Replacing my Converter/Charger - Help

DrewE wrote:

Steve92004 wrote:

I turned it up all the way and it's at 16.6V
The instructions say it should stay at the set level for a half hour and the decrease and stay at that level for two hours, and then decrease to float level

I thought smart chargers were supposed to work on voltage not timing

Edit.... It dropped to 15.8 after 30 minutes

They can't work on changing voltage while supplying a fixed voltage. All the unit will ever see when set at 16.6 V is 16.6 V (assuming it can supply enough power to maintain that voltage level, of course).

What it could theoretically do is monitor current and drop based on reduced current, but house loads would mess that up unless it sensed the battery current rather than its output current. Alternately, it could turn off the charging momentarily every now and then and see what voltage the system is resting at, which would lead to flickering/flashing lights and probably not be any too accurate due to surface charge on the battery.

Without actual battery instrumentation to more accurately monitor its state of charge based on usage, resting voltage, etc., a timer setup in combination with some rough voltage and current triggers is probably about as good as can be reasonably done by an RV converter.

Actually--- Iota stays at 14.8 until battery voltage reaches 14.6 waits 15 minutes, then drops to 14.2 for eight hours, then to 13.6 So it can tell what the battery voltage is getting to while it is still charging--perhaps by really feeling the increasing resistance, don't know.

Same with PowerMax regular models. They stay at 14.6 (or 14.4 some of them) and when battery voltage reaches near 14.6 or at 15 minutes from starting , which ever comes later, it drops to 13.6.

PDs will stay at 14.4 for four hours and then drop to 13.6 but if the battery is nearly full at around 97% SOC earlier, it drops to 13.6 then,

Vector portable chargers charge at 14.6 or 8 depending on model until battery voltage hits 14 (or 13.9 with some)--so they can tell when that is. This triggers a change of stage where now amps start to taper from being constant till then. With tapering amps the battery voltage continues to rise until at about 97% SOC and 14.6 or 8, the charger shuts itself off. (no float stage)

Early Xantrex chargers did like the Vector, but had the float stage and stayed on, so you could use them as converters. they had an optional two stage feature where you could pick not to have the float stage and it would shut off same as a Vector. Reason was they were onto the idea that deep cycle batts don't much like being floated for long periods, so you could opt out.