Rather Hot Sterling Battery Charger

[Toutvabien]

Just installed this new Sterling battery charger in our boat prior to leaving the UK for a year. The device seems to charge the batteries well but, when in use as a power supply, i.e. when on shorepower and we are using it to povide 12v to run the fridge etc, it gets very warm indeed, as does the wiring from the shore power supply to the charger.

This does not seem right to me, we are only drawing about 8-10 amps max when alongside so as the charger is rated 30amp I would have thought it would be well within it's capacity. I certainly would not fel safe about leaving the boat connected to shorepwoer and charger when not on board to monitor it.

Any ideas??

Many thanks,

Paul.

 

[William_H]

Does the charger have a fan fitted? If so is it turning.
One would expect it to be hot at 30 amps output but not at 10 amps.
The shore power cable being hot is another question. Perhaps you shoulld check the actuasl load at 12 volts. 30 amps at 14 volts is only 420 watts which is very low power drain ie about 2 amps on the mains which shouldn't get the cable warm. 10 amps DC equates to only 2/3 amp on the mains. very strange. olewill

 

[VicS]

The fact that the power supply wiring to the charger is getting even remotely warm is very worrying. Quite apart from the fact there must be something wrong somewhere it also suggests that the fuse (or circuit breaker) in the supply to charger is too large. It sould blow (or trip) at a lower current than is required to cause the wiring to become warm.

 

[pessimist]

There is something wrong. We use a Sterling and leave it connected when living on board. It runs two 'fridges plus everything else 12 volt. It seldom gets warm enought to start the inbuilt fan. The wiring to the unit does not get remotely warm.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

 

[catmandoo]

shore power cable getting hot is a concern

possible causes

cable not big enough for job
voltage drop across cable resulting in low voltage at charger and therefore high current to unit to ger power out put resulting in charger over heating
shore connection faulty


check your shore connection what is voltage
do you have a bad plug in connection . bad contacts , rusty terminals, connections can cause high impedance and voltage drop