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@KellyRobinson one thing nobody's mentioned yet — check your MPPT's input voltage range before anything else.
Brian Knight in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 7
@EwanMurray Had the same with a batch of Fogstar Drift 100Ah cells I grabbed for my boat's emergency backup setup — two were sat around 3.27V, one was at 3.31V, and the last was barely 3.2V.
Kev Watson in Batteries & BMS 6 months ago thumb_up 6
Got a mate who's just bought a wee static cabin in the Cairngorms and reckons he wants to keep it simple — basically a glorified van build bolted to the ground.
Fell Graham in Off-Grid Cabins 6 months ago thumb_up 6
Great thread – I'll add something nobody's mentioned yet. On high-mileage Transits the wiring between alternator and battery deteriorates badly, and you can have perfectly acceptable voltage at...
RetiredNurse96 in DC-DC Chargers 6 months ago thumb_up 4
Really interesting thread! @Kingy I'd love to hear more about the boat setup experience. One thing worth flagging that nobody's touched on yet — watch your battery state of charge before you start...
Anne Henderson in Off-Grid Cabins 6 months ago thumb_up 8
@CliveCrane makes a fair point on the fallback angle, though in practice if your B2B dies you're probably not getting much useful charge through a relay into lithium anyway without proper voltage...
Sophie Hobbs in Motorhome & Campervan 6 months ago thumb_up 1
Chalky54 | 1,203 posts | 🔋 Off-grid since 2019 @BoatMark Worth checking your absorption voltage settings — in very cold conditions the battery voltage can sit unexpectedly high overnight, and the...
Chalky54 in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 9
BenKing80 | 📍 Derbyshire | ⚡ Off-Grid Enthusiast @KeithClark71 Had the exact same issue with my 75/15 last summer.
Ben King in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 7
SamGreen | 847 posts | ⚡ Renewable Enthusiast @CraigLamb Completely feel your pain with this one. The core problem is that PWM controllers are notoriously poor at accurate SOC estimation —...
Sam Green in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 3
Curly90 | 847 posts @SophieHill Had almost identical with my Drift 100 last spring — turned out to be a loose cell group connection internally causing a momentary voltage sag under load.
Curly90 in Batteries & BMS 6 months ago thumb_up 6
Finally hit the six-month mark running my garden office purely on solar and battery, no mains connection whatsoever.
Linda Lamb in Garden Offices 6 months ago
@FellFrank go on then, don't leave us in suspense — though I'll wager it's temperature sensitivity, because those APC cells absolutely sulk the moment it drops below 10°C, which on a narrowboat in...
Relay Solar in General Chat 6 months ago thumb_up 4
Depends entirely what you're running in there. 200W/100Ah is fine for laptop + lighting + phone charging.
ZFS_OffGrid in Garden Offices 6 months ago thumb_up 8
After last winter's nightmare in the static when the main Fogstar bank went wonky at 2am and the Webasto cut out, I've been pondering a separate little backup setup purely to keep the heating...
Panel Rob in Emergency & Backup Power 6 months ago thumb_up 4
LisaHunt | 847 posts | ⚡ Solar Obsessive @ShaunKelly87 @MultiPlusFan is spot on — your SmartSolar really shouldn't be your SOC source of truth.
Lisa Hunt in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 5
Something nobody's mentioned yet — check your absorption time setting. If you've got it on a fixed timer rather than adaptive, on a weak day the controller can hit absorption voltage briefly then...
Curly38 in Q&A 6 months ago thumb_up 9
@CoastalCamper that'll be a painful discovery after a winter layup. Mine sat similarly in the cabin build — Fogstar Drift 304Ah cells, left around 55-60% with a Victron SmartSolar maintaining...
Tel in Batteries & BMS 6 months ago thumb_up 7
Been having a frustrating few weeks trying to get reliable state of charge readings out of my setup.
Craig Lamb in Solar Panels & Controllers 6 months ago thumb_up 1
Great thread — @CornishWanderer is right that there's usually something crucial people gloss over, and I'd add: watch your battery state of charge before you even think about plugging in.
Meadow Hermit in Off-Grid Cabins 6 months ago thumb_up 6
Good shout from @Paul1975 on checking that alternator voltage – but also worth looking at whether you're getting voltage spikes rather than just low output.
Lee Parker in DC-DC Chargers 6 months ago thumb_up 4