Are you having fridge problems Ken?
What sort of fridge do you have?
How much power does it use?
What auxillary battery do you have?
(I'll give you some ideas)
Yes a lot of the reference book is very helpful. Just don't take it as 100% perfect.
Phill
> Ken <unclekenz@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
Les and Phill and ALL,
Yes I do have that that publication, I know Phill has reservations but
really, in my view, anyone who owns a campervan, this is a MUST HAVE
publication, essential reading and ongoing ready reference/textbook.
Order it online.
On Page 15 there is a short item headed "Higher Voltage Regulators".
Also worth reading is Page 27 under Advantages (in my case for a deep
cycle AGM battery). Reading both, I think one can conclude there is some
merit in using an adjustable voltage regulator, provided conventional
batteries aren't being used. Certainly for my deep cycle AGM, it says
they handle higher voltages better and charge almost to 100%. Agreed
that charging higher than 14.4 vdc will shorten battery life, but not
properly maintaining conventional batteries does also. Clearly, any help
to get more energy into the camping battery to assist a 12vdc
refrigerator function longer when away from 240vac for more than a few
days, can only be a good thing. I do accept, throwing wads of cash at
this problem in more complicated ways can solve this problem, but that's
not the point of this post.
Which gets me back to my original reason for this post, utilising an
inexpensive adjustable voltage regulator, especially after reading the
speal on the promoters website and other syncro owners showing interest
as well on the USA syncro forum.
Any more thoughts and comments appreciated. Cheers.
Ken
--- In
Syncro_T3_Australia@yahoogroups.com, "Les Harris"
<leslieharris@...> wrote:
>
> Ken,
>
> This is a fairly involved matter. My knowledge of electrical systems
has never been very great and I recently bought a book called "Motorhome
Electrics" by Collyn Rivers to add to my understanding. It is written in
commendable and very understandable detail. He is an electrical engineer
with extensive experience in motor vehicle electrics, particularly
campervans and including solar arrays.
>
> He describes in detail how the regulator side of the conventional
alternator works and shows that it is a compromise designed to supply
enough electrical power to start the vehicle when needed and otherwise
allow the alternator to furnish the power to run the other components in
the system. The end result is that the vehicle battery never gets above
about 70% charge, even after continuous driving.
>
> He explains that campervans and motorhomes have very different
requirements and gives a lot of detail about how this is at odds with
the compromise of the average alternator and regulator. He nominates the
'smart' regulator as the means of overcoming this limitation and getting
both the main and auxiliary battery/batteries up to near maximum charge.
It does this by managing both voltage and amperage output of the
alternator in three progressive stages to overcome the amperage drop in
the compromise system.
>
> There is quite a lot of River's work on the Internet. Search for
"Collyn Rivers".
>
> Les
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: plander@...
> To: Syncro_T3_Australia@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Sunday, January 04, 2009 7:44 AM
> Subject: Re: [Syncro_T3_Australia] re: Adjustable Voltage Regulator
>
>
> This has merit if you have a diode type battery isolator for dual
batteries to counteract the 0,6v voltage drop. Otherwise I can just see
shortened battery life.
>
> > Ken unclekenz@... wrote:
> >
> > Gday All,
> >
> > This is an interesting topic being discussed at the moment on the
USA
> > syncro forum at ... http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/Syncro/
> >
> >
>