Meanwell is here!!
Ordered a Meanwell SP-200-15 from Jameco on Thursday, it arrived Saturday, looking all shiney and new. Here is the link to the listing on Jameco: http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Pr...
Forum Discussion
Phil, the point is that no matter how long you stay at 14.4 it is not going to do the job when batt specs say you need time at 15.x to do the job.
Longer at 14.4 does not make up for some time at 15.x.
The real trouble off grid is you can only meet the specs for 15.x after the batts are full and you can't even get past 90% full on any reasonable generator time.
The only solution so far seems to be to get as high as you can on generator and then swap to a solar controller that can do the 15.x trick, if only the sun stays up that long so it can get there.
If the sun goes down too soon, then you have to do the split bank trick, where you split the bank at 97% or whatever you got to at sun down, run the rig on half the bank that night while the other half of the bank stays at that 97% overnight. Now in the morning your solar can get going again on the rested half bank and "finish/top charge" it and even do an equalize, whatever needed to get SG to baseline.
Now you can swap over and run the rig on the "recovered " half and do the necessary on the run-down other half with solar over the next two days. (the weatherman has to be on your side to schedule this whole thing for that week it takes to do both halves)
It is a supreme PITA to get it all done when you have no shore power for weeks or months at a time, and you have to rely on the weatherman to be telling the truth for once. :(
Longer at 14.4 does not make up for some time at 15.x.
The real trouble off grid is you can only meet the specs for 15.x after the batts are full and you can't even get past 90% full on any reasonable generator time.
The only solution so far seems to be to get as high as you can on generator and then swap to a solar controller that can do the 15.x trick, if only the sun stays up that long so it can get there.
If the sun goes down too soon, then you have to do the split bank trick, where you split the bank at 97% or whatever you got to at sun down, run the rig on half the bank that night while the other half of the bank stays at that 97% overnight. Now in the morning your solar can get going again on the rested half bank and "finish/top charge" it and even do an equalize, whatever needed to get SG to baseline.
Now you can swap over and run the rig on the "recovered " half and do the necessary on the run-down other half with solar over the next two days. (the weatherman has to be on your side to schedule this whole thing for that week it takes to do both halves)
It is a supreme PITA to get it all done when you have no shore power for weeks or months at a time, and you have to rely on the weatherman to be telling the truth for once. :(
