Basic battery charging and solar question

Almot wrote:

And a lot of misquoted lines too :)...

For future reference, a quote is what's inside the quotation marks. I started with your comment because it was simply wrong, then expanded because other were, too.

Almot wrote:
As to the parasitic draws, half the time people include the fridge draw in this - though I don't think this is correct.

It's not. If it can be turned off and draw no current (as one might do during storage), it's not a parasitic load. A parasitic load is caused by a device which draws power even when off (like a car radio using power to keep station memory), or a device which simply can't be turned off (like a LPCO detector).

Almot wrote:
PS: The linked article is a bit messy. He was charging 2 different banks, 220 AH and 125 AH, with a nominal 12V/12W panel, and measured overcharging on 220 AH AGM. This battery is AGM, very low self-discharge.

Messy? it's quite simple - he saw both banks go above 15V when using an unregulated 12W panel. He then goes on to show just how little current is needed to maintain the charge on a battery, e.g. 0.2 A (~3 W) to maintain a 400 Ah flooded lead acid bank.