I have a minn Kota endura c2 55 on a 12ft alumacraft jon boat that I take in and out of the back of my truck. The trolling motor is my main battery source and I mostly fish a river and go for multiple hours at a time and go at least a couple times a week. Just wondering what would be the best battery to run with that. My last battery just broke, I had a cabelas advanced anglers group size 22 and that recently just melted my negative wire on my trolling motor and burnt around the the negative terminal. It was a little over 2 years old. What could of caused that?

Poor connection.

Tom

1 hour ago, WRB said:

Poor connection.

Tom

Absolutely a bad connection, loose/dirty connections cause heat to build up, look no further than right there where it melted.

The best battery? Run the largest deep cycle wet cell you can afford that has the highest reserve capacity rating.

23 hours ago, slonezp said:

The best battery? Run the largest deep cycle wet cell you can afford that has the highest reserve capacity rating.

....That and the heaviest one you want to lug in and out of the boat. Some of those batteries can be really heavy and depending on a persons age, physical strength, etc may be a no go.

The battery maybe OK and just overheated the terminal connection.

I assume the TM is a tiller mount with battery clips to connect to the battery post?

You shouldn't use clips. Now that you have burned the terminal connection, cut off the clips and replace with crimp on terminal lug that has a hole (5/16 to 3/8) for the battery bolt, if it has one. If no terminal bolt (usually 5/16) then get a clamp on battery terminal with a stainless steel terminal bolt.

Keep everything clean of oxides and use wing nuts to fasten the wire terminal lug to the battery terminal bolt.

Buy a good quality marine deep cycle battery within your budget, group 25 would be minimum, larger is better.

Tom