What's New

Latest posts across all forums

Latest Threads Unanswered
Been wrestling with this one for my shepherd's hut build and wondered if anyone else has gone down this rabbit hole. The setup I want is fairly straightforward in theory — solar as primary, shore...
Ewan Chapman in Batteries & BMS 7 months ago
Been running a similar setup on my narrowboat for a couple of seasons now — twin Multiplus-II 3000s with a pair of SmartSolar MPPTs feeding a 48V flooded lead-acid bank (about 560Ah, Rolls...
Short winter drives are genuinely brutal for battery maintenance — you're often pulling more than you're putting back in once you factor in heated seats, blowers, lights, and the alternator barely...
Great thread this, really useful to see real-world figures rather than theoretical maximums. I'm running 200Ah LiFePO4 with 300W of panels on my Sprinter conversion — been at it about two years...
Lisa in Motorhome & Campervan 7 months ago
Been playing around with VRM Advanced Graphs lately for my shepherd's hut setup and it's got me thinking about something that would make it genuinely more useful. I'm monitoring my Victron...
TQ_Builds in Batteries & BMS 7 months ago
Has anyone actually quantified the efficiency difference in real UK conditions though? I understand the theory — MPPT harvesting more from those lower-voltage panels — but I'm curious what the...
So I've been down this rabbit hole with my Multiplus II and honestly the VE Bus Error 15 is the cryptic crossword of the off-grid world — looks solvable until it absolutely isn't. Got my van...
@SmartSolarNerd the Fogstar Drift cells themselves won't affect the BMV readings — the shunt doesn't care what chemistry's behind it.
@BoatIan yeah the default Victron AGM preset is a bit aggressive for float imo. Had similar on my garden office setup — ended up dropping float to 13.5V in the VictronConnect app and the bank has...
Been there. The maths never lies — a decent compressor fridge will pull anywhere from 30–50Ah overnight depending on ambient temp and how often it cycles.
Just upgraded my motorhome setup with a full Victron ecosystem — Cerbo GX, MultiPlus II, SmartShunt, SmartSolar MPPT — and the Skylla IP65 is sat there looking pretty while I'm not entirely...
Been down this rabbit hole myself recently, so thought I'd share what I've learned. I've got a mixed bank situation on my boat — a pair of older AGMs that I wasn't ready to ditch, but I wanted to...
OffGrid Terry in Batteries & BMS 7 months ago
Been watching this one with some curiosity since the V1 landed. The wall-mount form factor is genuinely clever for tight installs — I've got a Fogstar Drift wedged into an awkward corner in my...
Tor Jake in Batteries & BMS 7 months ago
Got a question about the BMS communication side of things — are you running the Fogstar Drift with the Victron VE.Bus or just relying on the internal BMS to cut things off if it gets angry? Reason...
ThingamyBob in Batteries & BMS 7 months ago
@FellGraham spark arrestor on the exhaust is another one that'll have you knee-deep in carb cleaner before you realise the poor thing just couldn't breathe out — had my van's genny doing exactly...
Had almost the exact same headache last summer on the boat. Running a 200Ah AGM bank with a Victron SmartSolar 100/30, and I noticed the batteries were sitting at 14.1V in float for ages — well...
@DodgyCaptain — ran a similar setup on my narrowboat for eighteen months before I touched anything. What finally made the decision clear for me was logging actual consumption through the Victron...
Been mulling this one over for a while, actually. My static caravan setup runs a fairly beefy Victron system — 400Ah of Fogstar Drift LiFePO4 and a decent solar array — and I've occasionally...
@CE_Builds what spec DC-DC converters are you running between tiers? I'm in a similar situation and keep second-guessing myself on sizing. Specifically wondering — if surplus from the 24v side is...
@GoldenTrekker yeah OP got cut off but I'm guessing it's the instancing clash where your NMEA 2000 devices start screaming at each other because everything defaults to instance 0.