Trojan batteries

[sailaboutvic]

I know many won't agree with me here and they probably right not too has they had a better experience with Trojan but Just keep this in mind if your planning to buy Trojan batteries .

We for many year cruised using cheap batteries £100 touch lasting three to four years then just replacing them for more chep batteries it was working out about £100 per year .
Under three years ago we decided it time we brought some thing better and there been many report how good trojan batteries are and how long they last people ,
So we brought four 6v T 125 given us a usable AH 245 ,
We gone out of our way to look after them , topped up every month, keeping regular check on them and on the deepest discharge we not used more the 20% before fully charging them .
I went out of my way to get good info out best to look after them .
Less then three years on after many test over the last few weeks to check their SOH its working out we have 95 usable AH That's working out £280 per year .

NOW I'm not say Trojan are rubbish but maybe to think carefully before changing from cheap batteries to expensive once.

 

[pcatterall]

Thanks Vic. I will stay with cheap and cheerful then! Always good to get your practical take on these things.

 

[fredrussell]

The manual of my (Sterling) battery charger has a paragraph about choosing between the various battery types for a house bank. It states that true deep cycle batteries like to be cycled deeply. I wonder if rarely going below 20% DOD was not to your Trojan’s liking?

 

[sailaboutvic]

The manual of my (Sterling) battery charger has a paragraph about choosing between the various battery types for a house bank. It states that true deep cycle batteries like to be cycled deeply. I wonder if rarely going below 20% DOD was not to your Trojan’s liking?

That maybe the case but as we got 400w of solar and unless,we doing a night sail we only use around 80 ah by early morning here in the med we on float ,
Used more as we sailing but then the charge is being replaced as it used .
So what one to do , turn off the panels each day until we down to 50% ?
If one has to keep doing that it too much messing about .
Maybe because we are full time liveaboards , too much use, but other seen to suggest getting 8 plus years from them or are they just bull shitting .
Who know , this is just my experience.
To late to change them now as we on the move I will just run then into the ground and hope they last till winter .

 

[vas]

what charger are you using Vic? If Victron MPPT, have are you updating s/w regularly (new one came out this week) and how do you calculate that state of health, what tests did you carry out?
just curious, I'm on my third season iirc on T105RE (not the RE which stands for renewable energy- IIRC better tuned to the usage pattern of solar panels)

V.

 

[RobbieW]

what charger are you using Vic? If Victron MPPT, have are you updating s/w regularly (new one came out this week) and how do you calculate that state of health, what tests did you carry out?
just curious, I'm on my third season iirc on T105RE (not the RE which stands for renewable energy- IIRC better tuned to the usage pattern of solar panels)

V.

In addition to the above, do you know what triggers the charger to go to float ?

 

[vas]

In addition to the above, do you know what triggers the charger to go to float ?

yep, that's why I'm asking version of s/w and updates, last summer they changed the methodology for bulk to float transition. IIRC it used to take hours to no end on bulk, now goes to float rather quickly...

 

[sailaboutvic]

In addition to the above, do you know what triggers the charger to go to float ?

Victron set at Bluk/ Absorption 14.8v and float 13.5v these setting are from Trojan they also been been suggested time and time again here and on 12v batteries said site so unless that wrong then the setting are right Robin, I went out of my way when we brought these batteries to buy Victron bm and their MPPT , wasn't a cheap job .
Unless the batteries where fault from day one , my experience is there are US .
Seriously thinking of going back to cheap batteries when they give up the ghost

 

[sailaboutvic]

yep, that's why I'm asking version of s/w and updates, last summer they changed the methodology for bulk to float transition. IIRC it used to take hours to no end on bulk, now goes to float rather quickly...

By 0930 I was getting 20a from the panels so you see it doesn't talk long when you only taken out 75 ah as we did from when it stop charging till it started again at 0700 to replace the Amps .

 

[vas]

HOW LONG on Bulk though? previous versions of s/w kept them there for ages
I hope you don't use the BMV to measure SOC!

 

[vas]

By 0930 I was getting 20a from the panels so you see it doesn't talk long when you only taken out 75 ah as we did from when it stop charging till it started again at 0700 to replace the Amps .

? 7:00AM in GR nowadays I get half output more or less, 8:30-9:00 full don't know how big your panels are, so the 20A don't mean much to me tbh.

 

[GHA]

That maybe the case but as we got 400w of solar and unless,we doing a night sail we only use around 80 ah by early morning here in the med we on float ,

That doesn't sound quite right, takes many hours to get fully charged at bulk voltage of 14.7/8v, if you're dropping down to float so quickly good chance the batteries were never actually getting fully charged.
I set float to the same as bulk on my trojans at 14.9v on solar and from logging current they are still slowly decreasing the current they accept late afternoon.

 

[GHA]

By 0930 I was getting 20a from the panels so you see it doesn't talk long when you only taken out 75 ah

It does though, it takes ages to fully charge a lead acid battery.

 

[vas]

That doesn't sound quite right, takes many hours to get fully charged at bulk voltage of 14.7/8v, if you're dropping down to float so quickly good chance the batteries were never actually getting fully charged.
I set float to the same as bulk on my trojans at 14.9v on solar and from logging current they are still slowly decreasing the current they accept late afternoon.

haven't thought it this way tbh, how much water do yours drink then? must be loads!!!

 

[sailaboutvic]

panels 400w
MPPT now showing 8 A and it's on float .
BM shown 1.8A , consumed 0
If as I did put on a big load on it now just gone up to 20A

 

[sailaboutvic]

It does though, it takes ages to fully charge a lead acid battery.

I have tested each cell when on float each reading above 1.277 which again suggest there fully charge .

 

[sailaboutvic]

what charger are you using Vic? If Victron MPPT, have are you updating s/w regularly (new one came out this week) and how do you calculate that state of health, what tests did you carry out?
V.

I don't think I had any thing to lost as I sure the batteries fu@Cked the test for SOH you have to fully charge then bring the batteries down to 10.5v not something many of us want to do .

 

[RobbieW]

panels 400w
MPPT now showing 8 A and it's on float .
BM shown 1.8A , consumed 0
If as I did put on a big load on it now just gone up to 20A

Part of the difficulty here is knowing which part of that 8A is load and which is going to the battery, and what is the BM measuring in the 1.8A ?

@vas Do you know how the Victron MPPT decides when to switch to float ? My solar charger (Rogue MPT2024) is set to switch when the 'charge' current drops to 1% of the bank capacity. But as noted above that is difficult to measure when loads are also active

 

[vas]

Part of the difficulty here is knowing which part of that 8A is load and which is going to the battery, and what is the BM measuring in the 1.8A ?

for this reason, I have a BT monitor on the MPPT so I can see it on my mobile, this reports what the MPPT is giving back to the system. The BMV if the shunt is wired properly (and that's a big IF imho) reports what's the combined A going in or out.
The way I see it, if MPPT says 10A and BMV says 8A means that 8A go to the battery the other two straight to consumption (most likely fridge...)

@vas Do you know how the Victron MPPT decides when to switch to float ? My solar charger (Rogue MPT2024) is set to switch when the 'charge' current drops to 1% of the bank capacity. But as noted above that is difficult to measure when loads are also active

no, but intrigued, will ask tomorrow a v. knowledgeable guy where I bought all the kit from. Else need to read the docs and don't have any time right now.

 

[GHA]

haven't thought it this way tbh, how much water do yours drink then? must be loads!!!

not that bad, with the fridge cycling and the panels getting some shadow the voltage is not always up that high