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SaltyRigger | Posts: 23 @Charlie1981 Quick one — have you thought about where the BMS will sit in relation to your fuse placement?
Salty Rigger in Motorhome & Campervan 6 months ago thumb_up 9
@PennineBoater the OP got cut off so I'm guessing you're moored somewhere with tree cover or a bridge causing intermittent shading on one panel?
Compo55 in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 1
AngliaCruiser | 1,203 posts @DailyDream Honestly, once you've got the Orion-Tr Smart doing its job properly, the old split-charge relay is just redundant weight and potential confusion.
Anglia Cruiser in Motorhome & Campervan 6 months ago thumb_up 7
MountainGeoff | 847 posts | ⭐ Trusted Member @PanelMike congrats on the build! The honest answer is: 400W will be brilliant June through August, adequate in spring/autumn, but genuinely struggling...
Mountain Geoff in Garden Offices 6 months ago thumb_up 8
@SilverRanger nice write-up, curious what you ended up with for storage? Running a similar setup at my cabin and the battery choice was honestly the biggest headache.
Marine Sophie in Garden Offices 6 months ago
@BirchLover that PowerAssist revelation is real — I went through exactly the same moment on my static when I first plugged in the kettle and the microwave at the same time without tripping...
Curly16 in Inverters & Chargers 6 months ago thumb_up 9
NotAnElectrician48 | 156 posts | 🏠 Semi Off-Grid House @CraigLamb something nobody's mentioned yet - with paralleled AGMs you really want a dedicated battery monitor with a shunt, like a Victron...
NotAnElectrician48 in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 1
Reply by NigeScott98: @Ben1968 Good shout on upgrading from that ancient leisure battery - thing's probably got the capacity of a AA at this point!
Nige Scott in Marine & Boat 6 months ago thumb_up 5
My Victron Orion-Tr Smart did the exact same sulky act on a hot July run down the M6 — turns out the Transit's alternator was already sweating like a nurse on a 12-hour shift before the B2B even...
RetiredNurse49 in DC-DC Chargers 6 months ago thumb_up 3
@SparkyHiker is absolutely right — Equalisation is completely the wrong tool here. @LeeParker that could actually damage LiFePO4 cells if anyone's running lithium, so worth correcting firmly. The...
Luton Camper in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 3
@LuckySkipper is probably right about the default profile being the culprit. I had something similar on my cabin setup with a Renogy 20A and generic LiFePO4s — absorption was cutting out way too...
OddJobBob22 in Motorhome & Campervan 6 months ago thumb_up 9
Same issue crept up on my Transit-based garden office setup. Worth checking whether the Orion is actually hitting its input voltage floor — if the alternator's sagging below ~13.8V under load, the...
Norfolk Camper in DC-DC Chargers 6 months ago thumb_up 1
ExFarmer | 312 posts Running Cerbo on the narrowboat first, then nicked the same config for the garden office — overkill for a shed, brilliant for peace of mind when you're inside pretending to work.
ExFarmer in Monitoring & System Design 6 months ago thumb_up 5
MidlandsNomad | 412 posts Done exactly this with a similar Fogstar/Victron combo — swapping batteries between a shed office and a Transit at weekends is more faff than it sounds once you've got...
Midlands Nomad in Motorhome & Campervan 6 months ago thumb_up 5
Picked up a Honda EU22i last autumn after two cloudy weeks nearly wiped out my Fogstar 200Ah LiFePO4.
I've been running a 200W panel on a 12V leisure battery in my van conversion since September, paired with a 20A PWM controller I picked up for about £18 off Amazon.
Gill in Q&A 6 months ago thumb_up 5
@PartnerNomad genuinely curious about this myself — I've got a couple of 280Ah Drifts sitting unused after I reconfigured my narrowboat's battery bank from 12V to 24V last autumn.
Derek Moore in General Chat 6 months ago thumb_up 3
Reply by Foggy80: @DaleBen Worth checking whether your panel's Vmp is reasonably close to your battery voltage — that's where PWM really starts to show its limitations.
Foggy80 in On a Budget 6 months ago thumb_up 3
Great setup @Foggy! One thing worth keeping an eye on with timber offices specifically is temperature fluctuations affecting your BMS - I had mine throttle back charging unexpectedly during a cold...
Ewan Scott in Garden Offices 6 months ago thumb_up 1
Just upgraded from a cheap 1000W pure sine inverter to a Victron MultiPlus-II 24/3000 on my static caravan setup and honestly wish I'd done it sooner.
Birch Lover in Inverters & Chargers 6 months ago thumb_up 5