Thread: Wiring for Anderson Plug for Camper

Originally Posted by drivesafe

Hi Bill, if you are fitting an electric winch then I recommend you fit a USI-160.

Even if you are only planning to use the winch infrequently, there are advantages to both having two batteries supplying the winch while it is in use and to using the USI-160.

Best practice winching is to have your motor on high idle and winch for 60 seconds, then rest for 90 seconds and then repeat for as long as you need.

The short winch period means the winch shouldn't get too hot while in use and the rest period both allows the winch to cool a bit between uses and to allow the battery, or batteries, to recharge.

By allowing the battery time to recharge, between uses, the voltage going to the winch, while in use, will be higher. Higher voltage at the winch means the winch will not have to be used as hard to achieve the same amount of work.

This reduces the heating of the winch and ware on the winch.

By adding a second battery to a winch setup, firstly the voltage at the winch is going to be even higher. The load the winch is pulling is going to be spread over two batteries, so less stress on the cranking battery.

While in the rest cycle, you will replace more of the used battery capacity and again, this means higher voltages at the winch while it's in use.

Instead of fitting a USI-160 isolator, you could link the batteries either with a marine battery switch or a heavy duty solenoid, controlled by a switch in the cab.

The problem with using either a marine battery switch or a heavy duty solenoid is that if when you have finished winching, if you forget to turn the marine battery switch or a heavy duty solenoid off, and you go off camping, you could end up with two flat batteries.

The USI stands for Ultra Smart Isolator and here are a few reasons why.

Under normal operation, the USI-160 would be in the recommended SHARED Mode, and this has a minimum pre-set Cut-Out ( turn off ) voltage of 12.0v but when you select WINCH Mode, the USI-160 automatically resets the Cut-Out voltage down to 10.0V.

The 10.0v voltage allows for both batteries to be used while winching, but if you are not taking care while winching and you operate your winch down to a stall situation and don't stop winching, the USI-160 will disconnect the auxiliary battery so that if you damage the cranking battery, you still have the auxiliary battery as an emergency backup.

Next, if once you have finished your winch operations but forget to switch the USI-160 back to normal operations, if you turn your motor off, 5 minutes after your motor is turned off, the USI-160 automatically resets the Cut-Out voltage back up to 12.0v, removing any risk of you flattening both batteries while camping.

Hope this answers your questions.

Thanks Tim...appreciate the detailed response. I'll be in touch.

Cheers,
Bill

[QUOTE

Here's a thread on compressor locations for reference:
http://www.aulro.com/afvb/l319-disco...ide-setup.html

Compressor in driver's side aux tray:



Hi Scott,

I've ordered the Traxide unit....so in the meantime started looking at the compressor mounting in the drivers side area as per your photo...how did you fix your compressor? I assume that I'll need a large metal base plate and have the compressor fixed to that befor installing in that area? The ferrules in that area don't seem particularly well located to be useable.

Cheers,
Bill

Originally Posted by D4206

Here's a thread on compressor locations for reference:
http://www.aulro.com/afvb/l319-disco...ide-setup.html

...how did you fix your compressor?
I assume that I'll need a large metal base plate and have the compressor fixed to that before installing in that area?
The ferrules in that area don't seem particularly well located to be useable.

Bill, yes you are correct. I haven't done it but have a look in that thread I linked to see what James, Kieran and David have done. Link here again:
http://www.aulro.com/afvb/l319-disco...ide-setup.html

And this thread by Graeme provides good details for clearing the aux tray in the first place:
http://www.aulro.com/afvb/l319-disco...tery-tray.html

Cheers,
Scott

Hi Tim,


The other day you posted that the "new SC80 has REVERSE CHARGING to allow for solar panels ( with a regulator ) or a battery charger to be used via the Anderson plug at the rear, to charge and maintain both batteries, even while the vehicle is locked up".


