Four stage charging?

Sy-Revolution

Sy-Revolution

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Hi Folks,
I have a Vetus battery charger (BC120263) and having recently bought myself some AGMs I was told I should get a four stage charger. The charger, although perhaps a little small (26amps) is listed as being suitable for gel batteries and has what looks like four stages, but are they?
This is what's listed in the spec.

Charing characteristic:
IUoU, Limited charging current, charging current, (equalise), maintenance (float).

Does this look like a four stage charger?
I intend using solar/wind for charging in the main and so at this stage I'm not into shelling out on a new mains charger.....
Cheers,

Crispin.
 
You may need to adjust the charger settings for AGM. Depending on which AGM's you have the manufacturer may suggest different charging voltages etc.

For instance the Lifelines we have instruct to charge as if they were wet cells ie 14.4volts, whereas Gel batteries have a lower charge voltage recommendation.

If you have just bought your AGM's and have wind / solar then do you need a mains charger as well? The wind / solar should keep them nicely topped up.

Jonny
 
Hi Jonny,
I have just removed the charger from my boat as the batteries are here at home, where they'll stay untill I've sorted out the battery housing on the boat. I therefore wanted to keep them topped up in the meantime. The batteries are Squadron energy series 3 110ah. I've set the charger to 'gel', but yes you're right I should give Squadron a ring and see what they say.

Is it a four stage charger though?............
 
The series 3 squadron batteries are just AGM not gel. (Series 4 are agm with a gel electrolyte) from their website: [ QUOTE ]
Series 3 AGM range features glass mat technology resulting in high cyclic life and deeper discharge capability - they typically offer 5-8 years service. Complete with carrying handles and 3 year warranty. Especially recommended for general boat caravan and motorhome use. NB: must be charged using a low 13.6v for the 3rd or final stage, advanced chargers do this but simple ones may not - if in doubt charge as GEL. These are "Totally Sealed" and can even be used on their side, which can be very handy indeed when space is severely limited! Our 'best buy'.


[/ QUOTE ]

Read the manual for the charger, which is on the Vetus website www.Vetus.com
At least I think it is, I'll leave you do battle with that (and they criticise the Ofcom website!)

Maybe your charger includes an equalising stage. I don't think you'll want to use that if it does.
 
I have found the manual for the battery chargers on the Vetus website now. It's at http://www.vetusweb.com/manuals/files/Ba...r03%2010-04.pdf

You have to scroll through to the English section and you'll have to turn it through 90 degrees to read the table of figures. (Right click and then rotate clockwise if like me you wondered where the option that I am sure used to be on the tool bar has gone)
 
Vic you have to reset the toolbar, list what you want now. Had the same problem till the other day, now all singing toolbar.

Just to the left of the print icon, run mouse pointer and you get the word file appear, click and you can go to toolbar options.

Brian
 
[ QUOTE ]
you have to reset the toolbar

[/ QUOTE ] Thanks. I only stumbled on the right click thing by accident. Was getting crick in the neck until then as I could never remember the keyboard short cuts.
 
I only came across it when I overshot the print icon and got file appear, then wondered what it did, and found the toolbar setting, now got a lot of buttons.

Found reading the notes for the Vetus charger interesting, still the same operating system I introduced in 1985, would have thought they would have progressed a bit by now. Only thing seems to be switching from transformer to switchmode, the remainder looks very basic to what we used to do with later ones.

Brian
 
You could say three stage at a push, as float I concider a power supply, holding voltage, i.e. stopping self discharge. It still needs a high voltage charge periodically to maintain a healthy battery.

Brian
 
First stage of charging - as many amps as can be delivered/received at a rising voltage from start to "ABOUT" 14.5 volts depending on battery type.
Second stage - hold at that voltage for a specific time, relative to the battery banks power (in amp-hours), the charge current will gradually drop during both these phases.
Third stage. - Float at about 13.5 volts. The batteries were considered to be fully charged after the end of phase 2 so this is a maintenance charge and will remain in operation until the battery voltage drops again ( due to usage) .
Phase 4 seems to be the sensing and transition from float back to phase 1 again.
 
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