Solar Controller Battery Draw Amount?
This is a confused sort of post because I am confused.
I was trying to get to the minimum amps for knowing when my AGMs were truly full and to do that I tried to get all the other draws down to near zip as possible. I was even looking at how the Trimetric monitor has its own draw and you should "zero" it, but I have not done that.
I discovered that my solar controllers each have a draw on the battery bank without any array connection. (When connected they are supposed to take care of any "charging the array" at night, but that does nothing about their own draws on the battery)
I got tangled up trying to isolate the controller draws (I have two MPPT controllers in parallel on the bank) from other rig standing draws, but I was seeing quite high draws I think by the change when disconnecting them one at time from the bank--up to 1.5 amps in one case, but that might have been a false reading.
I am not clear on all this for amounts--I would have to take more time and effort to isolate them, and see what is "repeatable" to verify the amounts.
So to save me a bunch of work---has anybody else seen how much their controllers draw just from being connected--as a sort of "parasitic" load-- (never mind the debate on which loads are that, :) )
Thanks
I was trying to get to the minimum amps for knowing when my AGMs were truly full and to do that I tried to get all the other draws down to near zip as possible. I was even looking at how the Trimetric monitor has its own draw and you should "zero" it, but I have not done that.
I discovered that my solar controllers each have a draw on the battery bank without any array connection. (When connected they are supposed to take care of any "charging the array" at night, but that does nothing about their own draws on the battery)
I got tangled up trying to isolate the controller draws (I have two MPPT controllers in parallel on the bank) from other rig standing draws, but I was seeing quite high draws I think by the change when disconnecting them one at time from the bank--up to 1.5 amps in one case, but that might have been a false reading.
I am not clear on all this for amounts--I would have to take more time and effort to isolate them, and see what is "repeatable" to verify the amounts.
So to save me a bunch of work---has anybody else seen how much their controllers draw just from being connected--as a sort of "parasitic" load-- (never mind the debate on which loads are that, :) )
Thanks
