Thanks - seems to working well! What do you set the upper limit of the controller to? I think its default is about 14.5 which I took down to 14.0... but someone's told me that's the charging current rather than the floating charge...? Someone else warned me that I might be frying my batteries leaving the controller charging at 14...
Yes Crisp 14.0 is probably too high but check the specs for your battery. You can probably find them online somewhere. I have a huge 218Ah AGM that requires 13.5V to 13.8V float and 14.7 bulk so not all batteries are the same.
Did you put a multi meter on it and measure volts and or amps when connected?
No, but the controller was showing 13.9v which I thought was about right.
Just installed 2 X 50W foldable panels for my 12v system with an Epever 1210 AN controller (could have used 1206 AN but no matter). Interpreting the Chinglish instructions is a bit of an art, but they have float at 13.7v, boost at 14.4v and equalise at 14.6v for a sealed battery. The charge cycle cuts in again to top up when the battery falls to 13.2v. Most batteries don’t start to take a charge under 13+v. Once the battery is fully charged, the controller stops it being overcharged - err, that’s the point of a controller. So I think you’ve set yours too low. But read the detailed instructions which come with it, it’ll be in there somewhere. Why do you need to change the factory settings? Well, maybe you want to eliminate Equalisation charging, depending what type of battery you have. Also, call up your battery manufacturer and ask them.
I reckon most of these cheaper ones quote the theoretical maximum power output, plus sometimes quite a lot to round it up to a good figure. The actual output I have found is in the region 20 - 30% of the figure quoted even in full sunshine, until you get up to the reputable suppliers who quote more realistc figures. The angle of the panel to the sun makes a fair difference to the output.
