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hedge's avatar
hedge
Explorer
Dec 12, 2016

Which side of cutoff switch to connect charge controller?

I'm curious as to which way others are going when hooking up their charge controller. Are you connecting it to the battery side or the load side of your disconnect switch (assuming you have one).

I'm thinking on the battery side allows you to keep the solar connected to the batteries to charge them but still remove parasitic draws... but it isn't truly cut off.

On the load side it seems like it could cause an issue if you shut it off because you could be feeding the system via the solar panels.

I currently have it hooked up to the battery side with a separate switch between the panels and controller which I have to remember to shut off before unhooking the batteries.

In practice I usually never touch the switch so contemplating simplifying the wiring a bit into a common fuse box but it would mean everything would be on the load side.

Hope I'm not bothering you guys too much with all my questions, it's been -20-25C all weekend so this is my way of missing camping season.

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