Hello, I am just a beginner truck camper and I have a few questions about using and programming my Trimetric battery monitor. I hooked it up last week along with a new battery converter 3 stage(Boondocker converter) I bought from bestconverter.com. I had a 12 volt worn out interstate battery originally and when it was low at 10 volts according to the Trimetric and I plugged in the amps would start out at 40 and as the battery charged being plugged in it would gradually decrease until amps read 4 and the battery volts 13.6. I soon realized that as I was driving down the road my truck was not charging the battery and it was soon at 10 volts after 300 miles of driving, well I solved that problem and added a fused wire back to the 7 pin so now it charges as I am driving or maintains charge. Since I got that out of the way I decided to purchase a new battery, I went with two 6 volt batteries from Costco since I had 70 dollar gift card, got those installed today and volts now say 13.5 and 7 amps. I am assuming the battery is now being trickled charged? How high should my volts read to tell me the batteries are fully charged? I thought it was supposed to be 14.6 or so? I believe that is the default setting in trimetric, and the battery must hit that in order for the % full to display (right now % full is blank with two dashes). Is there something wrong with my converter? Shouldn't it bring my batteries all the way to 14.6?

This is a handy chart showing the charge status of BATTERIES.What you are seeing on your batteries is the DC OUTPUT of the converter/charger unit.To actually read the real battery DC VOLTS you need to disconnect the out board charging DC VOLTAGES (Converter/charger or the connected Trailer TOW DC charge) and allow the trailer battery to settle down for a few minutes. My batteries read 12.6-7VDC after being charged at 14.4VDC for two hours and then continued to be charged at 13.6VDC for an additional hour. In the three hour charge time then my batteries at at their full charge state. I monitor my battery DC VOLTAGE all the time and never want to see it drop below 12.0VDC which is close to being at the 50% charge state. Then I want to get them re-charged back up to full charges as soon as I can. When camping off the power grid I can run my batteries down to their 50% charge state over night and then re-charge in the morning using smart mode charging to get them back up to at least their 90% charge state using my 2KW Generator connected to the trailer. This will take right at three hours of generator run time. Then I can make it through the next day/night run again until 8AM the next morning. I can do 12-14 of these 50% to 90% charge cycles before I need to do a FULL 100% CHARGE which will take around 12-14 hours of charge time. Otherwise I will start doing damage to my batteries performance.Roy Ken

It will read dashes until the batteries are fully charged for the first time. Check the manual.

Did you program the information needed into the trimetric on level 1? The -- will reset once you meet the requirement to tell the trimetric that the batteries are fully charged. Hope I worded this right for you. Gary

P1 is set at 14.3 P2 is 2.0, P3 220. Does this sound right? I have to meet these parameters in order for the Trimetric to read my % of full. RoyB, it sounds like what you are saying is to actually check that my batteries are fully charged I should unplug the 30 amp cord and also the 7 pin connector at back of the truck, wait a few minutes, then take my volt meter and measure the actual voltage of my batteries, if they read 12.6 or greater I know I am fully charged and my batteries are at 100%? Since I have two 6 volt batteries I would measure them together?

the details for programming the tri are in the installers guide, level 1. since you're using a boondocker converter, set P1 to 13.5v, P2 to 2a, P3 to your bank's ah capacity, and P4 to amps. then do a charge.then set P7 to level 3, and P10 to 85%, and next time you charge, see if the tri says 100% soc and about 0Ah's after a full charge to a little under 2a at 13.6v. if it takes over 100% to get to a full charge, decrease P10 to say 84%,, and vice versa.the boondocker converter has a preset setpoint of 14.6v. this is the point at which, once battery voltage reaches 14.6v, during "bulk" charging, the converter switches to "abs" or "normal" voltage, which is 13.6v. it's working as it should. however, when it drops to 13.6v, amps will drop by about 70% of it's amps rating, and thus increase charge time considerably... like many more hours.my pm4b-45 would drop from 45a to about 19a, for example, and then taper from there, instead of tapering from 45a. if you're running a generator, this is not good. if you're on shore power, it means it will take a long time to reach full charge, and will likely never get the bank's sg (specific gravity) readings up to their potential.

