Whitelightning

I know that in the 50's a lot of farmers put 8V batteries in tractors that were hard to start so it would give the starter a little more kick when starting. Those tractors had a cutout on them instead of a regulator which would quick charge the battery up to about 7 to 7.5V and then open a set of points and then charge at about 1 to 2 amps which when runnig the tractor would charge a 8V battery. This system didn't work to well when you ran the lights because the battery would be sucked down since the lights would draw more than 2 amps but it worked OK for day operation. The main drawback was that you had to make sure you checked the water level in the battery often. But these tractors generally didn't come out factory as 8V. If this truck originally came out as 6V and everything is 6V and it starts OK on 6V I would use a 6V otherwise I would convert to a 12V since the parts and batteries are more readilly available.

Kenneth L. Hollingsworth