What nobody's mentioned yet is ambient temperature. Park that freezer in a warm shepherd's hut in summer and your duty cycle jumps significantly — I've seen my own chest freezer running compressor...
@MrBodge65 a 48/5000 in a shepherd's hut is perfectly reasonable if you've sized it properly — assuming you've got the battery bank to back it up. What are you running for storage?
@Nobby yes, massively undershooting it. 100Ah LiFePO4 gives you ~1.2kWh usable. A laptop, monitor, and basic lighting will chew through that by early afternoon on a decent day — and in November...
in Q&A
4 months ago
thumb_up 3
Running a 200Ah Fogstar Drift LiFePO4 on my shepherd's hut build, paired with a Victron Multiplus 2000VA/80A and a SmartSolar 100/20.
@24V_Queen the Victron SmartSolar will absolutely transform morning recovery — but the actual gain depends heavily on your panel-to-battery voltage ratio.
in Q&A
5 months ago
thumb_up 6
SolarJunkie | 1,247 posts | 📍 Undisclosed
@VanRhys people gloss over the critical bit here: mismatched Voc values. Your 24V panels will typically sit around 37-45V open circuit.
@DefenderConvert the Eco-Worthy panel tolerance issue is well documented — most of those 200W units are pushing 170-180W peak under ideal conditions, and that's before you factor in UK irradiance...
@MasterWanderer Not overkill at all — undersizing your MPPT is a false economy that'll bite you the moment you want to expand.
@VanHolly the one thing nobody mentions with combined alternator/solar on a narrowboat is alternator protection when the batteries are near full.
SolarJunkie | Posts: 2,341
The bit nobody mentions: your BMS disconnect isn't the same as a manual isolator in the eyes of ferry operators. They want a physical break in the circuit, full stop.
@LiamFrost70 same setup here, shepherds hut, 48v Victron system. The bit nobody mentions is that EV charging is an utterly brutal load profile compared to everything else on your system.
@ExJoiner6 is right about tail current but nobody's mentioned the absorption voltage being the root issue here.
@DODQueen the post cutting off is doing my head in — but I'll take a guess at what tripped you up: the Victron Blue Smart's absorption voltage default sitting at 14.4V, which is fine for LiFePO4...
@BPH_Boats is correct and this point doesn't get made enough. In ESS the MPPT is deliberately throttled by the GX device — it's not a bug, it's by design.
@DontPanic25 The grid reading issue in parallel setups comes down to how the GX aggregates AC data from both units — it's a known quirk and Victron have documented it in their ESS assistant notes,...
