What to expect out of my trolling motor

[fisherman21]

I feel like I have been having issues with my trolling motor my last couple times out, but I’m not sure because I don’t often spot lock in one location for hours. Last Saturday I was spot locked in place for about 4 hours in 10 to 15 mph winds before the motor died. Today I was spot locked for an hour in 20 plus mph winds before it died. The trolling motor was running at 10 speed to keep me in place. Does this seem normal to you guys. All batteries were fully charged. 

[rolmops]

I do not know what voltage your motor draws and I do not know the battery capacity you have and I do not know how new those batteries are.

But in spite of all those unknowns it sounds to me that, that trolling motor is working very hard and that it is probably just fine.

Spot locking in hard winds takes a lot of energy and you cannot really compare performance by wind speed alone. 20 mph creates strong surface currents that are on top of wind speed.

and dependent on the wind direction there may not have been a lot of current when the wind speed was 10 to 15

 

Edited April 28 by rolmops

[Roys Boys]

Have you checked you voltage at the plug? If it’s 24-36 volt try taking your leads off and checking each battery to make sure they are all good and getting a full charge. My 36 volt I can get about 5-6 hours of spot lock and cruising for fish

[fisherman21]

1 hour ago, rolmops said:

I do not know what voltage your motor draws and I do not know the battery capacity you have and I do not know how new those batteries are.

But in spite of all those unknowns it sounds to me that, that trolling motor is working very hard and that it is probably just fine.

Spot locking in hard winds takes a lot of energy and you cannot really compare performance by wind speed alone. 20 mph creates strong surface currents that are on top of wind speed.

and dependent on the wind direction there may not have been a lot of current when the wind speed was 10 to 15

 

Ah yes, it’s a 24 volt. One battery is on its second season and the other one is new. The boat is an alumacraft trophy 195. The motor was coming in and out of the water all morning with the waves

[Fishmaster 196]

You need to check each battery independently to see if it is good.  I have a 24v system and bought group 29 size agms figuring they were better.  After one year one of the battery's went bad.  When one is bad it will draw the charge from the good battery and they will both drain faster than normal.  

[13owhunter]

I have two cheap lithium batteries and one charges "weird" sometimes.  It charges faster than it should every once in awhile.  Really not sure if it is the charger or battery.  If I unplug it for an hour and plug it back in it charges normally.  This caused significantly lower run time until i figured it out.

 

When I was troubleshooting the issue, I picked up two cheap LCD voltage displays from amazon so I could see the voltage when charging and using them. They use hardly any power. May be worth picking some up so you can monitor voltage on the water.  Like it was mentioned above, if one battery has more capacity then the other, the lower one will die real quick.

[Prof T]

My experience tells me something way more simple: If the motor can’t keep up with the conditions (for an amount of time that I an unsure if) it will protect itself and give up. If you are close enough to hear it will give you a chirp from the motor. 
 

It could be under mild stress with discharged batteries or getting blown too far off mark with good ones.