I am starting to really dislike my camper solar

[hoyden]

I thought the % was to be mostly ignored, but the v was what mattered? I'm so confused.

It also feels? like the fridge has been 'running' for quite a while this late afternoon/eve. Its not hot out - my internal thermostat says 74f now.

Starting to wonder if I ditch the fridge and get a cooler. Ugh. That ain't gonna happen. Last thing I need to have to deal with is having to constantly get ice.

 

[hoyden]

Shoot stoopid connectivity dropped when I tried to post another comment. Argh! Lost!

Short version: fridge been running since before I posted my stats. I can hear and feel it.

Right now - over half hr since my readings post, Victron says its pulling -47w.

Is that normal?

 

[klahanie]

Normal ? I'd say yes - when the fridge compressor is running that is.

Notice your two earlier readings today the current draw was 14 and 19w ... at those exact times of reading the compressor was off. The third reading it was on. It cycles on and off to maintain the set temperature, that's normal.

How much it should draw (max when on) should be on the info plate inside and/or in the manual

The important thing is how often the compressor runs in terms of how much total power it typically uses in relation to your battery bank reserve and your truck/solar's ability to replenish

 

[klahanie]

(the 13.17V is a surface charge)

This is important to understand. A "rested" 12v battery would likely never show 13.17v. It might be ~12.8.

When the battery is being charged it gets "excited" and the battery will show a temporarily high voltage after the charge source is disconnected. But can ack as an indicator that the battery had been receiving a charge.

Your 6:14pm reading of 12.67v (at 99%) is reflective of the surface charge having been removed (through slight draw down from appliances)

 

[klahanie]

As rando says, see where you are at in the morning. Then you can quantify how much power the camper has used in, say, a 12hr period.

Then compare that to your battery capacity and - sometime - figure out what your solar can add back.

Let us know your reading tomorrow morning.

 

[hoyden]

Oh, I meant is it normal that it was running for so long, not the numbers

Thanks for resting info. It's supposed to get some rainy weather in this region this week and I'm a little worried abt how to maintain. Maybe I'll be running the truck more (now that its finally charging from truck to camper)

 

[camelracer]

I find that my fridge runs more than normal when it's not completely full. I also keep frozen water bottles or food in the freezer since that's where the temperature sensor is located. The fridge will have a hard time keeping a dead air space at constant temperature as opposed to a large thermal mass.

 

[Machinebuilder]

I thought the % was to be mostly ignored, but the v was what mattered? I'm so confused.

It also feels? like the fridge has been 'running' for quite a while this late afternoon/eve. Its not hot out - my internal thermostat says 74f now.

Starting to wonder if I ditch the fridge and get a cooler. Ugh. That ain't gonna happen. Last thing I need to have to deal with is having to constantly get ice.

I would watch the state of charge and the consumed amphours, on the history page look at the discharged energy and charged energy, and time since last full charge.

What you are concerned about is taking more energy out of the battery than you are putting in. Voltage alone doesn't tell you the story.

Energy will be the Amphours (how many amps over time). as I recall you have 2 78 amphour batteries, If you use the 50% rule for discharge you ca go to 78 amphours before you are getting into really needing to put energy back NOW.

the info from the history page will help to understand how fast you are using energy.

it sounds like you have made progress but still might be having some problems with balancing the energy in to energy out.

 

[hoyden]

Yep, I do keep my fridge decently full and keep water bottles in fridge and freezer.

History:

Deepest discharge: -35Ah
Last discharge: -16Ah
Cumulative Ah discharge: -214Ah

Time since last full charge: 14h 58mins

Discharged energy: 2.6kWh
Charged energy; 3.2kWh

Min battery voltage: 4.01v
Max battery voltage: 14.84v

 

[Vic Harder]

i agree totally with rando

 

[DaveL]

So, I've been following this thread with a lot of interest. Due to what I've been reading about the Victron controller & monitor, I switched from the Trimetic, which I liked, but like the Victron a lot more - MPPT controller & Bluetooth monitoring lets me monitor while driving. Everything is working a lot better! So thanks, Vic & pv?

I do want to give some input on paying more attention to the Ah used than watts or even the percentage. On my Trimetic I tracked the Ah drawn and charged. I found this was an easy accurate way to know exactly where I was in battery usage/charging. I've got a total of 150 AH, so as long as I don't get too close to - 75, I'm. Also, I'm not too concerned if weather or trees prevent a full recharge during the day as long as the trend is keeping me up above that. Example is when we recently camped at Tuolumne Meadows (Yosemite) for 5 days without moving. I'd get enough sun to partially charge what I lost overnight, but never was able to fully recharge, but it was enough. Everyday I ended the charging day a little lower than the day before, but never got below - 35 at the end of the day, so it was OK. I have 160 panel, plus a 130 portable I'd use to help a bit because of the trees. Main power usage is ARB 12 chest fridge & the heater. If I was parked in the sun, I would have had no problem fully charging.

