Charge settings for a generic AGM battery

[GILow]

Hi all,

I'm wiring up my friend's camper van. I have sold him on the idea of lots of solar with a Victron combo of solar regulator, battery sensor and battery monitor. (This is what I use on the boat.)

At the moment he has a weird no-name AGM 150AH 12v battery, which I have assured him he will outgrow sooner rather than later. But I want him to do a bit more camping first to get a feel for what sort of battery capacity he needs before we make any changes there.

I cannot find ANY data on the battery he has, so I figured I would ask here for advice on what sort of charge profile to use and, given the pretty extreme heat the battery is likely to experience in South Australia this summer, what kind of temperature compensation to apply.

Over to the battery lovers...

Matt

[Wotname]

Originally Posted by GILow

Hi all,

I'm wiring up my friend's camper van. I have sold him on the idea of lots of solar with a Victron combo of solar regulator, battery sensor and battery monitor. (This is what I use on the boat.)

At the moment he has a weird no-name AGM 150AH 12v battery, which I have assured him he will outgrow sooner rather than later. But I want him to do a bit more camping first to get a feel for what sort of battery capacity he needs before we make any changes there.

I cannot find ANY data on the battery he has, so I figured I would ask here for advice on what sort of charge profile to use and, given the pretty extreme heat the battery is likely to experience in South Australia this summer, what kind of temperature compensation to apply.

Over to the battery lovers...

Matt

Hopefully you will get way more experienced Victron responders soon but in the meantime I will take a stab a the charge profile question (dunno enough about the temp. comp. question).

Me - I would use the default Victron rotary switch setting #2 which AFAIK is ideal for generic AGMs.

[Wotname]

FWIW, the above info was given to by the state Victron tech rep. and I never found any conflicting advice elsewhere.

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Wotname

Hopefully you will get way more experienced Victron responders soon but in the meantime I will take a stab a the charge profile question (dunno enough about the temp. comp. question).



Me - I would use the default Victron rotary switch setting #2 which AFAIK is ideal for generic AGMs.

Rotary switch? I don’t remember seeing any switches on the Victron regulators. I thought they were totally software controlled?

[GILow]

Originally Posted by GILow

Rotary switch? I don’t remember seeing any switches on the Victron regulators. I thought they were totally software controlled?

Ah… I trawled through the manuals and yes, there IS a rotary switch. Go figure, I had no recollection of that little bugger. Mine are all software configured.

Well, it will make a good fall-back, I will see if I can figure out what temperature compensation it uses.

[Jim Cate]

Matt, if this battery is not in the engine compartment I'd think its temp exposure would not be any worse than normal automotive usage... even in the outback in summer!

Jim

[Wotname]

I'm sure you know the rotary switch presets can be over written by the software options; what I couldn't figure out was the difference between pos 2 and pos 3 but I didn't going looking deeply as the tech guy had already convinced me the default was suitable in our installation.

More upmarket batteries presumably need more care when selecting charge parameters than no-name ones.

[Wotname]

Slightly off-topic, what battery monitor have you chosen?

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Wotname

Slightly off-topic, what battery monitor have you chosen?

Got the BMV-712. I’m a little envious as I am still using my old Votronic battery monitor, which does not talk to my Victron gear.

I still think the Victron monitor looks like crap tho. The Votronic looks MUCH nicer. (Sorry SV Jedi.[emoji23])

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Wotname

…



More upmarket batteries presumably need more care when selecting charge parameters than no-name ones.

Is it that they need more care or is it that they actually provide the information you need to GIVE the care? I suspect the latter.

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Matt, if this battery is not in the engine compartment I'd think its temp exposure would not be any worse than normal automotive usage... even in the outback in summer!

Jim

True, but I figure I might as well look after it as best I can.

I think he will be in the market for around 200AH of useable capacity, based on what I can estimate of his use. So this battery is not going to be remotely adequate anyway.