I am just about to spend a lot of money on loads of lovely little blue boxes and just wondered if you could help me choose between a couple of them?
I am a boater I’m afraid. My curse is that I am simply tied to a soap on a rope in the middle if a river all season. This means I have no shore power and have to take advantage of all the elements to charge my LiFePo4 battery. Wind and solar is comprehensively taken care of due to charge controllers however I’m left in some doubt over the engine charging:
I have a 230ah LiFePo4 battery bank (not Victron I’m afraid) managed by a simple Chinese BMS. My starting battery is a small 16ah lead acid. My charging source is a 15hp Honda outboard with 12a charge coil (not really an alternator)
As I see it, the simple solution is a dc-dc 18a(?) charger connected between starter and LiFePo4 but I wondered if the BMS 12/100 unit might be an alternative? I appreciate that without a Victron smart battery a significant amount of its functionality is lost but in principle, it looks like I would benefit from a higher charge rate, should I need it in the future, adjustable charge rate and a battery protect cut off with a remote control circuit. Am I correct in this or will this not work without the combination of smart batteries?
Do Victron have or ever plan to develop a battery BMS for non Victron batteries that would allow connection to the Victron BMS bus?
I also have a 50a mains to 12v charger which I hope to use for the winter lay-up months but it is not designed to be used with LiFePo4 batteries. Would running this charger to the starter battery and hence through the 12/100 bms manage the charge to the LiFePo4 bank?
Thanks in advance,
Jamie
