How hard to rewire a Caterpillar D6 to 12 volt starter from 24 volts?

I have a D6 sitting out back that needs a couple hundred bucks worth of batteries and a new starter.

Would it be difficult to rewire it to 12 volts and use a different starter?

 

You could wire two 12v car batteries in series for 24v...

 

That is pretty much what we have been doing. But it is scary. When you crank it, you can see the wires actually tense up, so you know there is all kinds of amps going through it.

I figured, it is only 66hp 6 cylinder, and 12 volt modern starter on a single battery should be strong enough to crank it.

 

Yeah, but it's prolly around 20:1 compression ratio. Not familiar with diesel's, do they have a compression release for starting?

 

Use bigger cables...

Unless you can locate a 12V starter that does the same work for less amps(not likely) the two battery workaround is your best bet...