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Old 18-01-2025, 23:07   #1
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Victron Multiplus help

I purchased and installed a Multiplus 120/3000 on my boat to replace an older Freedom 30. The Freedom had one AC in and two AC out. That is also what I wanted out of the Victron and asked the dealer about.
The challenge I now face and asking for help with, is making the AC 2 out active even without any AC in. I need that leg hot or I have no outlets and some other wanted items to run on inverter.
I looked on the VictronConnect app for settings to change but I did not see it if it is there. Have not tried VE.Connect yet.

If there is no option to change this via settings on the software, I really don't want to spend another boat buck on a new inverter that would do this, in which case my question for that scenario would be - can I join the two AC out hot legs in one end of a suitable butt connector and on the other side a short single cable to the AC 1 out on inverter? That way both legs would be energized when on batteries only while using inverter.

And in case you need to know about the boats electrical panel, The inverter goes to a manual transfer switch on the panel and it will feed any circuits with breakers turned on, on the 120 volt side that is. So normal ops for this boat before turning the transfer switch to inverter, Turn off all circuit breakers for non essential items, main breakers off, turn the panel transfer switch from either shore power or generator to inverter.
Then main breakers on, and verify the circuits you wanted only are on. For us that would be refrigeration, lights, outlets, microwave. On the outlets we would mostly be running phone or laptop chargers, and a small fan for air circulation.

Thank you for the help!
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Old 19-01-2025, 00:26   #2
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

The AC2 out on the Multiplus is ONLY a passthrough that may be boosted by the inverter when the power browns out.

All the outlets you want to have power while inverting need to be hooked up to AC1


I have the same inverter on my boat, and the way I have it setup is I have 3 circuits in my electrical panel that are shore power only, they feed the electric element in the water heater, and 2 plugs that are very specifically for my electric heaters I use at the dock.

Everything else is run through AC1.

The idea of the system is that if the power browns out say like when there is a winter storm going and the wind kicks up and everyone on the dock has their heat kick on at the same time and it draws down the power, the Inverter will engage and stabilize the power on the boat back to a proper voltage which protects your electronics.

If the power goes all the way out however it will kill the power to the heaters and water heater, I then keep the thermostat on my diesel heater set about 10 degrees below what the electric heaters are at, so if the boat cools off enough the Diesel heat will take over.

That is the only function of hooking up the AC2 output.

Your transfer switch is on the wrong side of the inverter, you have it wired the old way.

With the Multiplus you should simply have the switch where it will either draw power from the shore, or from the generator via the power in, the Multiplus is designed to be inline 100% of the time unlike with the older inverters which were smaller and could only power a portion of the circuits.

You are going to need to update your electrical panel if you want to post some photos of it I can give you an idea what you need to do.
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Old 19-01-2025, 01:24   #3
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Attached is the wiring for my Victron 12/3000/120 inverter/charger. I believe that my setup is similar to what Renegde_Sailor described (but honestly, I'm not quite sure).

You'll see that shore current comes into my boat and goes directly to the main breaker on the 120v panel. From there, power is distributed to my water heater via a 15A breaker and to the inverter via a 30A breaker.

The positive output (AC1) from the Victron unit is led back to a breaker on the 120v panel that controls power to my outlets. Note that I cut the positive bus bar on the 120v panel to isolate the outlet breaker from the others. I do not use the AC2 output from the Victron unit at all.

In this way, if shore power goes out my water heater simply goes dead - instead of kicking in the inverter and draining my batteries.

If I add, say, a refrigeration unit - I'll put another breaker in that draws power from the main 120v breaker, or if I decide that it's OK to kick in the inverter to run the refrigeration unit if there is no shore power - I'll add another breaker to the inverter bus.

You may want to put your transfer switch before the 120v main breaker to toggle between energizing your 120v system with the generator or shore power.
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Old 19-01-2025, 02:47   #4
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Quote:
Originally Posted by rls8r View Post
Attached is the wiring for my Victron 12/3000/120 inverter/charger. I believe that my setup is similar to what Renegde_Sailor described (but honestly, I'm not quite sure).

