I’ve got a very similar system for over a year now with the Escape installed 6v lead acid batteries. I hope this attempt to explain is not terribly confusing.
I’ll start with temp setting, the one on the 712 is going to use the temperature to calculate the state of charge you see in the display, since the 712 is “just” a monitor it has no influence on how the battery is being charged. This next paragraph is from the 712 manual
Temperature coefficient This is the percentage the battery capacity changes with temperature, when temperature decreases to less than 20°C (above 20°C the influence of temperature on capacity is relatively low and is not taken into account). The unit of this value is “%cap/°C” or percent capacity per degree Celsius. The typical value (below 20°C) is 1%cap/°C for lead acid batteries, and 0,5%cap/°C for Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries. Default Range Step size 0%cap/°C 0 – 2%cap/°C 0,1%cap/°C __________________________________________________________
The temperature compensation setting on the MPPT will actually increase charging voltage as temps go below 20c and decrease on temps above 20c. Every battery chemistry requires its own settings.
But before using any temperature setting effectively you need to install the optional Victron temp sensor for your 712 monitor and then setup what Victron is calling “VE.Smart networking” a Bluetooth wireless network between the 712 and the MPPT charge controller. Using this wireless communication the MPPT charger receive not only the temperature but also an accurate voltage as measured by the 712, not influenced by wiring between the controller and the battery. The battery current is also transmitted to the controller, probably needed when charging using multiple charge controllers.
Another note on the temperature sensor, if you don’t use it or don’t set the VE.Smart networking, your Victron MPPT controller will use its own internal temp sensor, if not installed in the same area as the batteries (as in most Escape 19) the temp reading at the controller is going to be very different from the batteries temperature.
Now after all this, many charging systems don’t compensate for temperature when dealing with lead acid. As a side note, I noticed in my system that the batteries can reach over 120f in the sun when the outside temp is under 80f (I still don’t understand who came up with the black battery box, but that’s a different discussion)
The pictures below show my 712 VE.Smart networking setup, the two left are the 712 (note the small icon at right above the battery percentage circle, indicating VE.Smart), the third is from the MPPT controller.
When it comes to charging voltage I’ve seen recommendations from 14.4 to 15.00 in bulk and 13.2 to 13.6 for float, I run 14.5 and 13.5.
Equalization, I run it twice manually but this is one area I didn’t explore much
