Thread: REDARC In Vehicle Battery Charger for 130 Puma

I can't really agree with what you say. My 130 (TD5) alternator puts out 13.8 volts which is not enough to even nearly fully charge my Fullriver batteries which require 14.5 to 14.9 volts according to their website.

They also state that the maximum charge rate is capacity/4, so that a charge of 100 amps could damage any batteries of less than 400 a/h.

The graphs also show that if discarged to 20%, they only have half the life that they do if discharged to 50%. It's all here if anyone is interested. Of course, that is just one brand - others may be different.

http://www.fullriver.com/products/ad...sbrochures.pdf

Hi Silenceisgolden, and mate, you are missing a whole lot of of info.

First off, you do NOT need 14.5 to 14.9v to fully charge your batteries. This is a mistake most people make.

14.9v is the maximum voltage these batteries can be safely charged at. If you have a good look at the Fullriver site, somewhere on there they state that their batteries can be fully charged with a voltage of just 13.0v, it will just take a LOT longer.

Next, I am not suggesting you use one of the 100 amp DC to DC chargers, in fact I don’t even list them on my site for the reasons I posted earlier.

BUT, if you use one of these 100 amp chargers, because they come with battery temperature monitoring and compensation, your battery would not be charged at 100 amps.

As to discharge voltages.

If you were to go out every weekend and every time you go out, you discharged your battery down to 20% SoC, then you can only expect to get 5+ years of use from that battery, according to Fullriver's own specs.

How long do you think your battery will last if you only cycle it down to 50% SoC?

As above, you have missed a whole lot of info and when you factor in things like real use patens, even when cycling your battery down to 20%, SoC, your battery will die of old age way before before that sort of cycling use has any major effects on your battery’s capacity.

I am sure you are right in what you say, but I do know that with my 130 the house battery battled to run the fridge over a two night stop after a full days driving, but with the Redarc DC-DC instead of a basic Redarc solenoid it has no trouble at all. Much better.

So what you are saying is that in your case, you got an improvement, because you could not fully charge your battery after a “full days driving”

If you could not fully charge ANY battery and ANY number of batteries after a full days drive, then there is something wrong with your setup.

Even at 13.8v, your alternator should have no problem FULLY CHARGE a low battery after a full days drive.

Again, somethings wrong with your setup.

Maybe, but anyway, the Redarc completely fixed whatever was wrong. Works great now.

from the the pdf you pointed out

max voltage when fully charged 13.5v so anything above 13.5v is going to charge your battery.




charge voltages at various temperatures

so at 40deg C anything above 14.34v is wasted or bad it appears




even worse under a bonnet or at the back of an engine under a seat.

Yep, his battery should have been at at least 95+% after a full days drive, and I rate a drive time of 5 hours as a full days drive.

While he has got around what ever the problem was/is, it’s a hell of an expensive solution for what was probably a simple and inexpensive fix.

Originally Posted by Silenceisgolden

I can't really agree with what you say. My 130 (TD5) alternator puts out 13.8 volts which is not enough to even nearly fully charge my Fullriver batteries which require 14.5 to 14.9 volts according to their website.

They also state that the maximum charge rate is capacity/4, so that a charge of 100 amps could damage any batteries of less than 400 a/h.

The graphs also show that if discarged to 20%, they only have half the life that they do if discharged to 50%. It's all here if anyone is interested. Of course, that is just one brand - others may be different.

http://www.fullriver.com/products/ad...sbrochures.pdf

I run a fullriver in my 101 - off a simple solenoid at the moment, but with a Traxide kit soon - I'll explain more about that in a minute.

My wimpy little 35 amp alternator that can only punch out 13.8 volts can bring my battery back up to over 90% SOC (12.5 volts) after 6 hours on the road - from an overnight stay. Longer than that and my solar panel on it during he day. If I don't move and don't use my solar panel, I can still run my 38 litre Engel easily for 3 days and still not have it trip on low volts. Sounds like you have an underlying issue with your system.

Now, just to point something out about the Traxide kits. I have one in my L322 charging 2 UPS batteries. Once I fitted the kit I found something remarkable happened that you simply won't see from your setup. 2 things happened - 1st is that I got a lot longer running from my fridge and had better volts in the morning than I usually had - why? - because the Traxide kit keeps the house batteries and the cranking battery connected together until the volts drop quite a bit - this still gives you plenty of grunt in the morning to start the car, but makes life easier on your house batteries. The second thing is the best though. During normal day to day driving, this actually brings your cranking battery up to a higher state of charge. Most Winters - even with a new battery, I get the odd fault code thrown up due to low volts during cranking first thing in the morning. Now I get none of that. It cranks faster and starts easier, even when really cold.

Let's see you DCDC unit pull that trick out of its bag.. I'm sure your unit is doing what you need it to do, but there are far better ways.

I'm a sparky by trade and know a bit about 12 volt stuff - more than most, but I realised quite soon after I joined here that Traxide knows more than anyone else I know. Your relying on the words of mechanics and Sparkys like me, but he makes a living - not just by selling this stuff, but by designing it too. He knows his ****.

His after sales service is also second to none by the way - there you go, free plug mate.