You'll see that shore current comes into my boat and goes directly to the main breaker on the 120v panel. From there, power is distributed to my water heater via a 15A breaker and to the inverter via a 30A breaker.

The positive output (AC1) from the Victron unit is led back to a breaker on the 120v panel that controls power to my outlets. Note that I cut the positive bus bar on the 120v panel to isolate the outlet breaker from the others. I do not use the AC2 output from the Victron unit at all.

In this way, if shore power goes out my water heater simply goes dead - instead of kicking in the inverter and draining my batteries.

If I add, say, a refrigeration unit - I'll put another breaker in that draws power from the main 120v breaker, or if I decide that it's OK to kick in the inverter to run the refrigeration unit if there is no shore power - I'll add another breaker to the inverter bus.

You may want to put your transfer switch before the 120v main breaker to toggle between energizing your 120v system with the generator or shore power.


Similar but not quite the same, I have been meaning to do up a drawing on this, so here are the 120V connections.

As you can see I am using the pass-through for the 3 circuits.

Also it is worth noting, the Multiplus can bring in 50A worth of shore power but will only output ~25A when inverting and that should be the load limit for AC1.

Because I only have a 30A shore power cord I have the Inverter throttled to 30A input from shore power.
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Old 19-01-2025, 06:35   #5
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Thanks for the quick replies.
Yes I realize the wiring for inverter is the old way, but I was wanting to keep it simple as possible with essentially remove the old inverter and put new one in.
I will get a picture of the back of AC panel to post up here. On my last boat the Panel was much simpler and even though it did not previously have an inverter, I found it easy to wire one in (Multiplus II) and I also shuffle some breakers around and cut the copper bar to separate out the ones that would get power only from AC 2.
This boat's AC panel is more complex and frankly not sure I want to mess with it.

SO if I cannot change AC2 to provide inverter power, and assuming I can't return this inverter for a different one I see will provide inverter power to two legs, Is there any reason I cannot tie the two hot legs together and connect to AC1?
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Old 19-01-2025, 07:24   #6
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Boaterholic,

You are in way over your head here. You either didn’t read, or didn’t understand the manual where the difference between AC1 and AC2 are clearly explained.

You are dealing with electricity that can burn your boat down, or kill you. Has anyone reviewed the wire sizes for this installation? Do you understand your old transfer switch is no longer needed? Are there fuses and breakers of the right size in the right places? A MultiPlus is not a drop-in replacement for a Freedom, as you have discovered. Get help. Please!

Your suggestion of just jamming two AC supply circuits into the same butt connector is absolutely not appropriate. Don’t do it!

Everything your old inverter could power, your new one can do—and do better. But it needs to be installed properly.
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Old 19-01-2025, 09:28   #7
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

boaterholic -

The only thing my Users Manual and Service Manual say about the "AC2" (or "Auxiliary AC output") is the following:

"4.4.6 Auxiliary AC output (AC-out-2)
Besides the usual uninterruptable output, a second output (AC-out-2) is available that disconnects its load in the event of battery operation. Example: an electric boiler or air conditioner that is allowed to operate only if the genset is running or shore power is available.

"In case of battery operation, AC-out-2 is switched off immediately. After the AC supply has become available, AC-out-2 is reconnected with a delay of 2 minutes, this to allow a genset to stabilise prior to connecting a heavy load."

There appears to be no way to configure the MultiPlus to do what I believe you're trying to do. It seems to me that doing what it appears to me you want to do would defeat the purpose of the AC2 output, which is to shut down high-wattage loads if shore (or genset) power is lost (while keeping other loads energized via the inverter's AC1 outlet).

