2014-2016 Traxide Dual Battery Kit Lessons Learned

[Michael Gain]

I was able to dedicate about and hour today (it is Christmas Eve afterall).

Because I did not provide a good picture the first time, here is the wire with the two spade terminals that goes into the smaller, two-wire connector (not to best, as the garage door was closed to conserve heat):

I then wrapped it pretty well in electrical tape to protect the circuit from the elements, and to add some stability.

I also started building the multi-pin connector harness:

All of the terminal ends are color coded by the stripe in each wire (i.e. blue with white stripe has white electrical tape):

Finally, here is a picture of the harness connected and the wire run up on top of the radiator cowl:

More fun to follow after Christmas.

Merry Christmas everyone!

 

[Michael Gain]

Finally wrapped this up.

As already stated, I mounted the PSDB in front of the passenger side airbox. I recycled the original start stop, cross-engine wiring and modified as necessary.

The red lead is from my aux battery. The blue, shrink-wrapped lead I created by cutting the original wire that went from the "load" stud to the fuse box, and soldering a new ring terminal onto it---it brings power from the cranking battery to the PSDB. I also trimmed one of the battery box plugs to fit the unused harness connection:

Here is how the PSDB sits, all hooked up, and with the air box reinstalled. I left the "loads" stud empty (more on that later) as the fuse box is now connected directly to the starting battery:

Here is a better picture of how the wires are run across the radiator cowl. There are two looms: one for the aux battery lead, and one for the four-wire connector:

Working my way to the driver side, here is where the extended, four-wire harness connects to the original wires (shrink-wrapped in blue over the connectors, and yellow just to group the four wires together):

Here are the wires all tidied up, covered with wiring loom, and tucked underneath and behind the brake master cylinder:

More in the next post.

 

[Michael Gain]

Installed the aux battery and reinstalled the battery box. I sourced the black cable on top of the bracket from autozone. It ultimately feeds the PSDB as batt2 :

I then ran the cable along the A/C line to below the headlight:

In this picture, I connected the original fusible link to the cable coming across the radiator cowl, and the new, black lead from the aux battery. It tucks neatly underneath the coolant expansion tank and is zip-tied onto the washer fluid fill neck:

Final assembly of the aux box and components:

Final assembly of cranking battery box and components:

So, the ECO light is still on. Most likely because the "loads" stud is not connected. However, the LIN error is corrected and the heated steering wheel functions again--- i parked the truck outside for tonight. So, hopefully, i get a frost tonight to test the heated windscreen.

Bottom line: this correction makes the LIN happy, but the truck still doesn't like the fact that the PSDB is not completely connected--it has stored a code in the gateway module, but only to complain that the PSDB is not functional as expected.

I am happy with this compromise. I am sure that connecting "loads" back to the fuse box will remove the code, but will also re-enable start/stop.

So, there you have it. Make room for an aux battery and retain start/stop (or don't).

 

[bbyer]

The ECO light might just go off in a couple of weeks. It seems that open when I disconnect the cranking battery to replace it or whatever, I lose the ETA function on my NAV for a couple of weeks or so.

Then for no reason or with no warning, I will look at the NAV display and see the time of arrival at destination working again.

It is the same with the steering wheel button thing or whatever - usually in cold weather something goes wacky and I get a message to the effect that Cruise Control Not Available or some such.

Usually cold weather seems to set it off as I only seem to see it in the winter. As a fix, I amuse myself thinking that pressing repeatedly on the steering wheel cruise control rocker switches will hurry the disappearance of the message. Maybe so, maybe not, but a few days or hours later, the message does not reappear upon an engine start.

The same might prove true of the ECO light it will just go away.

 

[Michael Gain]

Since I started this debacle, I wanted to see it through to the end.

Great success (no ECO light):

Since installing the dual battery kit, moving the PSDB, and hooking it back up, I still had some annoying codes---even though my heated windshield and steering wheel came back:

In an attempt to resolve these, I hooked the PSDB up to mimic the stock set up: cranking battery to batt1, auxiliary battery to batt2, fuse box to loads, and I reattached the starter leads to the PSDB instead of bridging to the battery.

The codes would still return once cleared. Additionally, I received two new codes related to the in-cabin humidity sensor (will make a new post):

Researching these faults on other forums led me to believe that this affected the start stop functionality as well. So, I replaced the sensor.

I had just received some waterproof connectors and was postured to redo all of my wiring for the PSDB. In a moment of clarity (rare) I decided to check the fusible links and fuse (old picture but you get the idea):

I found that the 5A fuse was blown.

I replaced the 5A fuse, reinstalled the air intake system from replacing my MAF sensors, and started it up.

The ECO light is finally off and there are no codes after sitting at idle for about 5 minutes.

After a couple drive cycles I will let everyone know if the start stop is functional again, and whether any codes return

 

[greiswig]

I am tuning in late to this. I'm less interested in disabling the ECO mode (can't that just be done with the switch?) than I am in having a really good second battery available instead of the itty one there.

I read this entire thread pretty thoroughly, and I'm still a little confused. I guess my main questions boil down to these:

1. If all of the electrical wires were magically extended, so that you could relocate the power management box with all wiring attached, and you hooked up a different 12V battery in place of the existing itty one, would things still work as designed and not throw codes?
2. Is the existing power management box able to handle the load of charging a larger battery, or is that just going to burn up the MOSFETs or other components?

 

[Michael Gain]

I am tuning in late to this. I'm less interested in disabling the ECO mode (can't that just be done with the switch?) than I am in having a really good second battery available instead of the itty one there.

I read this entire thread pretty thoroughly, and I'm still a little confused. I guess my main questions boil down to these:

1. If all of the electrical wires were magically extended, so that you could relocate the power management box with all wiring attached, and you hooked up a different 12V battery in place of the existing itty one, would things still work as designed and not throw codes?
2. Is the existing power management box able to handle the load of charging a larger battery, or is that just going to burn up the MOSFETs or other components?

1) yes

2) it can handle the load.

My start stop functionality is restored as if I were still running the smaller battery.

The traxide kit just adds the isolation solenoid, "always on" outlets in the rear, and an Anderson plug mounted beside my trailer hitch.

 

[greiswig]

Thank you sincerely, Michael! I appreciate your share here.