Multiple Chargers
I’m traveling and the charger has failed. Until I can get it repaired I’ll buy and use a standard auto charger. Have you used multiple chargers on a battery bank or do you know which ones work in that...
Forum Discussion
I'm not going to get into a Pmatch here, but this is what I did for cruising yacht owners for years before the depression shut us down.
You will do much better to either separate the bank into sections if you can and charge each individually with small chargers or get one big charger and try to charge the assembled bank. If you buy a free standing 3+stage converter charge now, it can be temporarily connected to your house bank and properly installed later.
If you put multiple charges on any single bank, you will not get the full rate from all of them. I know, I have had to diagnose this a number of times and made some good money doing it. This advice is free and based on decades of experience and other people's money.
If the chargers you buy are any decent kind of automatic (suggested) then they will back down in their set-point order as soon as the bank voltage gets anyplace above dead. It does not matter if it is a stand-alone, MPPT solar controller or the main engine alternator, the same holds true based on my experience and the expensive instruments that I use to diagnose these kinds of issues.
Matt
You will do much better to either separate the bank into sections if you can and charge each individually with small chargers or get one big charger and try to charge the assembled bank. If you buy a free standing 3+stage converter charge now, it can be temporarily connected to your house bank and properly installed later.
If you put multiple charges on any single bank, you will not get the full rate from all of them. I know, I have had to diagnose this a number of times and made some good money doing it. This advice is free and based on decades of experience and other people's money.
If the chargers you buy are any decent kind of automatic (suggested) then they will back down in their set-point order as soon as the bank voltage gets anyplace above dead. It does not matter if it is a stand-alone, MPPT solar controller or the main engine alternator, the same holds true based on my experience and the expensive instruments that I use to diagnose these kinds of issues.
Matt
