These units are very popular with RV & boat folks. I have the 60 amp
version in my truck camper, I am very happy with it. By what I can
determine, it will give a full charge in about 8 hours. I have it
feeding a 190 AH battery string. You will have to work the numbers to
find out the charge time, I would buy the 80 amp version. It will
take a while to bring a string that size back up. Make sure you add a
low voltage disconnect to protect the batteries. If they go flat,
they will never come back to their original capacity.
If you use a charge controller, and a 13.6 supply, the job will get
done eventually. Note the charge curves.
http://www.progressivedyn.com/prod_details/charge_wizard.html
Best Converter seems to have good pricing on them.
http://www.bestconverter.com/80-Amp-RV-ConverterCharger_p_173.html
If you want really snaz it up, use a battery monitor gauge.
http://www.xantrex.com/web/id/274/p/1/pt/5/product.asp
You can use the alarm relay to trip your controller, to tell you when
the battery capacity has gone below the set threshold.
I have read, repeated discharges below 50% are not recommended for long life.
At 10:04 AM 2/16/2009, you wrote:
I have a site which seems to be at the bottom of Idaho Power's to-do
list when it comes to outages. The last "major" service interruption
for for 8 days.
Previously, our repeater was piggybacked on a commercial user's
battery back up which gave us working power for about 3 days (duty
cycle on the commercial gear was much higher than our equipment).
That company has since gone belly up and removed their equipment and
back up power leaving us with nothing but AC to rely upon.
I've inherited several dozen Gel Cell batteries previously in use
for CATV line equipment power supplies. These are rated at 85-90 amp
hour. Our plan in the spring is to put 10 of these up on the site
for roughly an 800 amp hour array, with plans to go up from there.
The vast majority of the Ham plans I've seen on the web are designed
for 7-12 amp hour Gel Cell charging at a rate of less than 1 amp. Is
there an a relatively inexpensive method of charging these batteries
without completely breaking the bank?
I know in a recent conversation here on RB, one of the users had a
Solar Charge Controller inline between his 12 volt power supply (in
our case a GE Mastr II 30 amp supply) and the actual repeater equipment.
Any *useful* information is much appreciated HI HI :)
73s,
AJ, K6LOR
