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12v solar charger

L

lairdAl_374474951

hi all, iv'e had one of those 12v trickle solar chargers for xmas.

son thought it would be a good idea once leisure battery was charged to connect this and keep battery topped up until van comes out of storage at easter.

I haven't tried it yet,does anyone else do this ? your thoughts / comments would be appreciated.

laird al.
 
Hi Laird Al,

I have done exactally that. Due to an error on my part, my leisure battery was totally flat and I mean flat. I bought a Ctek Multi XS3600 and had the battery on charge for about 3 weeks. After a week it still only had 8.1 volts, so I connected up my old charger and gave it a quick charge to 12.5 volts. I have been in contact with Ctek who said they thought my Ctek charger was struggling with the 110Ah battery. I have since bought a 12amp charger from Argos (
 
Sorry Laird Al, I missread your post and didn't recognise you saying a solar trickle charger, so my reply above may be useless to you?
 
I have a small solar charger which sits in a south facing window of the van. The battery reads around 13v on a sunny day. It will charge at around 85 to 100 mA in full sun, much less on a cloudy day, but still enough to keep it topped up, providing it's fully charged to start with.

Ron
 
Hi,

I have been wondering about something like this myself - basically to avoid taking the battery off when in storage and bringing home to charge (as a tracker is fitted I also have to notify them that the battery is off - plus of course I am actually invalidating my insurance because of the discounts for alarm & tracker).

Do you simply connect the solar panel up to the battery terminals ? Can it be that simple ? Is it ok then just to leave the battery connected to the van for the alram and tracker to draw from?

Cheers

Jon
 
Not sure about other make, but my new 2010 Swift has a connection for a solar panel. I can't say if it is fitted on older models. Why not have 2 batteries and swap them over every 2 months, problem solved with the insurance cover? Mind you, another battery probably costs about the same as you got in discount.
 
Hi all,thanks for your replies much appreciated,battery's fully charged & have connected the solar charger etc.will see how it performs.

Just got to go to halfords now & get a voltage meter.

laird al.
 
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