PD4655 converter question

Thanks again everyone - no worries about hijacked threads, it is all good information being shared here! My last trailer had the PD9145 in it, with the charge wizard and 2 group 24's, and it worked perfectly. I'm probably splitting hairs between the PM and the PD, but I'll probably stay with PD since I was happy with it in the past.

I replaced my single stage 45 amp model with a direct change out swap using the PD4655. Works fine, brings up the batteries and goes in to maintenance mode with slow flashing green LED. Put it in bulk charge and the LED lights in the MH noticeably brighten up. New fuse board came with the large main fuses, you transfer the existing fuses from the old board. Took me about 2 hours to complete. Glad I did it to maintain battery during the winter, and bulk charging dry camping.

terryaGJ wrote:
Mbopp - did you run the IOTA output through a fuse before the battery? Did you wire the output of the WFCO through the IOTA DC output to provide path back to distribution panel?

Terry

The IOTA is hard-wired to the battery terminals, no fuse or circuit breaker. Good point though.
I didn't do anything with the factory 12V wiring. The feed comes off the batteries and through the WFCO 12V fuses.
For the AC power to the IOTA I tapped off a 120V outlet in the bedroom, drilled a hole and ran the cable down into the pass-through, and added a switch and duplex outlet.

hikerboy1 wrote:
After some further conversing with Randy at Best Converter, he is a big fan of the Boondocker Powermax units....more so than the PD units. He says that they charge faster than the PD units do. So now I'm back on the fence. I like the idea of a longer warranty and an easier install, plus they are less expensive. Seems like too good to be true, but before I click the "buy now" button, any final thoughts?

PowerMax is a great converter. The drop in replacement seems too easy. It will serve you well.

The only issue is the charging profile. As soon as the converter hits 14.6 volts (at the converter) the PowerMax moves down to 13.6 volts to complete the charge. This leaves you charged somewhere about 70% to 90% depending on the charge rate and battery size. The smaller the battery and larger the converter puts you at the lower end close to 70%. Four batteries charged with the small PM should get you closer to 90% but will take a few minutes longer.

PD4600, PD9200 will continue to hold 14.4 volts for a full 4 hours and get you to 90% every time.

Is it a huge big difference. Maybe not. Go a little big with the PD and a little smaller with the PM is my only advice.

My plan was to put a new converter within 3' of the battery so that's why I purchased the PD9260 deck mount. I was replying to BurbMan why I couldn't go his route of paralleling wire since I already purchased the deck mount. I thought about a PD 4655 or a PowerMax replacement for the WFCO but since I had 15' of 6 ga I wanted to eliminate the voltage drop.

Why get a PD9260 over a PD4655 if you want to put it where the WFCO was? Same charge wizzard, and 5A different.

Hikerboy1 - sorry I hijacked your thread, I thought it was pretty much at an end when I posted.

BurbMan - thanks for the feedback. I just ordered a PD9260 two days ago, planning on doing what RoyB recommended. Looks like dimensionly the PD9260 won't fit in the WFCO space so can't do what you did and run parallel wire. I bought a new breaker to run AC wire to the front near the batteries for the PD9260, will keep the WFCO hooked up so will have ability to run the WFCO if the PD9260 goes down. What I was a little fuzzy about was hooking the output from the WFCO into the output for the PD9260.

Mbopp - did you run the IOTA output through a fuse before the battery? Did you wire the output of the WFCO through the IOTA DC output to provide path back to distribution panel?

Terry

I did what RoyB did - installed a deck-mounted converter (IOTA 55 in my case) in the front pass-through which gave me a 3' run to the batteries. I put the WFCO on its own circuit breaker and the IOTA has its own switch.

Terry I replaced my WFCO with the PD 4655. My converter is about 25' from the batteries and had the same #6 wire. The wire runs through the floor joists and I couldn't get to it, so I added a #4 wire running underneath the floor inside some split loom and zip tied it to the black pipe propane line. So I have two (+) lines running from the converter to the batteries, one #6 and one #4, giving me a combined capacity that is slightly greater than a #2 wire. The two wires start and end at the same points, just take separate paths. The (-) path is the frame, so no capacity issues there.

You definitely need to either upgrade the wire or shorten the path like RoyB did to get the performance out of the PD converter. In my case RoyB's solution presented more wiring issues that it solved. Whatever you do is going to depend on your floor plan and what fits best.

I replaced my WFCO 8955 with a PD4655 and am quite pleased. When the batteries are low the PD holds the charge amperage until the converter sees the set voltage at the converter, that's pretty good IMHO.

I don't see where the Boondocker can manually be put into boost mode, where the PD can. The advantage to that is lower charge time when using the generator, even if the batteries don't require it. For this reason I would install the PD distro board with LED and boost control.

I would go with the 55A model, the EU2000 will have no issues with it. Peak draw is 950w, throw a fridge into the mix and your at 1250w. The EU2000 is rated for 1600 continuous, 2000 surge.