Re-reading your original post I'm not sure what you mean to do with the "butt connector." When you say, "... can I join the two AC out hot legs in one end of a suitable butt connector and on the other side a short single cable to the AC 1 out on inverter?" it seems to me that you're creating a loop with two wires going into the AC1 out. I'm sure that I'm reading this wrong. When you say, "the two AC out hot legs" - do you mean the circuits going to the loads or breakers that used to be connected to the two outputs of the old Freedom inverter?

I see that you then say, "That way both legs would be energized when on batteries only while using inverter." To me, that seems to be the role of the AC1 outlet on the MultiPlus. Why not just run a wire from the AC1 output of the MultiPlus to a terminal block and distribute the power to your various loads from there? What am I missing? Of course, I'd want to have breakers for each of the circuits - instead of gathering them via a butt connector or terminal block. This doesn't seem to me to be a terribly complicated wiring job - but then again, I haven't seen your boat. If your boat wiring is that complicated - perhaps it's time to use this opportunity to simplify things.

Renegde_Sailor -

Great drawing! I was thinking about wiring my boat like yours, but when I installed things I didn't have an ELCI - and I wanted to be able to shut off power to the inverter/charger if bad things happened. I'm keeping your drawing as a reference, though - in case I have another wiring job to do. Thanks. Like you, I have my MultiPlus 'throttled' to 30A using the MultiControl (or whatever it's called) at the nav station.
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Old 19-01-2025, 10:10   #8
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Quote:
Originally Posted by SailingHarmonie View Post
. . . Everything your old inverter could power, your new one can do—and do better. But it needs to be installed properly.
Yeah, you should understand the basic concept of the Multiplus. The manual is quite good and worth reading and rereading carefully.

You are supposed to run all your AC power through it (or at least everything you want to power with the inverter).

THEN, whatever you don't want to draw from the inverter (heaters, immersion heater, AC, etc.), you connect either to AC2, or to a separate shore power inlet, or to a bus upstream of the Multiplus.

This works a treat; much better than the "old way".

Concerning the power rheostat -- know what that does. It will limit the shore power (or gen power) drawn through the Multiplus to the set power level provided you're not drawing more than that through AC1.

So if the total load is more than the set power, it starts by turning down the charger, until that's off. Then, it will disconnect AC2. If the inverter is switched "on", then it will start to invert power to boost the shore power limited to whatever you've set it at. This is a fantastic feature which will really help you prevent overloading of shore power or gennie. I wouldn't want to be without this now after having used it for some years.
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Old 19-01-2025, 10:33   #9
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

First, I have attached my reference diagram for this installation type. I know, there is an isolation transformer, which should be on every boat that uses shore power in my opinion, but you can leave it out if you don’t want this “gold standard” installation.

Point is that it shows how to install this.

Now to your question: yes, you can connect everything to the AC1 output. You will need a junction box and I recommend you use 3-way Wago 221 connectors for connecting it all: wires from AC1 to junction box into three Wago connectors and simply connect the two feeds to the panel to the Wago connectors as well.

It isn’t hard to rewire to the new setup, but you do need an electrician to adapt the panel to it. The transfer switch on the panel is then wired before the input of the Multiplus, in the diagram between Multiplus and transformer.
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Old 19-01-2025, 11:27   #10
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Quote:
Originally Posted by boaterholic View Post
Thanks for the quick replies.
Yes I realize the wiring for inverter is the old way, but I was wanting to keep it simple as possible with essentially remove the old inverter and put new one in.
I will get a picture of the back of AC panel to post up here. On my last boat the Panel was much simpler and even though it did not previously have an inverter, I found it easy to wire one in (Multiplus II) and I also shuffle some breakers around and cut the copper bar to separate out the ones that would get power only from AC 2.
This boat's AC panel is more complex and frankly not sure I want to mess with it.

