By Dustin Wilks
Special to BassFan

(Editor's note: "Catching Bass with Dustin Wilks" airs five times per week on the Sportsman Channel – 2 p.m. ET Sunday, 4:30 a.m. Monday, 6 a.m. Tuesday, 11 a.m. Wednesday and 5:30 a.m. Saturday. The six-time Bassmaster Classic qualifier provides BassFans with additional insight about each episode in these submissions.)

Wouldn’t it be nice to have unlimited power for your trolling motor? A little nuclear-powered bass boat, never having to worry about running out of battery juice?

I’m a shallow-water power-fisherman and thus heavy on the trolling motor. My buddies told me I needed to slow down. I'd tell them I’ll slow down when we find something. I’m quite sure I blast by a lot of fish, but I’m not really looking to catch every fish in front of me (although that sounds nice).

What I’m looking for is “that” bite. I want the one that identifies how the big fish are positioned and how fast they want the lure.

Because I want efficiency on the water, I take batteries seriously.

Many years ago, I would carry an extra set of standard lead acid batteries in the boat and change them out on the water when the first set gave out. I hated when the batteries would die by 1 p.m., when there was so much time left to fish. What a pain that whole thing was. I remember some of my friends even carrying a generator in the boat with them until B.A.S.S. banned them for safety reasons.

Enter AGM (Absorbed Glass Mat). When these came along, especially the big group 31 size made with pure lead (which I still use for a cranking battery), things got way better. I was impressed; they would keep me going, but at huge costs in price and weight. I had four batteries at 280 pounds total and spent over $2,000 getting the very best. These did very well compared to my old system of standard lead acid batteries. I would start the day on 50 to 60 percent of my trolling motor power setting and end it on 100 just to stay at the same speed, but they would last through the day.

Enter lithium – Don’t Die Lithium Batteries.

I’ve never been one to skimp on power and I want the biggest and the best trolling motor and cranking batteries I can get. I’m generally slow to adopt new technology because of potential bugs. I’m glad I waited.

I now use Don’t Die Lithium Batteries, which you may not have heard of. If you follow Bassmaster pro Bernie Schultz, you have heard of them because he adopted them early on, keen to take advantage of all the benefits lithium provides to both his bass boat and his shallow-water skiff for saltwater.

You might ask why I chose them. I did a lot of research. The first thing is that they are not just a start-up sticking their label on a battery.

The Lithium Battery Company makes the Don’t Die Series trolling motor batteries and they make batteries for major corporations and specialty batteries for cool companies like Space-X and have been in business a long time.

I made a trip to Florida and talked with the owner, Nathan Staron, while filming an episode of Catching Bass with Dustin Wilks TV. I learned so much about lithium batteries on that trip.

The most shocking thing was Nathan telling me about his trips to dozens of factories in China to see how these batteries are made. He saw firsthand how many manufacturers are just using recycled lithium cells removed from big city electric buses. In fact, Nathan said there are likely only 3-4 lithium battery cell manufacturers producing batteries using high-grade lithium cells.

The next thing that convinced me that Don’t Die Lithiums were the way to go is an exclusive reset button. I’ve heard the horror stories of guys killing lithium batteries and not being able to charge them without disconnecting them and getting a jump from another lithium battery. With Don’t Die Lithium, they are programmed to shut down with enough juice stored in the battery that your charger will recognize that there is something there to charge. Simply hold the reset button down for 3 seconds, and you are back up and running, ready to take a charge.

It is unlikely that you will kill these batteries in the first place, so the reset button is just added peace of mind.

Last, but not least, is compatibility with Power-Pole CHARGE. BassFans are already aware of this revolutionary charger through many of the top-level pros who endorse it. It is truly awesome, allowing you to go on crazy adventures for days without charging with an outlet. It charges your trolling motor batteries while you run.

While the CHARGE is state of the art, it can only work well with compatible batteries, and not all batteries are created equal. I learned that every lithium battery has a control board or a “brain”. This little computer controls all kinds of stuff I can’t explain, but what I can explain is, it has to be compatible with your charger to be safe and fast.

Nathan has extensive knowledge of these boards and the technology to make them work properly. Since all these major corporations like Space X and General Dynamics trust him, I do too.

In the future, Don't Die lithium trolling motor batteries with the C-Monster Network will unlock new possibilities for Power-Pole users while providing powerful analytics capabilities to give unprecedented insight into battery performance. Their advanced diagnostic tools will allow users to detect issues before they arise while giving unrivaled control.

The grand finale for me was my personal testing of the battery. I fish a lot, and way beyond tournament hours. The most amp hours I’ve used so far is 43 in one day. This was with minimal use of my outboard (like 10 minutes). I fished daylight till dark heavy on the trolling motor, in current with very few breaks.

Fishing and running my outboard as I normally do, I’m averaging only 15 amp/hours used, which I can see right on the Don’t Die app on my phone. The app is so advanced it can detect a problem with the trolling motor or boat wiring in advance of a major issue, saving you precious time on the water and enhancing your own safety. The times I make a long run, I come back in to find my batteries almost fully charged because of the Power-Pole CHARGE.

I still can’t get over the Don’t Die 36V, a single battery that fits in a standard group 31 size battery tray, weighing only 35 pounds. My Caymas CX-21, which is a tremendous bass boat for shallow water, only gets that much better with less weight in the back.

The Don’t Die is 36V with 50 amp hours of usable energy on a full charge. This is roughly equivalent to three 100-amp hour lead acid batteries since they will not power a trolling motor when they discharge around 50 percent. Lithium goes full power until it shuts off.

Nathan says having three drop-in batteries wired in series can cause a situation where your power is only as good as your weakest link. This means three chances for problems with the standard setup like most of us are used to. A single 36V battery is most efficient. A single battery in combination with the Power Pole Charge will suit 99 percent of anglers perfectly.

With that said, you will find almost all professional anglers have two 36V batteries in parallel as a fail-safe. When you have that much money on the line, and the battery only weighs 35 pounds, there is no disadvantage other than the cost of the extra battery.

While I understand the price of the combo of the CHARGE and the Don’t Die Battery seems high, in the long run, they are more cost-effective and afford more quality time on the water.

While these batteries may not be for everyone, for those who made it to the end of this entire article, this combo is for you – we love to fish! The Don’t Die Battery and the Power-Pole CHARGE are as close to nuclear as you can get, but without the radiation!