Ehu/charge

[Salty Spuds]

Not answering your question but I am intrigued with the above......why do you connect to EHU at home when you have a solar panel? Is it not permanently connected; i.e. on the roof, doing the same job?

We have a small oil filled radiator set low to keep the van aired & damp free.

 

[andys]

Not answering your question but I am intrigued with the above......why do you connect to EHU at home when you have a solar panel? Is it not permanently connected; i.e. on the roof, doing the same job?

In my case because the pesky winter sun never seems quite strong enough to make it through the garage roof

 

[Dellmassive]

I’m in a similar position. My setup is as follows:-
T6 conversion with leisure battery.
EHU feeding a fixed auto battery charger; charge/bulk/float. This is connected directly to the Leisure battery.
Solar panel/alternator charging of leisure battery via CTEK 250, this also tops up the starter battery via the solar panel.

The van has been parked up for about 6 weeks, connected to the EHU at home. I started it a couple of weeks ago & it started fine. Went out to it this weekend & the starter battery was completely flat, wouldn’t even operate the central locking.

SO! Can anyone see a problem wiring in a CTEK ct5 under the passenger seat & hard wiring into the 240v EHU, & connecting the output to the permanent live from the alternator/starter battery that feeds the CTEK 250? This would charge the starter battery whenever the EHU is plugged in. The only issue that I could see is a possible conflict with the solar charging of the starter via the CTEK 250, but this is only the same as having the engine running, so unless I’m missing summat......

You could use a relay or switch to shunt between your solar charging and EHU charger to keep them isolated.

A simple dpdt switch would be a cheap solution.

 

[travelvolts]

@Loz might be the best person to advise you of the effictiveness of a low power (18Watt) solar 12v battery maintainer. . . . . . . Not tried this myself yet.

we have a couple of mobile 100W panels for camping setups, not done the trickle charge thing yet.

though looking again at that Amazon listing . . . . . . its just chucking out voltage all the time the sun is shining . . . . with no battery monitoring or any smart multi stage charging (just a revers flow blocking diode and 18V). . . . . That could possibly damage the AGM starter battery . . . . . . i think with @Loz setup he used a stand alone MPPT charge controller that was suitable to charge various types off batteries like AGM etc.

that solar is listing:
Imp = 1Amp
Vmp = 18v
Voc = 21.6v

and the spec sheet says for sealed lead acid battery's

it doesnt look like it has any type of charge controller PWM or MPPT, just a blocking diode.........so i cant say for sure.

.

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Small panels that only have about 20 watts available don't need regulation. Under load the voltage will always be less than the maximum recommended for your battery and will only just about manage a float charge level.

 

[travelvolts]

I’m in a similar position. My setup is as follows:-
T6 conversion with leisure battery.
EHU feeding a fixed auto battery charger; charge/bulk/float. This is connected directly to the Leisure battery.
Solar panel/alternator charging of leisure battery via CTEK 250, this also tops up the starter battery via the solar panel.

The van has been parked up for about 6 weeks, connected to the EHU at home. I started it a couple of weeks ago & it started fine. Went out to it this weekend & the starter battery was completely flat, wouldn’t even operate the central locking.

SO! Can anyone see a problem wiring in a CTEK ct5 under the passenger seat & hard wiring into the 240v EHU, & connecting the output to the permanent live from the alternator/starter battery that feeds the CTEK 250? This would charge the starter battery whenever the EHU is plugged in. The only issue that I could see is a possible conflict with the solar charging of the starter via the CTEK 250, but this is only the same as having the engine running, so unless I’m missing summat......

As long as you have the ignition control wire connected on the Ctek Dual you shouldn't have any problems with both chargers outputting at the same time. Solar activity is so poor at this time of year it is almost negligible.