Quote:
Originally Posted by patprice
I do not think my fairly basic solar controller is designed to equalise. However I do sometimes see 15V when fully charged.
My understanding is that an equiliser charge is about 15.2V at a very low amps?
I am hopefully on a learning curve.
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You cannot reduce amperage and keep voltage high. The battery controls the amps it will accept. You must supply enough amperage to raise the voltage though, if fully charged that’s not much amperage.
All you need to do to equalize a battery is supply it with
equalization voltage and have enough amps to maintain that voltage. ANY charge source large enough that can supply
equalization voltage can be used to equalize a battery.
But here’s the problem. first you have to start with a fully, completely charged battery. many times that’s not even possible with Solar. But after the battery is completely charged, you need to hold it at equalization voltage for hours, and that’s not possible with Solar, unless your where there is 20 hours of sunlight or something highly unusual like that.
Best way to equalize is to wake up at 4 AM and start a
Honda or similar that can charge the bank hard, so that it’s fully 100% charged by 10 AM or so, because it takes on average about 6 hours to fully charge a battery, then you can use Solar to equalize, because as you stated it only takes a small amperage to equalize.
You just need a controller that can be programmed to equalization voltage is all.