Any suggestions on how to further test this charger???
I was considering trying to find someone with a battery bank similar to mine, and letting the pm have a go at it, but that may not pan out. And sending it back to Florida for testing isn't an option, unless they will pick up the shipping fees...I already went through that with the first pm4b (60 amper) I bought, and I have no intentions of throwing more money at this one.
A little history:
I bought the pm4b-60 from Randy, spring of 2013. If I remember correctly, I spent $205 with shipping. It blew up on its second run. I contacted Randy and he advised me to send it to pm for testing. I emailed back and forth with Graham (I think it was?), and made the arrangements. That cost about $35, so now I was into it for $240, and 'sans' charger... that's french for you americans out there :).
A couple months went by with no response. I emailed Graham several times, but no reply. I checked with Canada Post to see if it was delivered, and their records showed it being received; not once, but twice! So something wasn't right. I emailed Randy and explained the situation, and he immediately contacted Erinn, who in turn contacted me the very next day. He never did get into why Graham hadn't returned my emails, but he did send me another charger, this pm4b-75, at no additional cost.
Now, not to sound ungrateful, but Erinn sent me a 75 amper, instead of a 60 amper, not considering what size bank I had, nor the output of my gennie. Luckily, it was o.k, or I would have been into another $35 for shipping... so $275 for a pm4b-60!
I didn't get around to installing this 75 amper 'til last month, and that's when I first discovered it was a 75 amper. And little did I know I would have to be de-programmed of the non-sense I had been taught by the "the deep cycle battery charging with a smart charger industrial complex"! (say that 5x fast!)
So, Im really not interested in chasing bad money with more good money at this point. And if this unit proves to be a dud, and if they're willing to somehow split the cost with me on a new bpcm-45, I would consider it. But short of that, i will continue looking elsewhere.
