Solar Charger Regulators

[Kevin B]

All,

just looking for thoughts, i have a 30a solar charge regulator laying around the shed but at this stage i dont have any panels, the thought occured to me to use it as a regulator to charge my AGM batteries which is what it is designed for, what i plan to do is on the regulator where you normally conect the panels to im going to conect a 20a power supply (not a Battery Charger) the type used for Communications i think its switch mode, now is the regulator smart enough to realise it is a power supply and not a panel? or will it just see the load as 12-14v 20a power and regulate it accordingly, everything i have read and know about this topic suggests it will make no difference, i understand it is an odd way utilising a Solar regulator but its only temperary

[rc42]

The regulator should be fine with that, the voltage output from solar panels is about 22v in bright direct sunlight, this drops down to 0v as the light level reduces to darkness.

All the regulator sees is a variable voltage on the solar input and if there is enough voltage it will switch it to the load pins or drive the battery charge circuit, when the solar voltage is too low it uses to battery to feed the load circuit.

You don't need to use the load circuit though, you can use the regulator as a battery charger and when the voltage on the solar input is high enough the battery will be charged.