is the convertor supposed to charge the batteries?
Our parrallux 7300 never has. Years ago we bought a tiny charger and installed it in the battery area. It was recommended by this forum. I wonder if it affects the convertor Thank all
Forum Discussion
VintageRacer wrote:
To answer your question, in most installations the converter is used to provide the 12v power to the accessories and lights in the RV and to charge the house battery. If there is no 120VAC power available, the house battery supplies the 12V power. If there is 120VAC available the converter turns on, supplies the power and charges the battery.
I side with those who recommend replacing the old transformer style Parallax with a modern multi-stage converter. The small separate charger can be a good idea for keeping a float charge on the batteries but it's normally too small to achieve the rapid recharge that you want in an RV that may only have power for a couple of hours a day.
Brian
Hi, Brian,
Did you happen to look at the units I linked to? Do you believe these are too small to provide anything over a float charge?
The only thing limiting the size of charger is the wiring to the batteries and the batteries themselves. There is nothing limiting the OP from using a 'larger' charger, next to the batteries, and therefore there is no reason to use a 'small' charger, capable of only floating the batteries.
Let's say the batteries can easily handle a 75 amp charge current. This would require a short length of say 2-4 awg between charger and batteries. But to carry that 75 amps over a much longer distance, would require perhaps 1 or 2 '00'. But if the max draw OFF the batteries is say 30 amps max, at any given time, then the long factory cabling from the batteries to the 12v panel can be a lesser gauge than required to handle 75 amps.
The wiring throughout the rig would be, therefore, limiting the re-charge current to much less than 75 amps, but it would easily handle the 30 amps from the batteries to the 12v distribution area.
A simple (and less expensive) solution:
Install a decent little power supply next to the batteries, as BFL suggested, and have two separate 120v - 12v 'converters' (in other words, power supplies), providing two separate functions; one to charge at a much more reasonable rate, and one to provide real time power.
