Our Bass Boat has two batteries...one for the engine and electronics, and one for the trolling motor up front. Some bass boats have as many as 4, but ours is not that sophisticated :-) The engine battery is automatically charged when the engine runs, but the trolling battery is not. Outboard engines don't have much of an alternator / charging circuit, so most people charge the trolling batteries each night. I'm working on a circuit to allow for charging the trolling battery from the engine when running, but that is not ready, yet. I also have a solar charger that I'm setting up for the trolling battery, and will blog info on it, when it's completed. Dad gave me a cool battery manager for the engine battery for Christmas, made by Battery Tender. I also have a Schumacher automobile battery charger with analyzer that came with our Jon boat, so I use it on the series 27 deep cycle battery we use for the trolling motor. This isn't as elegant as those multi-output charging stations some have installed in their bass boats, but it works and the price is right :-)