SO if I cannot change AC2 to provide inverter power, and assuming I can't return this inverter for a different one I see will provide inverter power to two legs, Is there any reason I cannot tie the two hot legs together and connect to AC1?
You may be able to feed it all off AC1, but I am not sure what the current wiring is. Sometimes when you have 2 input leads it is because your boat is wired for 220/110v

The modifications to your electrical system to get it done right are not that hard, but without seeing it I cannot say for sure.
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Old 19-01-2025, 11:30   #11
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Quote:
Originally Posted by rls8r View Post

Renegde_Sailor -

Great drawing! I was thinking about wiring my boat like yours, but when I installed things I didn't have an ELCI - and I wanted to be able to shut off power to the inverter/charger if bad things happened. I'm keeping your drawing as a reference, though - in case I have another wiring job to do. Thanks. Like you, I have my MultiPlus 'throttled' to 30A using the MultiControl (or whatever it's called) at the nav station.

Thank you!



I have been running this setup for over 2 years now while living aboard, it has worked flawlessly.
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Old 19-01-2025, 11:47   #12
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

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Originally Posted by s/v Jedi View Post
First, I have attached my reference diagram for this installation type. I know, there is an isolation transformer, which should be on every boat that uses shore power in my opinion, but you can leave it out if you don’t want this “gold standard” installation.

Point is that it shows how to install this.

Now to your question: yes, you can connect everything to the AC1 output. You will need a junction box and I recommend you use 3-way Wago 221 connectors for connecting it all: wires from AC1 to junction box into three Wago connectors and simply connect the two feeds to the panel to the Wago connectors as well.

It isn’t hard to rewire to the new setup, but you do need an electrician to adapt the panel to it. The transfer switch on the panel is then wired before the input of the Multiplus, in the diagram between Multiplus and transformer.
This is exactly what I meant. Take a cable from AC 1 to the junction box and into a connector of some sort that the two hot lines would also be connected to, thereby allowing AC 1 to energize both hot legs. I will look up the 3 way in your post- thank you.

I would love to redo the electric panel such that I can have the inverter always active and monitoring shore power and generator so it can do its own transfer automatically. I did that on last boat but was a simpler panel to deal with. But right now I just would like to have essentially the same setup as with old inverter as it would be simplest and most cost effective thing to do at moment.
I say cost effective because I have numerous other projects ongoing and quickly eating through the budget, including installing a davit crane, redoing most of the electronics and may have to change out the fridge and freezer now as well. All of which add $$$ up really quick.
All that said, unless it was a really quick,easy, and inexpensive project to redo the panel right now, I would. But I’m not thinking it is so a project for possibly next year.

I’ll post pictures of my panel shortly.

Thank you all for the help, I really appreciate it.
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Old 19-01-2025, 11:55   #13
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Here are three pics.
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Old 19-01-2025, 12:19   #14
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

Thinking a splice connector like this one in the link, and for extra safety put inside a junction box.
https://www.hawkusa.com/manufacturer...gaAkKEEALw_wcB
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Old 19-01-2025, 16:20   #15
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Re: Victron Multiplus help

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Here are three pics.
You have a 230/115V system, I would suggest get a marine Electrician onboard who knows inverters.

There are a few options how this can be hooked up, the first being you can do a bit of rewiring to the panel and set things so as that the outlets you want on the inverter are on either Group 1 or Group 2

Or what I would recommend is getting a 2nd Multiplus and setting it up where it is tied in phase to produce 230, then removing the common bussbar on the back of the breakers, and breaking out what you want to be powered all the time, and what you want to be powered from shore. Or if you want to maintain a common buss as you have now, making a new faceplate for the panel and moving things around so one row of breakers is hooked to AC1 and the other to AC2 and is only powered by shore.

And the 230v stuff could be configured to only work on shore, or if you really want you could invert it and run it if you have the battery capacity.

What this would do is change how the power is directed so it first comes to the switch which determines if you are drawing from the bow or stern shore power plug, then to your ELCI, then to the Multiplus where it splits between AC1 and AC2 giving you the always on and shore-power only distinction.

But to do this correctly you really need an inverter for each power input as your boat has two distinct power systems.
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