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Bob and Susan
Elite Nomad
Posts: 8813
Registered: 8-20-2003
Location: Mulege BCS on the BAY
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Mood: Full Time Residents
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"rule of thumb"
200w panel for every 6 volt battery
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landyacht318
Nomad
Posts: 247
Registered: 7-28-2007
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Equalization is not required often. It can be hard on a battery, causing more plate shedding, and boils off more water. Some manufacturers say every
7 cycles to 50% Depth of Discharge, others say monthly, some say only when you use a quality hydrometer and notice a certain disparity between the
cells in the battery/bank.
While an inexpensive Hydrometer is good at comparing cell to cell it cannot really be too accurate for determining state of charge.
Apparently Francis Freas hydrometers are the best available, and they are fragile. Using temperature compensation with these is apparently the only
99.9% accurate way to determine when flooded batteries reach full charge. Then you have the tools to determine what your battery bank requires to
best bring them up into the green.
Having a Solar charge controller with battery temperature sensing is very desirable, in my opinion.
Having an amp hour counter is another great battery monitoring tool, but it must be checked occasionally against the hydrometer.
Over on RV net they are talking about the desirability of the old manual chargers, because some have the ability to bring the charging voltages into
the high 15's given enough time. Today's 3 or 4 stage smart chargers usually will not exceed 14.4, or sometimes 14.8, and they might not remain up
there long enough until reverting to float voltage. 13.2 to 13.6, which is also temperature dependent.
I know my old manual Schumacher would do 15.4 volts. I can program my solar controller to go into the high 15's, but the batteries must already be
fully charged by midday for it to have enough current to hold 15.8 volts.
Like Automobiles cannot have too many grounds, an off grid system can not have too many solar panels, and it is cheaper to conserve electricity than
to produce it.
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Iflyfish
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3747
Registered: 10-17-2006
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I appreciate all the thoughtful posts. I am learning a lot and see I need more solar.....what's new?
Off to BC for some trout! Down Baja early next month.
Iflyfish
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snorklebob
Newbie
Posts: 11
Registered: 6-2-2007
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A bit off topic but maybe it can help someone. I have 12-T105 Trogens. On two different occasions I had one battery fail and stop the others from
fully charging. So of coarse I had to take 2 batteries off of my 12volt system. The suspect battery would only charge to about 4.2 volts on a separate
charger. This meant I had one dead cell out of 3. I thought it was build up at the bottom causing a short and so I had nothing to loose by playing
with it . So, I shook the 'S%&t' out of them and I guess it evened out the debris at the bottom and they are both working 2yrs later. Something
to try. Hope this works for someone else.
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MitchMan
Super Nomad
Posts: 1856
Registered: 3-9-2009
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Anybody know what the average cost of a KWH is using solar panels? I know it has got to be a range of cost/KWH as everybody's experience will vary.
Anybody ever calculate the cost in USD of a KWH over time for powering a small home with solar panels and batteries and battery chargers? You know, a
comprehensive cost analysis that includes all costs, using depreciation lives determined by actual hardware life experience, installation and even the
cost of recharging the batteries, etc.
[Edited on 9-23-2010 by MitchMan]
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larryC
Super Nomad
Posts: 1493
Registered: 8-11-2008
Location: BoLA
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Iflyfish
Charge to 13.5, now have "inteli charger" that varies charge. 130 solar panel.
Great discussion link ncampion, thanks.
Iflyfish |
Iflyfish
As others have said, and you now realize, you are under paneled. I suspect that is contributing to your sulfation problems.
As Landyacht mentioned and as this link will verify
http://www.trojanbattery.com/Tech-Support/BatteryMaintenance...
You should charge your batteries with at least 10% and as much as 13% of their amphour capacity, which in your case is 22.5amps to as much as 30amps.
(Figuring your bank is 225 amp hours.) Also 13.5 is too low a voltage. As the above link says the Trojan T 105's like to be charged to 14.8v.
Also a good way to tell when your batteries are fully charged is to monitor them with a batteriy meter like a Trimetric or similar, and as the charge
tapers down while in the absorb mode, when it finally tapers down to 1% of the amphour capacity of your bank (in your case 2.25amps) then you can
consider them fully charged and your controller then could be switched to a float charge. You will find that very few people acually charge their
batteries using these parameters but this is what the manufacturer recommends. Over at Northern Arizona Wind and Sun forum most of the guys recommend
5% to 10 to 13%, but in general you are better off spending your money on more panels than more batteries.
Hope this helps,
Larry
PS On the NAWS forum my username is rplarry
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wessongroup
Platinum Nomad
Posts: 21152
Registered: 8-9-2009
Location: Mission Viejo
Member Is Offline
Mood: Suicide Hot line ... please hold
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You guys... are such a wealth of information and knowledge .... WOW thanks so much... getting things back out on the drawing board... numbers are
looking pretty good.. at this time... will be checking out NAWS... thanks again...
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BajaGringo
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3922
Registered: 8-24-2006
Location: La Chorera
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Mood: Let's have a BBQ!
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They aren't for everybody but if you live in a high wind area like we do a wind turbine goes a long way to keep your batteries from discharging too
much at night. We have been so happy with the first one we installed that we are in the process of adding a second one now...
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Bob and Susan
Elite Nomad
Posts: 8813
Registered: 8-20-2003
Location: Mulege BCS on the BAY
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Mood: Full Time Residents
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BajaGringo i cant hear you...
the blades on the windmill are too loud
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BajaGringo
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3922
Registered: 8-24-2006
Location: La Chorera
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Mood: Let's have a BBQ!
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I have read prior posts from you saying that Bob but this one you can hardly hear at all, even in the 30+ mph gusts the other day (which were putting
out so many amps the solar feed via my Xantrex shut down!)
The waves on the beach below make much more noise and it is such a joy to see a constant 5 to 10 amps going into my battery bank late at night while
your panels are asleep.
I don't feel guilty at all turning the music up...
[Edited on 9-23-2010 by BajaGringo]
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Bob and Susan
Elite Nomad
Posts: 8813
Registered: 8-20-2003
Location: Mulege BCS on the BAY
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Mood: Full Time Residents
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i know...you're correct
i really need one to "test out"
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BajaGringo
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3922
Registered: 8-24-2006
Location: La Chorera
Member Is Offline
Mood: Let's have a BBQ!
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Like I said, they aren't for everybody. If you just get some good wind on some days it probably won't pan out for you. We have wind here probably 90%
of the time or more it seems like. Extremely rare when we don't see our turbine spinning although it does need to be about 10 knots to begin putting
out any power. The good news is that the ratio of increase in power to wind speed is cubed, so a little more wind is a lot more power.
Another suggestion I make is to throw away the cheap controller that comes with most of the turbines today and buy a good diversion unit from somebody
like Coleman Air. Keep your wind and solar feed controllers separate.
On our "worst" day here we got 1.2 kW from the turbine which is good enough for me. A second unit can only help I figure...
YMMV
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Bob and Susan
Elite Nomad
Posts: 8813
Registered: 8-20-2003
Location: Mulege BCS on the BAY
Member Is Offline
Mood: Full Time Residents
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for us simpletons...
YMMV="Your mileage may vary"
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snorklebob
Newbie
Posts: 11
Registered: 6-2-2007
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Hola, I have a 400X[Watt] wind turbine in Punta Chivato and it is almost silent. Almost. Our next door neighbor had an older one and it was quite
noisy. They have come a long way and I am very happy with the additional output to my PV system.
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