independent of the windlass battery in the v-berth, I have four 6-volt house bank and one 12 volt starter, banks one and two. These are wired properly and are regulated. The alternator through the balmar regulator charges these correctly. I've never seen more than 14 something volts going into them and when the sixes are low, it can crank in lots of amps at that voltage. Wind generator and solar are all wired through this and even when the wind generator is going at 15 amps in, the voltage going into all these batteries is 14.1 or 14.2.

I believe that the windlass battery is wired straight to the alternator, with no regulator, hence the 16 volts. This sounds insane to me, and a way to pop a battery, but the windlass motor is not getting any of that juice until I press the switch and it is under an up or down load. It would seem that the 16 or so volts going to it at that time would only be for a very short time until it dropped down to whatever voltage/amperage the undersized wires can supply to the windlass battery. I probably should be more immediately concerned with frying the battery, because it is going to get those 16 volts as long as the engine is running. If this is really happening, I'm surprised I haven't blown the boat up.