Purpose of Bus Bars?

[RedFred]

I know the answer must be already out there somewhere on the internet, but for the life of me I can't find it.

In most big builds I see people wiring batteries using bus bars, instead of just normal wire and lugs.

Is there an actual advantage to do so? Or is it more of a convenience factor for not having to crimp a ton of wires?

Any and all info appreciated?

[WalledSonic]

Convenience and to prevent a stacked cluster fuck of lugs connected to the battery terminals.  You can tap holes in the buss bars to spread out the lug connections across the length of the buss bar rather than all on the battery terminals.

[nadcicle]

14 minutes ago, WalledSonic said:

Convenience and to prevent a stacked cluster fuck of lugs connected to the battery terminals.  You can tap holes in the buss bars to spread out the lug connections across the length of the buss bar rather than all on the battery terminals.

This, plus it will hold the batteries together much better than wires.

[ShadeTreeMechanic]

The cross sectional area of a bus bar can easily be bigger than any cable. This means that more current can be delivered out of (and into) the bank. When batteries are daisy chained with cable, after the first few batteries the cable wont be able to carry enough current to live up to the batteries full potential. Bus bars should not be the only thing holding the bank together. A tray or box should be made to hold them, along with a way to clamp them into it. In the event of an accident, you don't want several hundred pounds of batteries to be bouncing around the interior of the vehicle. I see a lot of builds where people rely on gravity to hold them in place but it is a disaster waiting to happen.

[Karkov]

In my build i used wires (check it out) but I normally run buss bars.  Plus with buss bars you can make more connections for wires than there is battery terminals, which is nice when you need to run all kinds of equipment

[Mitchaford]

When you're working with bigger wire, 1/0 and larger, it starts to get really difficult to manage and get onto the terminal. One or two lugs is ezpz but 3/4/5 and so on its a pain. 

It also looks like crap

I picked up a pair of 14 inch long aluminum buss bars for $15 shipped. Hardware was maybe another $5 for 100pcs 

You can go from this spider looking thing 

To this which still looks like booty but its a lot easier to work with

[deathcards]

easier to get a good connection vs. 5 or 6 lugs on top of each other where maybe one or two get a good connection  or even none

[RedFred]

Okay, all very good info to have. I like the idea of bus bars too, just needed some backing up before I spent more money lol

Not sure if I'm allowed to ask (might turn into a vs thread?), but who do you guys go to buy bus bars from?

I've got 6 of these

http://www.sure-power.com/product/cd-technologies-high-rate-series-ups12-490mrlp/

[Mitchaford]

This is where I got mine from

http://stores.ebay.com/stonerstoolsandrawmaterials/

They have aluminum and copper. Mine were cut clean and exact length. 

 

[WalledSonic]

I bought on amazon. This website helps with specification of most conductive materials:

https://www.copper.org/applications/industrial/DesignGuide/selection/