I have always thought that even with the old SC-80, if I plug solar panels or a battery charger to the Anderson plug at the rear, the cranking battery would also charge, as long as I had plugged the panels or charger into the rear Anderson plug while the green light on the SC-80 was still solid on, as it is for a while after turning the engine off.


Is that right?


Cheers,
--John

Originally Posted by D4206

Hi Scott,

I've ordered the Traxide unit....so in the meantime started looking at the compressor mounting in the drivers side area as per your photo...how did you fix your compressor? I assume that I'll need a large metal base plate and have the compressor fixed to that befor installing in that area? The ferrules in that area don't seem particularly well located to be useable.

Cheers,
Bill

Hi Bill,
I've added a few more pics in the other thread that Scott has referenced. http://www.aulro.com/afvb/l319-disco...ide-setup.html
David

Originally Posted by John & Deb

Hi Tim,

The other day you posted that the "new SC80 has REVERSE CHARGING to allow for solar panels ( with a regulator ) or a battery charger to be used via the Anderson plug at the rear, to charge and maintain both batteries, even while the vehicle is locked up".

I have always thought that even with the old SC-80, if I plug solar panels or a battery charger to the Anderson plug at the rear, the cranking battery would also charge, as long as I had plugged the panels or charger into the rear Anderson plug while the green light on the SC-80 was still solid on, as it is for a while after turning the engine off.

Is that right?

Hi John and you are correct, the SC80 has always allowed reverse charging as long as the COMMON battery had no dropped below 12.0v, causing the SC80 to turn of.

With the old setup, you would be charging both batteries at the same time, if the SC80 was still on ( above 12.0v ).

This is still the case with the new SC80 MKII, but because of the high incidents of cranking batteries going flat, and this applies to all makes of new vehicles, not just LRs, I had to add some additional charging features.

As above, the SC80 MKII still allows for COMMON charging of all the batteries if you connect the charging source while the common battery voltage is above12.0v.

There is also the new TIME-OUT feature which turns the SC80 MKII off automatically, if the vehicle's motor has not been on in the at least 3 day.

As some vehicles are a real pain to gain access if the cranking battery does go flat, I have now add REVERSE CHARGING, available at all voltage levels, even when the auxiliary battery is flat.

The major difference is that if the SC80 has cut out ( turned off ), whether it did so because it Timed Out or because the common voltage dropped below 12.0v, the SC80 now allows the auxiliary battery to charge first and then when auxiliary the battery is near fully charged, the SC80 turns on and charges the cranking battery.

The SC80 has been deliberately programmed to work this way to avoid the possibility of the cranking battery having a dropped cell and keeping the auxiliary battery at no higher than 12.0v while you were trying to charge it.

A lot of great info in the discussion, thanks everyone!

One question I have as an infrequent winch user after reading the thread below - is swapping over to a USI160 from a SC80 just a matter is swapping out the isolator (aside from running the cable for the remote)? I.e. No upgrading of existing cables for the higher current?

Thanks all,
RickO

Hi RickO, while the SC80 will happily handle the normal currents that occur in a standard dual battery situation, but once you start linking batteries while winching, it is advisable, to be able to get maximum benefit from the second battery, you will need both an increase in the cabling between the two batteries and there is a need to be able to bypass the SC80 while winching.

My USI-160 kits come with 3B&S cabling but there is nothing stopping you from using even thicker cabling.

While you do not need to use a bypass but if you do not install some form of bypass, the SC80 will simply cut out ( turn off ) every time you apply a heave load while winching.

Now this means, if you are only winching very infrequently, then just leave your set up as is.

If you are planning to do a fair bit of winching, then you should seriously consider both increasing the size of cable linking the two batteries and either installing a high current bypass switch or replace the SC80 with the USI-160.

Also note, if you have 6B&S calling and want to double the cable size, you can simply run additional 6B&S cabling in parallel with the existing 6B&S cable, which will then give you the equivalent cable size of 3B&S.