Victron Settings

[BobG]

I noticed that John in Santa Cruz included the Status, History, and Trend screen shots of battery in the "Lost all power on 4th...." thread. Rather than post this off thread question there, I started a new thread.

John, your battery status shows voltage at 14.6 volts. This got my attention for several reasons, mostly irrelevant to my question which is: What are your SCC and Battery settings?

I have attached pictures of my settings, for the SCC and Battery as well as Battery Status and History. I am running at 24 volts so everything is double but you will notice that my battery status Voltage is 26.55 (13.3V equivalent to a 12 volt system). I don't understand this since my absorption voltage is 28.40V and float voltage is 27.00V, both higher than 26.55V. I am wondering how you maintain 14.6 volts.

Maybe you are on shore power and your charger is set at 14.60 volts and it takes president over the SCC settings? I very seldom if ever use the shore powered charger as the SCCs have kept my batteries charged.

I originally set my charger to 14.6 equivalent volts as recommended by the battery supplier but ended up in a fight with the BMS cycling the battery on and off due to high voltage. I think I have the charger set at 28.6 now but it isn't relevant because I don't use it.

Thanks in advance. Bob

[John in Santa Cruz]

indeed, the PD4655L is a 14.6V charger, and there's no adjustment... my first screen captures the day after hooking thing sup may well have been from it, and indeed, since my 360W solar is way more than enough to easily keep up with my daily load, I've left the power converter switched off. When I've intentionally discharged the battery from 3 days use with the solar off, I've gotten 2000-2300 watt*hours/day out of the solar, wooot.

[BobG]

John, could you capture and post your SCC and battery settings for me to look at?

I have always wondered if I used the correct settings. What has concerned me is that my SCC settings aren't the same as the inverter/charger settings. I don't think this really matters as long as both work and don't shorten the life of the battery but I wonder why they aren't the same?

Not that it matters much but I also wonder why my battery voltage is 26.55 but the float voltage is 27.00. Although at the time I captured the battery information, the solar was producing only 2 watts so maybe that is why. I will check again today after the sun is up and the SCC switches to float.

I think I went with the default Li settings in the SCC.

Does Escape use Victron MPPT SCCs and if so, can someone capture the settings they use for Li batteries and post it?

[John in Santa Cruz]

note the last 2 days, its been parked where the sun isn't very good (lots of tall trees), but its also been more idle than normal.

[BobG]

Thank you for the information. The main difference between your and my SCC settings is that you set your absorption and float voltages and I selected Victron's preset for Li batteries. I didn't get my battery voltage this morning while it was charging so will look at my charging voltages another time.

A curious thing to me is that your SCC status shows 74 watts and state as Bulk and voltage at 13.4 volts yet your absorption and float voltages are 14.40 and 13.80 volts. Shouldn't the voltage from the SCC be 14.4 if its state is Bulk?

There is a lot I don't understand about how everything works. I am just trying to learn and understand. Everything in my trailer works just fine but I doubt I have it set up correctly or maybe better description is that I don't have it tuned the way it should be.

[John in Santa Cruz]

solar panel was probably partially in the shade as I said, it is temporarily parked close to some very tall trees to the east and south.

yeah, just checked, not getting any direct sun, just blue sky from the north, so its only outputting like 50-75 watts instead of the usual 300-360. It should be back to its normal parking space after a dump run tomorrow morning.

[BobG]

Even if the solar panel is only putting out 75 watts shouldn't the SCC operating in Bulk mode be putting out the power at the absorption setting of 14.40 bolts instead of 13.40 bolts which is even lower than the Float setting of 13.80 bolts?

[John in Santa Cruz]

not if the battery is still charging, you won't see the full 14.4 volts until the charge current goes below some threshold.

[BobG]

Oh. Thanks.

[John in Santa Cruz]

ok, here's solar volts + amps, and battery volts+amps from a typical day of sunshine from before i moved the trailer

Solar:


Battery:


note my solar panel has about 40V peak solar voltage, and about 35V under max load.

[Vermilye]

As John noted, neither the Victron 712, Smart Shunt or solar controller (or any other charging device) will show the set bulk, absorption or even float voltages. They show the combination of the battery voltage & charging voltage. The battery voltage will start lower, pulling down the combined voltage and won’t be the same until just before they switch to the next stage. When it switches to float, it will show the higher absorption voltage until the battery tapers off to the float voltage. Depending on the load, it could take a few minutes to a number of hours.

[BobG]

Ok, I see what you are talking about.

My curves are similar, just different voltage settings. Thanks for clearing this up for me.

Evidently I selected the Smart Lithium preset instead of the Lithium preset for the 2 controllers I have. This lowered my absorption and float voltages. If I had selected Lithium then my voltages would be the same as yours except for 2x for 24 volts.

[BobG]

Thanks Jon and John. I believe I understand now. The voltage reported is the result of voltage drop across the discharged battery. The reported voltage gradually increases as the the battery resistance decreases and eventually the SCC switches to float.


I was thinking the SCC voltage would be the same throughout the system. I understand now and don't know how I could have thought such a thing. I expect the maxfan would have gone bonkers over 14.4 or 14.6 volts.


