Hello folks,
I have a bit of a question about the most effective way to combine a solar powered system and charging with the alternator.
I've seen people use B2B chargers, such as the Sterling one, in their campervan. This in theory provides a more appropriate 3-stage charge. My suspicion is that it's not worth the money because rarely would you be driving long enough to get past the "bulk" stage in most situations.
I'm most familiar with a simple voltage regulated relay or an isolator, which are different setups but considerably cheaper. They'd just provide a simple 13.8V charge to the system as long as you're driving from what I understand. This seems like the most effective choice to me.
And finally, I also see some folks combine the two (solar and alternator charing) with one of the Ctek chargers, but I can't even find one that combines solar with an alternator at more than 20A so it'd only work for relatively small systems and is also expensive compared to a relay and a small MPPT controller.
Does anyone have a preference here? I'm working off of some of my assumptions so the chances that I'm missing something are pretty high!
I have a bit of a question about the most effective way to combine a solar powered system and charging with the alternator.
I've seen people use B2B chargers, such as the Sterling one, in their campervan. This in theory provides a more appropriate 3-stage charge. My suspicion is that it's not worth the money because rarely would you be driving long enough to get past the "bulk" stage in most situations.
I'm most familiar with a simple voltage regulated relay or an isolator, which are different setups but considerably cheaper. They'd just provide a simple 13.8V charge to the system as long as you're driving from what I understand. This seems like the most effective choice to me.
And finally, I also see some folks combine the two (solar and alternator charing) with one of the Ctek chargers, but I can't even find one that combines solar with an alternator at more than 20A so it'd only work for relatively small systems and is also expensive compared to a relay and a small MPPT controller.
Does anyone have a preference here? I'm working off of some of my assumptions so the chances that I'm missing something are pretty high!
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