Dual Battery Monitor

[Trekrider Banned Find all posts View Profile Close Trekrider]

gme tx3340, one with the remote mic keys,

Thanks Pjorek, that's the one I've got - didn't know it could do that Note to self RTFM!

[120D4D Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close 120D4D]

Rob my GME does the same, you are able to change it from displaying the signal strength to battery volts, not sure how accurate it is but does seems to work. I know you're not using GME so not sure why im telling you all this...

[pjorek Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close pjorek]

i've checked it against a multimeter whilst the car was stationary once and seemed spot on and yes RTFM helps

[Trekrider Banned Find all posts View Profile Close Trekrider]

i've checked it against a multimeter whilst the car was stationary once and seemed spot on and yes RTFM helps

Thanks again Pjorek, just went out and changed the setting on my GME to display volts - nice trick that one I know the primary battery is good because the Redarc light comes on, now I know the state of the second one at zero cost

[pjorek Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close pjorek]

No problem Trekrider, save $ means more for other mods

[MidLifeCrisis Out of control poster! Find all posts View Profile Close MidLifeCrisis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, glad your all happy, I have an Icom440 lol

[mjrandom Out of control poster! Find all posts View Profile Close mjrandom]

Not quite the same thing but I have ordered a couple of these to test:

http://www.rc-electronics-usa.com/am...y-monitor.html

I am interested in the real world consumption of the fridge and keeping an eye on the solar input will let me work out what is going on with the aux battery. So I will fit one on the line into the fridge between the outlet and fridge connector and the other from the solar panel into the aux battery.

The fridge is my only real consumer when camping (if I don't use the compressor too much) and it is hard to know what the solar panel is doing without disconnecting and playing around with the multi-meter. There is a very good manual available. Hopefully these will arrive soon and I will give a report.

[mjrandom Out of control poster! Find all posts View Profile Close mjrandom]

I wanted something more than a couple of voltmeters could show, plus voltmeters only read the surface voltage of the battery and that is not really accurate when the battery is getting down. I wanted to see if the solar panel was charging the auxiliary battery as well as checking the battery voltage and I also wanted to check the power consumption of the fridge. It is one thing to read all the specs for a fridge but how much does it actually draw when you are bush camping at the beach with a fridge full of food in summer at 30+C daytime temperatures?

A friend found these monitors

http://www.powerwerx.com/digital-met...dc-inline.html

They seemed to do what we wanted so we ordered a few from the states. The monitors arrived Thursday and I wired one in 3 wire configuration (current only passes through the negative lead) for the fridge and the other 4 wire (straight in and out) for the solar panel. I need to get a new right angle connector for the supply side of the fridge cable and I have left enough spare cable for that but this was to test the monitors and check out their performance so I used a connector I had left over. Oh and I desperately need to tidy up the mess that is my aux wiring. First and last time anyone else wires up the auxiliary for me. Going to fit one of these



where the compressor is and relocate the compressor into the bullbar winch space along with a small receiver.

Anyway back to the monitors.



The monitor is loose at the moment because I just have the solar panel on the ground testing the system. When we are camping the solar panel sits in the roofrack and the supply cable runs down past the snorkel and all will be secured under the bonnet. I fitted Anderson powerpoles either side of the monitor so I can take it out of the circuit if we go for a long drive, otherwise I will leave the monitor in place. I also bought some proprietary Anderson clips that hold the powerpoles locked together.



I am quite pleased. The 100W solar panel is now about 2 years old and while it has only run about 2 months in that time I was concerned how much its performance would have fallen. Bearing in mind we are in the tail end of winter and the panel was sitting flat on the ground I was getting 90 ~ 105W when the sun was shining brightly. 70 ~ 80W with a bit of cloud cover so that part is still working very well. It is a Kyocera panel if anyone is interested.

The monitor on the fridge gives me current draw, Ah consumed and local voltage (and more) so I have to say everything I need to know.



These monitors can be wired to log current fed into a battery or charge used. The monitors display instantaneous Watts consumed/generated, Volts (anywhere between 4 and 60V) and current (up to 100A at 60V) and then in a scrolling display Ah (up to 6554 Ah per period), KWh (cumulative up to 655 kWh!) and Ap (peak current) and Average V and Vm (minimum voltage). All at 1% or better accuracy and using only 0.007A! The two monitors cost me $130 delivered which is the same as most places want for simple voltmeters. $15 worth of power poles and half an hour to wire up and I can get good data to know how the system is working. If you go to the website above you can download all the information and manuals for the monitors. They certainly get my vote.

[Justo77 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Justo77]

I got myself a Projecta dual battery monitor the other day, I'll post some pics when I have installed it.

[rabs Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close rabs]

Had a look at the ABR sidewinder monitor an thought could make one myself. Got the bits and pieces from Jaycar all up about $40. Will post some pics when finished if it works.

[Justo77 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Justo77]

I finally got around to installing my battery monitor, so far I'm happy with it.

I attached a picture of its location but I'm not sure if I'll be leaving it there as its not really the sort of thing I feel as though I need to be able to see all of the time, might end up relocating it to inside the centre console.

[1coolbanana Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close 1coolbanana]

I finally got around to installing my battery monitor, so far I'm happy with it.

I attached a picture of its location but I'm not sure if I'll be leaving it there as its not really the sort of thing I feel as though I need to be able to see all of the time, might end up relocating it to inside the centre console.

Thats a good spot for the rodent as well
Mines where your Projecta is and Im always cracking my knee into when getting in the car

[MidLifeCrisis Out of control poster! Find all posts View Profile Close MidLifeCrisis]

Had a look at the ABR sidewinder monitor an thought could make one myself. Got the bits and pieces from Jaycar all up about $40. Will post some pics when finished if it works.

So rabs how did it go? My project failed as the switch can't ne configured properly to do what I want dammit.

[rabs Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close rabs]

only got the parts today

[Noobie Banned Find all posts View Profile Close Noobie]

Piggy made me