Bob

[John in Santa Cruz]

FWIW, my MaxxFan Deluxe seems to handle 14.6V just fine.

[Rossue]

Originally Posted by BobG

I noticed that John in Santa Cruz included the Status, History, and Trend screen shots of battery in the "Lost all power on 4th...." thread. Rather than post this off thread question there, I started a new thread.

John, your battery status shows voltage at 14.6 volts. This got my attention for several reasons, mostly irrelevant to my question which is: What are your SCC and Battery settings?

I have attached pictures of my settings, for the SCC and Battery as well as Battery Status and History. I am running at 24 volts so everything is double but you will notice that my battery status Voltage is 26.55 (13.3V equivalent to a 12 volt system). I don't understand this since my absorption voltage is 28.40V and float voltage is 27.00V, both higher than 26.55V. I am wondering how you maintain 14.6 volts.

Maybe you are on shore power and your charger is set at 14.60 volts and it takes president over the SCC settings? I very seldom if ever use the shore powered charger as the SCCs have kept my batteries charged.

I originally set my charger to 14.6 equivalent volts as recommended by the battery supplier but ended up in a fight with the BMS cycling the battery on and off due to high voltage. I think I have the charger set at 28.6 now but it isn't relevant because I don't use it.

Thanks in advance. Bob

I asked the OP of the Lost All Power thread what kind of batteries as I suspected it might be a settings issue with Lithium batteries. So far there has been no reported answer to the cause of his drained batteries.

Was curious as I encountered an Oliver owner on a maiden trio with a very similar problem with his lithium batteries. Will not be surprised to learn both camper's problems share a settings issue for their lithium batteries not charging as they should.

IMO 80-90% of Escape buyers do not need lithium batteries. Its not like they're bulking up to run an air conditioner on 12V. So bottom line question is whether it's worth it. And if it is whether or not the ETI option is the best choice.

[John in Santa Cruz]

I eyed lithium batteries, even drooled a bit, oooh, those would be awesome. but I couldn't really justify the cost and the need. Golf Cart batts are a lot better than the typical 'marine/rv' battery smaller RVers use, like 27M, 31M. a GC-2 golf cart battery is a true deep discharge battery, and can handle nearly 1000 discharge/recharge cycles to 70% or 80% discharge. thats camping every day for almost 3 years and using *ALL* your usable power every day.

but then my RMD8555 absorption fridge (designed/made by Electrolux, sold by Dometic) stopped working on propane, and then stopped working entirely. I researched DC compressor fridges and found that the Norcold N2175 was an exact fit. I wanted to be safer than sorry, so overkilled my battery, getting 2 x 12V 206AH Lithium SOK batteries, giving me 5200 watt*hours, with more thousands of charge cycles than days I'll likely own the camper.

I actually have enough battery, that I probably *could* get away with a high efficiency mini-split A/C, and double my solar and have no worries, be able to run it for a few hours/day in hot humid weather as long as I get daily sun.

[BobG]

Rossue, the 5 deep cycle AGM batteries I had on my sailboat were $350 each retail and $250 each street or sale price. That was about 260 Ah useable. I overcharged them when a sensing wire was accidently broken. Five new batteries were about $1300. Lead acid batteries can be bought for much less than AGM deep cycle batteries but ....

I bought 320Ah of lithium for about $1600. Not much difference. The lithium can't be overcharged are simpler and much faster to charge and have multiple times more cycles with much less worry and maintenance than lead acid batteries. I can pull the amps to run high draw items like the air conditioner and induction tea kettle with no concern about damaging the battery. They charge faster and are much lighter than lead acid batteries

Last winter in the desert I could run the air conditioner during the day and stay charged as long as the temperature didn't go over high 80s. I could cool the trailer at bedtime until the outside temperatures dropped. This is what I wanted.

I think most everyone could benefit from a Li battery but not many would benefit from as much battery and solar as I have. Most people could get by with a generator for dry camping. I could not. The MaxFan is good but nothing like 13,500 BTU AC.

Of course there is shore power and if it is the primary energy source then one would have to decide what is the most practical battery configuration.

[John in Santa Cruz]

my 412AH of lithium was about $2200

just sayin' ...

[MichaelMc]

Originally Posted by Rossue

I asked the OP of the Lost All Power thread what kind of batteries as I suspected it might be a settings issue with Lithium batteries. So far there has been no reported answer to the cause of his drained batteries.

Was curious as I encountered an Oliver owner on a maiden trio with a very similar problem with his lithium batteries. Will not be surprised to learn both camper's problems share a settings issue for their lithium batteries not charging as they should.

IMO 80-90% of Escape buyers do not need lithium batteries. Its not like they're bulking up to run an air conditioner on 12V. So bottom line question is whether it's worth it. And if it is whether or not the ETI option is the best choice.

I’m new to all things trailer electronic. Our Lithium batteries are deleting for no obvious reason and slow recharging. What are the correct settings?

[John in Santa Cruz]

Originally Posted by MichaelMc

I’m new to all things trailer electronic. Our Lithium batteries are deleting for no obvious reason and slow recharging. What are the correct settings?

"deleting" ?

what lithium batteries do you have, and what is your power center and solar controller? are you charging via solar or 'shore power' (campground/home 120VAC power cord).