Okay to extend the trolling motor battery cable?

I troll with a jon boat and 45# MinnKota. The problem is that there's 290 lbs at the very back of the boat (me, the battery and the motor) and nothing amidships or in the bow. As a result, the wind blows the bow around like crazy and I spend a lot more time course-correcting than I should.

I'd like to put the battery further forward to get a little balance, but of course its cable is only 5 or 6 feet long. Would there be any problem getting an 8-10 ft. extension as long as it's the same (or larger) gauge? I suspect it might rob me of some amp efficiency but probably not enough to make a difference.

Any reason(s) not to do this?

I did that on mine I made the splice and soldered it and put heat shrink on it.

go for it it will wprk

It'll work fine.

agreed......use the same or one size larger wire.....solder the connections and heat shrink.....crimping will allow corrosion and rob you of potential power to the motor.........

We just did the same in dads (16') boat, I used #6 wiring.

Wire Sizing Chart 12 Volt System
Wiring Size Guide

We got a couple 5/16" stainless bolts, washers, nuts & wingnuts, recessed (countersunk) the heads of the bolts on the backside of a thick piece of (non-conductive) PVC, use flat washers and nuts to lock the bolts in place, and just attach the TM to the bolts same as you would a battery with the wingnuts. This also gives you a spot to clip on other 12v accessories.

Depending on how you plan to do it, I'd consider adding a breaker at the battery. If the bare wires would happen to contact the boat, you could arc-weld a hole in the hull in an instant. Cheap insurance.

You can get a breaker with a reset button that attaches directly to the battery. the lead attaches to the breaker. Works great. 6GA wire is more than enough . Good luck.

Many thanks for the advice. The MinnKota user manual recommends adding a 50-amp circuit breaker (why didn't they just include it as part of the package???) and CatFan offers a great reason to do so!

6-gauge, soldered and double shrink-wrapped, with a 50 circuit breaker. I'm going to look for foul hooks resettable breaker so I don't have to carry extra fuses.

I did the same thing, for the some of the same reasons. You will be fine if do as advised. 90% of my trips are alone, hitting waves the bow came up alot. Moved the batteries amid, fuel tank up also, quite stable now. They didn't include the breaker as it would cost them money. Safer for you, YES.

Minn Kota's breaker is about 40 bucks and probably worth the money, considering the options if it contacted the hull. On a separate note, I used to take a 48 qt cooler and put it up front, full of water, to help keep the nose in control. Worked well for me, and I just pulled the plug and let it run out the drain hole when on the way home. 5 gallon bucket works too, but isn't as stable and doesn't hold as many fish.

i'm rethinking some things on my boat, a 14' semi v bottom light weight aluminum, first i'm moving the battery to be just in front of the middle seat and putting a fuel tank in the front of the bow, then building a 2x4 frame making a box for the battery and the fuel tank, i plan to run 2 jumper cable gauge wires down one side of the boat and securing them to a wood block with 2 heavy bolts(one wire will be black and one red, bolts will be labelled to match the wires) and running a hard fuel line down the opposing side of the boat for a gas motor, and will complete the frame throughout the boat and cover it with 3/4" marine plywood, hope it works well for me, any suggestions on why this may or may not work?

I completed the "extension cord" project. I ended up using 8-gauge wire because Boats US had it as a 2-wire cord while the only 6-gauge I could find were single wires. First time out I hand-checked the entire length of the cord for heat while running the motor near full power; it wasn't warm at all.

At the joint I soldered the connection, two turns of electrical tape, shrink tube over each individual wire, then two shrink tubes over the two-wire connection (one from the original end and one from the extension end).

I still need to decide on the circuit breaker I'm going to use. I also need to come up with a good system to wrap and store this now-14 ft. cable. I think maybe a velcro tie-wrap, zip-tied on the back end of the motor's head. It won't look pretty but there's not a lot of surface on these motors to choose from. (I use publicly available jon-boats, so I have to rig and unrig the boat each time I use it; no permanent installation).

Thanks for all the suggestions!