So as said, just watch you are not getting close to 50% of your amp hours.

 

[Vic Harder]

So as said, just watch you are not getting close to 50% of your amp hours.

And since the Victron is already configured with the AH of your battery bank, it is even simpler... just look at the SOC% and keep it above 50%.

If it dips below 50% occasionally, that is no big deal either. Doing it constantly will lower your battery life. Using my 250AH ROLLS batteries as an example, if I keep them above 50% I can expect 1500 charge cycles. If I always discharge to 30%, only 500 charge cycles. That said, I have had ONE charge cycle in 50+ nights of camping, and that was only because of a test run at home where I purposely drained the batteries.

The thing to avoid doing is leaving the batteries deeply discharged when it gets cold out. They can freeze, and that is not good.

Finally, going by 500 charge cycles at 50 nights a year, you are still looking at 10 years of camping! I suspect most folks here who replace their batteries every 3-4 years have no monitoring system in place, and so the batteries have little chance of lasting very long.

 

[hoyden]

You people and your acronyms. :-D
What's SOC?
Oh! It's "State of Charge"! Just got it. Hahaha!

Knock on wood, I drove 22 miles today and parked around 9am with no shade. Somewhat overcast sky, with some moments of full sun, and 100% at 13.26v at 2pm.

 

[Vic Harder]

Knock on wood, I drove 22 miles today and parked around 9am with no shade. Somewhat overcast sky, with some moments of full sun, and 100% at 13.26v at 2pm.

SOC is just another TLA.

(Three Letter Acronym)



Dawn, 100% at 2 pm is awesome! Do a happy dance!

 

[hoyden]

TLA!
I was hoping to plug in somewhere cuz supposed to be rainy later today and tomorrow (maybe into Wednesday?) but no. At least I'm on solid ground at a campground (only $7/night) so that's good. I was 3.5 miles out a dirt road campering, but decided that might not be the best location to wait out stormy weather cuz mud road....

Hoping can get thru these rainy days, but at least can charge from truck now!

Clouds are piling up now 2:50pm
100%
12.86v

 

[klahanie]

Knock on wood,

Ha Ha, I guess that's as good a take away as any.

 

[craig333]

I will admit the victron is a better looking unit and bluetooth may interest me a bit but certainly not enough to ditch the trimetric and fork over that much money. The trimetric really could use a redesign.

Overcast today and still 100% SOC. Maybe we'll get enough rain to clean the panels?

 

[DaveL]

I will admit the victron is a better looking unit and bluetooth may interest me a bit but certainly not enough to ditch the trimetric and fork over that much money. The trimetric really could use a redesign.

Overcast today and still 100% SOC. Maybe we'll get enough rain to clean the panels?

I should have said a mishap with the batteries bouncing up on a rough road, hitting the trimetric controller & bending the input connection led me to change! It still worked & I carefully bent it back into place, but I didn't trust it so decided to replace it with a new trimetric. At the same time I was following this thread, so the timing was perfect & I figured I might as well step up to MTTP. Glad I did - seems to charge a lot faster.

 

[DaveL]

And since the Victron is already configured with the AH of your battery bank, it is even simpler... just look at the SOC% and keep it above 50%.

If it dips below 50% occasionally, that is no big deal either. Doing it constantly will lower your battery life. Using my 250AH ROLLS batteries as an example, if I keep them above 50% I can expect 1500 charge cycles. If I always discharge to 30%, only 500 charge cycles. That said, I have had ONE charge cycle in 50+ nights of camping, and that was only because of a test run at home where I purposely drained the batteries.

The thing to avoid doing is leaving the batteries deeply discharged when it gets cold out. They can freeze, and that is not good.

Finally, going by 500 charge cycles at 50 nights a year, you are still looking at 10 years of camping! I suspect most folks here who replace their batteries every 3-4 years have no monitoring system in place, and so the batteries have little chance of lasting very long.

Yup. But still like to watch the AH lol

 

[Vic Harder]

I should have said a mishap with the batteries bouncing up on a rough road, hitting the trimetric controller & bending the input connection led me to change! It still worked & I carefully bent it back into place, but I didn't trust it so decided to replace it with a new trimetric. At the same time I was following this thread, so the timing was perfect & I figured I might as well step up to MTTP. Glad I did - seems to charge a lot faster.

Congrats! I think you might be the first person here to switch from a Trimetric (Which is considered to be a very good PWM controller) to a Victron MPPT.

What kind of difference are you seeing in charging "faster"?