AGM Baterries. Extravagant or Worth the Cost?

Ladiver

Ladiver

Well-known member
Tonight I wanted to see when the inverter would finally cut off and save the battery from 100% discharge. There seemed to be a hiccup at 30% battery remaining. So, I started charging. Stupid me did not document the voltage, but it was around 12.something. After an hour and five minutes I was up to 74%. After another hour and ten minutes it was up to 94%. That is where I sit now. In the bulk charging, my inverter/charger can only push 125 amps, so that is what it had. It looks like 46 amps is being applied right now in absorb mode. Needless to say in less than 2 1/2 hours I have gone from 30% to 94%. Not too bad, but this is with 50amp service. I am curious how long it will take to top off to 100%.
 
J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
Benefit to AGM is no gassing and faster charging. According to Rolls you do equalize, but I have seen other material that says no equalization. But who can argue with Rolls. You pay for this little bit of benefit. They are just like flooded lead acid in that you should not discharge below 50%.

Careful not to confuse AGM with Gel Cell. Among the solar battery bank crowd the Gel Cell is less than desirable.

If you have a pocket full of money, you can buy this batt.

http://www.lithiumion-batteries.com/products/12v-200ah-lithium-ion-battery/

Yes it cost 2300 dollars but it will give you 2000 80% discharges and you will still have 80% capacity battery at the end of those 2000 cycles. This batt is less expensive per amp hour per cycle. It is very light and does not gas off.
 
J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
What batts are you running?

Ladiver said:
Tonight I wanted to see when the inverter would finally cut off and save the battery from 100% discharge. There seemed to be a hiccup at 30% battery remaining. So, I started charging. Stupid me did not document the voltage, but it was around 12.something. After an hour and five minutes I was up to 74%. After another hour and ten minutes it was up to 94%. That is where I sit now. In the bulk charging, my inverter/charger can only push 125 amps, so that is what it had. It looks like 46 amps is being applied right now in absorb mode. Needless to say in less than 2 1/2 hours I have gone from 30% to 94%. Not too bad, but this is with 50amp service. I am curious how long it will take to top off to 100%.
Click to expand...
 
J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
Do you have the progressive dynamics charger. My heartland came with one. IF you do do you have the charge wizard remote?

http://www.progressivedyn.com/charge_wizard.html

Ladiver said:
Tonight I wanted to see when the inverter would finally cut off and save the battery from 100% discharge. There seemed to be a hiccup at 30% battery remaining. So, I started charging. Stupid me did not document the voltage, but it was around 12.something. After an hour and five minutes I was up to 74%. After another hour and ten minutes it was up to 94%. That is where I sit now. In the bulk charging, my inverter/charger can only push 125 amps, so that is what it had. It looks like 46 amps is being applied right now in absorb mode. Needless to say in less than 2 1/2 hours I have gone from 30% to 94%. Not too bad, but this is with 50amp service. I am curious how long it will take to top off to 100%.
Click to expand...
 
Ladiver

Ladiver

Well-known member
The Magnum is an inverter and charger (OEM stuff is still installed, just not connected. Gives me options when I upgrade...in MANY years!). I have a battery monitor that feeds information to an advanced remote control. That controller is where I set all of the parameters. Depth of discharge, charging amps, any time related variables, etc. It really is a very smart combination of parts. I have the auto gen start module to make sure the batteries always can charge. Like you, I am planning on adding solar to the mix. This inverter is ready to go, all I need are the solar panels and one little add-on piece.
 
J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
Look at my list of solar stuff in my signature. Then go look at my pics. Those panels are cheap and I think they are best on the market. I paid less than 200 per panel and I got a smoking solar charger.

Cool on the magnum, I got a Xantrex 3012.

I built my system just like you are doing, and it turned out very good. It was my first installation, and everyone who knows anything about solar, says it is well built. I boondock with it and have no problems. Sometimes I get a glitch but that is mostly because of my familiarity of the system. IF you only take it out now and then you forget what it is doing and what you are doing. It gets confusing. But I catch up. And enjoy my boondocking. My first solar shake down trip was a failure, so I came back and worked on it and added the Bogart Tri-metric. That changed everything. When you build it yourself you are intimately familiar with it, and you know its right.

Ladiver said:
The Magnum is an inverter and charger (OEM stuff is still installed, just not connected. Gives me options when I upgrade...in MANY years!). I have a battery monitor that feeds information to an advanced remote control. That controller is where I set all of the parameters. Depth of discharge, charging amps, any time related variables, etc. It really is a very smart combination of parts. I have the auto gen start module to make sure the batteries always can charge. Like you, I am planning on adding solar to the mix. This inverter is ready to go, all I need are the solar panels and one little add-on piece.
Click to expand...
 
scottyb

scottyb

Well-known member
Jeff, have you allowed the AGS to startup your generator yet? I was reading on another forum where a particular brand of high-end MH (Entegra) was being wired in such a way that the AGS would not start the generator if there was a power loss, while connected to shore power. This seemed a bit odd to me. They are usinging the Onan EC-30 AGS. The claim was that if the AGS was engaged, the gen will take over when hvac calls, even if the shore power is still active. The resolution was to add a doorbell transformer that senses if shore power is present, which makes the generator the 2nd option. Just wondering how your Magnum AGS is wired.
 
Ladiver

Ladiver

Well-known member
I have not tried AGS yet. Maybe next weekend. I need to drain the batteries again. Every time I think about testing AGS, it is too early in the morning or too late in the afternoon. I guess I had only planned on starting the gen when the battery was depleted, not when shore power is lost. I will add that to the list of things to check. I will keep you posted.
 
J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
What are you draining them too? Are you exercising them or something?

Ladiver said:
I have not tried AGS yet. Maybe next weekend. I need to drain the batteries again. Every time I think about testing AGS, it is too early in the morning or too late in the afternoon. I guess I had only planned on starting the gen when the battery was depleted, not when shore power is lost. I will add that to the list of things to check. I will keep you posted.
Click to expand...
 
Ladiver

Ladiver

Well-known member
sorry for the late reply. I put in a 20 hour day at work yesterday and am just now getting back into the swing of things.

I was only testing to see how much I could run before draining the batteries to the preset inverter shut off. I have now had a chance to test the AGS, and it turns on and off as designed.

I was not able to have AGS kick in when shore power was lost. I am sure it is just a setting, as the inverter did not kick on either. I will go through the manual again. I remember seeing something about inverter defaulting to on or off. There was also a setting to fire on the gen when there was a certain amount of amps being drawn for 30 seconds(??), so that is probably how I could get the gen to fire up when power is lost. Set the inverter to default to on, and have the gen set to fire on at 5-10 amps used.

I did not time the battery recharge on gen, but it seemed just as fast as while on shore power!
 
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