Solar Charger & Truck Power Question
I've recently installed a Go Power! GP-PWM-30 30 Amp Solar Regulator because the previous owner had solar installed but no charge controller (he just had a simple diode or voltage regulator that conne...
Forum Discussion
Initially I had a longer write-up to explain more of the details but cut it out to try to keep it short. Here is a bit of what I cut out...
My two 6v AGM batteries are located in the front of the bed of the truck sitting saddlebag style to the camper and connected in series using 4AWG (possibly 2AWG can't remember) wire. I then have wire that runs back to the battery compartment on the Bigfoot 2500 camper where I now have terminal posts that connect the batteries in the bed to the camper. Now that I have the larger batteries in the bed of the truck, the camper battery compartment is going to be re-purposed to hold a 2000 watt inverter so I can run the blender without firing up the generator.
When I first got the camper and setup the batteries in the bed of the truck, I was relying on just the 4 bar battery indicator that came stock with the camper. I then replaced that with a permanent volt meter gauge for more accurate information. What I found was that the batteries would stay around ~12.6v or 12.7v (possibly close to 12.9v after several hours of driving but would quickly fall back to 12.6v or 12.7v once parked for an hour with just a couple of LED lights on. With the truck running the voltage would be around ~14v or maybe slightly higher, with the generator on I think it was about ~14v (sorry I can't verify these numbers, it's back in storage). I can't completely rule out an issue with the batteries but right now I'm inclined to think that my batteries were getting the "bulk" charge from the truck but never going to the "absorption" or "float" charging state because the power coming from the truck wasn't going through a charge controller.
For load, I don't actually have much load going on, maybe about .3 amps or less. My fridge is just Propane or 120v, there is no DC option (it does have climate control switch but it's set to off). There are the CO2 and smoke detectors of course and just the radio pulling power. I used my Fluke Multi-Meter to see what the current draw was at each fuse and then at the battery terminals.
When I installed the solar charge controller for my 60w panel it was on a cloudy day but the controller was still delivering 1 amp of charge. At first I was confused that the unit would never read anything above 1 amp but I think I figured out that when the controller is first installed it limits the amperage until the batteries have gone through a complete charge cycle. Because the days I was messing with the system were cloudy and it being winter, there wasn't enough time for the 60w panel to top off the batteries so the unit stayed at 1 amp, at least that is my theory for now until I get it back out of storage and can mess with it. The controller indicated that at 12.6v the batteries were only about 60% full so it appears that my batteries had not been topped off even while on the road. Now, it is possible they could be damaged as they did endure one very deep discharge cycle but
The initial thought was maybe the batteries were damaged because of one very deep discharge cycle they endured while the truck was parked for a week (had to fly home for a week in the middle of a trip). However just yesterday I was at the truck that had been taken out of indoor storage and the batteries were fully topped up from the trickle charger they plug in for me and the batteries are now showing 13v and 100% charge. I think putting them on the trickle charger for an extended period helped them to get to full capacity and now the solar charger is doing it's job.
Back to the reason for my post though is that I need to put a charge controller between the truck and camper batteries. Instead of installing a second controller I'm considering having the toggle switch to select the source of power going into the controller I already have.
My two 6v AGM batteries are located in the front of the bed of the truck sitting saddlebag style to the camper and connected in series using 4AWG (possibly 2AWG can't remember) wire. I then have wire that runs back to the battery compartment on the Bigfoot 2500 camper where I now have terminal posts that connect the batteries in the bed to the camper. Now that I have the larger batteries in the bed of the truck, the camper battery compartment is going to be re-purposed to hold a 2000 watt inverter so I can run the blender without firing up the generator.
When I first got the camper and setup the batteries in the bed of the truck, I was relying on just the 4 bar battery indicator that came stock with the camper. I then replaced that with a permanent volt meter gauge for more accurate information. What I found was that the batteries would stay around ~12.6v or 12.7v (possibly close to 12.9v after several hours of driving but would quickly fall back to 12.6v or 12.7v once parked for an hour with just a couple of LED lights on. With the truck running the voltage would be around ~14v or maybe slightly higher, with the generator on I think it was about ~14v (sorry I can't verify these numbers, it's back in storage). I can't completely rule out an issue with the batteries but right now I'm inclined to think that my batteries were getting the "bulk" charge from the truck but never going to the "absorption" or "float" charging state because the power coming from the truck wasn't going through a charge controller.
For load, I don't actually have much load going on, maybe about .3 amps or less. My fridge is just Propane or 120v, there is no DC option (it does have climate control switch but it's set to off). There are the CO2 and smoke detectors of course and just the radio pulling power. I used my Fluke Multi-Meter to see what the current draw was at each fuse and then at the battery terminals.
When I installed the solar charge controller for my 60w panel it was on a cloudy day but the controller was still delivering 1 amp of charge. At first I was confused that the unit would never read anything above 1 amp but I think I figured out that when the controller is first installed it limits the amperage until the batteries have gone through a complete charge cycle. Because the days I was messing with the system were cloudy and it being winter, there wasn't enough time for the 60w panel to top off the batteries so the unit stayed at 1 amp, at least that is my theory for now until I get it back out of storage and can mess with it. The controller indicated that at 12.6v the batteries were only about 60% full so it appears that my batteries had not been topped off even while on the road. Now, it is possible they could be damaged as they did endure one very deep discharge cycle but
The initial thought was maybe the batteries were damaged because of one very deep discharge cycle they endured while the truck was parked for a week (had to fly home for a week in the middle of a trip). However just yesterday I was at the truck that had been taken out of indoor storage and the batteries were fully topped up from the trickle charger they plug in for me and the batteries are now showing 13v and 100% charge. I think putting them on the trickle charger for an extended period helped them to get to full capacity and now the solar charger is doing it's job.
Back to the reason for my post though is that I need to put a charge controller between the truck and camper batteries. Instead of installing a second controller I'm considering having the toggle switch to select the source of power going into the controller I already have.
