Xantrex Truecharge2 Reliability?
Hello all, New member here with a 2015 Rockwood 2306 that we picked up June of 2018. We're upgrading from the terrible group 24 battery to a set of two Trojan T-105 batteries. I'm looking for a sui...
Forum Discussion
" The PowerMax 60 A model is 875 W, or 59 A at 14.82 V"
The website figures are not quite accurate, but give a general idea.
Not how that works. You have to consider the power factor of about 0.7 on typical converters. Also the draw on a gen relates to the output watts, which relates to the battery voltage, then you work back to input watts and then input VA, the real number that matters.
EG actual figures while charging using a 55 amp PowerMax set to 14.8v.
Honda gen 126v unloaded, Kill-A-Watt readings:
124.7v, 11.06a, 980w, PF 0.7, 1383VA and battery 13.7v (and rising) with output 56.8 amps.
So output watts was 56.8 x 13.7 at the time (rising with batt v)778w
input watts 980w so efficiency 79.4%. The input watts with PF 0.7 gets the VA as that 1383 so under the 1600VA running rating of a typical "2000" gen.
Note that the VA goes up as battery voltage rises to the absorption voltage and then amps taper, reducing output watts as they taper. So the peak power required to run the charger is just before amps start to taper when you get to Vabs.
Measuring all this is complicated by the battery voltage reading being low due to voltage drop between the charger and the battery. Once amps start to taper the battery voltage gets closer to charger voltage until the battery is full and no amps flow, so voltage is the same.
So you will see battery voltage at maybe 14.2v when amps start to taper and it keeps rising contrary to the story that you get to Vabs and voltage is then constant.
LY gets good use from his little charger but he only has one battery. You could use a 75 amper with that Honda 2200 (at sea level)
The 75 amper pulled 1693VA doing 75 amps with battery at 14.08v
One thing about that TC2 is that it is PF corrected with the lower amp models too. PowerMax only has PF correction for the 100amper (NOT for the 75 amper as sometimes seen advertised) This is because the VA for the higher amp chargers pushes the limits of a 120v, 15a circuit. Note that the PD brand 80 amper requires a 20 amp circuit. So you can have the PowerMax 100 amper on a 15 amp circuit.
It would help a lot if the lower amp converters were PF corrected so you could run them on small VA size inverter-gens. But no such luck with most of them.
The website figures are not quite accurate, but give a general idea.
Not how that works. You have to consider the power factor of about 0.7 on typical converters. Also the draw on a gen relates to the output watts, which relates to the battery voltage, then you work back to input watts and then input VA, the real number that matters.
EG actual figures while charging using a 55 amp PowerMax set to 14.8v.
Honda gen 126v unloaded, Kill-A-Watt readings:
124.7v, 11.06a, 980w, PF 0.7, 1383VA and battery 13.7v (and rising) with output 56.8 amps.
So output watts was 56.8 x 13.7 at the time (rising with batt v)778w
input watts 980w so efficiency 79.4%. The input watts with PF 0.7 gets the VA as that 1383 so under the 1600VA running rating of a typical "2000" gen.
Note that the VA goes up as battery voltage rises to the absorption voltage and then amps taper, reducing output watts as they taper. So the peak power required to run the charger is just before amps start to taper when you get to Vabs.
Measuring all this is complicated by the battery voltage reading being low due to voltage drop between the charger and the battery. Once amps start to taper the battery voltage gets closer to charger voltage until the battery is full and no amps flow, so voltage is the same.
So you will see battery voltage at maybe 14.2v when amps start to taper and it keeps rising contrary to the story that you get to Vabs and voltage is then constant.
LY gets good use from his little charger but he only has one battery. You could use a 75 amper with that Honda 2200 (at sea level)
The 75 amper pulled 1693VA doing 75 amps with battery at 14.08v
One thing about that TC2 is that it is PF corrected with the lower amp models too. PowerMax only has PF correction for the 100amper (NOT for the 75 amper as sometimes seen advertised) This is because the VA for the higher amp chargers pushes the limits of a 120v, 15a circuit. Note that the PD brand 80 amper requires a 20 amp circuit. So you can have the PowerMax 100 amper on a 15 amp circuit.
It would help a lot if the lower amp converters were PF corrected so you could run them on small VA size inverter-gens. But no such luck with most of them.