Trimetric questions | Good Sam Community

14 Replies

azrving
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
You will see over 100% because it needs to put more than 100% back in. I'm not near my manual right now to see what the default setting is. If you take X amount out, you need to put X plus about 10 % for a generic wet cell back in. Not positive on the figure but it's about that much. Battery and system inefficiency requires more in than out. There are no free rides. Gas or ... , no one rides for free.
CT_WANDERER
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
DieselBurps wrote:
jrnymn7, I will check it tomorrow. Right now I got my % full to activate, but it's reading 105%! I need to go in and mess with the parameters some more. Volts say 13.6 on the Trimetric, I have never seen it read any higher than that, I figured it would show 14.6 when in bulk or boost charge (whatever it's called). I am really beginner when it comes to anything electrical including the volt meter but I am learning. Sounds like I can take the red end of meter to positive and black to negative and check each batt. individually and then neg on one and pos. on the other and see what it is across the both of them. Once I get everything dialed in I will start researching solar. The truck and camper are spending the summer in Idaho and the winter in Mexico, Central America so I am looking forward to getting it all set up.

If you hold the reset button down for a few seconds, you will see it blink a few times then it will reset to 100%.
Bend
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
Use what you need for your system - Tri settings, lessons learned:

http://www.irv2.com/forums/f93/trimetric-settings-lessons-learned-208890.html
DieselBurps
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
jrnymn7, I will check it tomorrow. Right now I got my % full to activate, but it's reading 105%! I need to go in and mess with the parameters some more. Volts say 13.6 on the Trimetric, I have never seen it read any higher than that, I figured it would show 14.6 when in bulk or boost charge (whatever it's called). I am really beginner when it comes to anything electrical including the volt meter but I am learning. Sounds like I can take the red end of meter to positive and black to negative and check each batt. individually and then neg on one and pos. on the other and see what it is across the both of them. Once I get everything dialed in I will start researching solar. The truck and camper are spending the summer in Idaho and the winter in Mexico, Central America so I am looking forward to getting it all set up.
jrnymn7
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
if that 13.5v is the tri's readout, confirm it with your handheld meter.

the boondocker's are not set exactly to 14.6v and 13.6v, but fairly close. mine goes into float (~13.2v) only after about 8.5 hours of continuous charge. yours may do different?

and my particular 6v's are full at a resting voltage of at least 12.78v, so yours may be higher, as well. the charts are a general guideline, and not to be taken literally.

and by resting, i mean sitting with absolutely no loads for that 1 to 3 or 4 days. which means a proper resting voltage can only truly be done while the bank is out of service. but once you know what it takes to fully charge your bank, you can rely on the amps-at-volts charge parameters... such as say 1.8a at 13.6v.
jrnymn7
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
the two 6's are in series for 12v... pos of batt A to neg of batt B... you take your voltage readings from the remaining pos and neg posts.

but you can also check across individual 6v batteries by simply taking a reading across each battery's pos and neg post, and compare. they should be very close, if not the same.
azrving
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
When you believe you have a full charge also check the specific gravity.
DieselBurps
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
Thanks jrnmn7, I am plugged in now so I will see what it says in the morning. I am down to 4.8 amps and 13.5 volts (output). I have P1,2 and 3 all programmed. Sounds like I have to wait to set P7 to level 3 and P10 to 85%? I will do some more reading of the manual.
jrnymn7
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
you have to take sg readings to determine if the bank is full. it also takes much more than a few minutes for the "surface charge" to self dissipate. i've seen a good surface charge last more than 3 days. at 13.6 Vabs, at least a day, i would think.
jrnymn7
Explorer
Jun 28, 2015
the details for programming the tri are in the installers guide, level 1. since you're using a boondocker converter, set P1 to 13.5v, P2 to 2a, P3 to your bank's ah capacity, and P4 to amps. then do a charge.

then set P7 to level 3, and P10 to 85%, and next time you charge, see if the tri says 100% soc and about 0Ah's after a full charge to a little under 2a at 13.6v. if it takes over 100% to get to a full charge, decrease P10 to say 84%,, and vice versa.

the boondocker converter has a preset setpoint of 14.6v. this is the point at which, once battery voltage reaches 14.6v, during "bulk" charging, the converter switches to "abs" or "normal" voltage, which is 13.6v. it's working as it should. however, when it drops to 13.6v, amps will drop by about 70% of it's amps rating, and thus increase charge time considerably... like many more hours.

my pm4b-45 would drop from 45a to about 19a, for example, and then taper from there, instead of tapering from 45a. if you're running a generator, this is not good. if you're on shore power, it means it will take a long time to reach full charge, and will likely never get the bank's sg (specific gravity) readings up to their potential.