listed on it- the higher the better.

http://www.batterystuff.com/tutorial_battery.html#4

I've run my radio for 6 hours, power tools of an inverter, lights for a while... all without the motor running and I'm still using the same Deka battery. Cost 65 bucks and still starts up like new even when its 5 degrees out.

 

Haha no kidding i live in canada and this week its been -45 with the wind chill and my 800 cca barely cranked my jeep without pluggin it in, i usually have a 1200 cca battery in jeeps, although they higher the CCA the quicker they will die if you drain them down all the time. Lower CCA batteries are better for draining them and charging them back up, such as you would use for lights, so im probably goin with two batteries when i get around to it.