Unanswered Questions in orion dc-dc

Hi! I am working on a "simple" diagram for a sailboat.

All charging sources (including 4pcs MPPT 75/15) go to Charge Bus Bar that feeds LiFePo4 house battery.

From the same Charge Bus Bar I am going to feed the ORION DC-DC Charger to charge the AGM starter battery. The AGM start battery will supply also the bilge pump.

When I leave the boat for longer period, I would like to disconnect the LiFePo4 house battery to store it at 50-70% SOC as recommended (all charge sources and loads disconnected).

The AGM battery remains connected to keep the Bilge Pump working.

Now the question:

Will the AGM battery get solar charge, when MPPT supplies voltage to the Charge Bus Bar and from there to ORION Charger, but no other battery is connected to the Charge Bus Bar (in other words: no battery connected to MPPT).

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Hi,

I have a camper with an Orion Smart HQ2053 used to manage charge of the leisure battery from the van alternator/battery.

On the leisure side, I also have solar controlled by SmartSolar HQ21427 and the battery is monitored by a SmartShunt HQ2219.

The solar is doing a great job on the leisure battery.

What I am looking to do is also utilise the solar to keep the van battery topped up. As its a camper is used infrequently and after a few weeks standing the van battery is often very low.

I'm thinking I have an option to manually connect the van and leisure batteries together when the van is stood but the best solution would be to automate connectivity treating the solar as the charger for both batteries when the engine isn't running?

Is this possible?

Thanks in advance

Ian

Hi, I have a 12-12/30 isolated dcdc in my camper trailer. I have just upgraded all the wiring from start battery to dcdc.

If I lower my Shutdown Voltage to say 12.6v the input voltage on my bms says 12.6v and my output amps is about 26amps.

If I up the shutdown voltage to say 12.9v the inout voltage follows to 12.9 but my output amps lowers to around 20amps.

Why would my input voltage always be the same as the shutdown.

Greetings,

Any ideas or assistance will be appreciated.

I'd like to integrate a Sterling Power BB124870 (12 to 48v 70A DC DC / Battery to Battery Charger) into Cerbo GX (DVCC) controlled off-grid system. Currently the system plays together nicely; 52v 100Ah Blue Nova Lithium Battery (built in BMS with CAN comms), 5kVA MultiPlus II, SmartSolar 100|20, Cerbo GX & GX LTE 4G. This is built into the back of a pickup or 'bakkie' as they are affectionately known in South Africa. If Victron had a 12-48v DC DC charger I wouldn't have thought twice and would have gone the Victron route. Sterling Power's product is not ideal but there wasn't really much choice in the matter.

The DC DC charger will be installed as a voltage based element of the system much like an Orion Tr Smart. Naturally parameters will be configured to match battery requirements as far as is possible. The unit is triggered by voltage exceeding a preset on the incoming line or ignition signal just like an Orion Tr Smart. In addition it has two BMS inputs (for a 0V or 2-17V trip signal to trip charging). Ideally one or the other should be used based on nature of signal from BMS.

Considering that the BMS is built into the battery in this case, is it possible to tap that trip signal from the Cerbo or Battery?

If not any creative ideas on controlling this device other than just connecting as a voltage based charger?

Considerations:

- Voltage of Bulk/Absorption/Float can not be matched exactly based on available increments so I intend to configure to charge at closest increment below specified voltages.

- I intend to zero out Conditioning / Absorption / Float stages as far as possible and only use for bulk charging. MultiPlus / SmartSolar can take care of charging to / maintaining 100% SOC. I'm concerned that the unit may trip the battery if its program veers from what the battery is asking for. Resetting the battery is a a bit of an effort access wise.

Thank you!

Setup is:

1. smallBMS

2. Orion 12 12 18 DC Charger

3. Progressive Dynamics Li Charger

1. is controlling 3. via Cyrix-Ct-Li.

How can 1. also control 2. in this scenario? Can I just daisy chain the Control cable coming from the smallBMS "Charger" port and use the non-inverting remote on-off switch to control the Orion charger?

Hi Everyone,

Until recently, I was charing while driving roughly between 18A and 27A, therefore quite ok. I know it's not 30A, but apparently nothing alarming from what I read here and there.

I had one night of very cold weather - -20°C - in Norway and in the morrning, the battery dropped to 4° (therefore could not be charged at that temperature) and a warning that one cell dropped below the recommended voltage or something like that.

I obviously immediately turned on the engine to charge the battery, which temperature increased to 5° and therefore could be charged.

The battery charged well up to 100% that day and even was rebalanced, therefore I did not worry. However, since then, the battery is only charging between 5A and 10A which is really low and worries me a little. It seems that the Orion Tr Smart 12/12 30A does not draw sufficient current. I am not so sure why would that be, and why would it change from a week ago since I did not touch anything.

Would anyone have faced the same issue, or would know what might have happened here and what should I do?

I have the following items installed in my RV:

• Victron Smart Battery LifPo4 160Ah
• Victron Orion TR Smart 12/12 30A non isolated
• Victron BMV 712
• Victron Battery Protect 65A
• Victron Cyrix-Li Charger
• Converter 600W Gianel (other than Victron)

Hi

I have a Orion 12/12 30 . Can i still have my rvs nordelektrika ne 237 (15amp)charger installed and in use at same Time With the Orion? I have one 160ah Lifepo.

I'm looking at DC-DC converters, as I'd like to supply my HF radio equipment with a clean source of 14.2V to minimize transmit IMD. My power is via LiFePO 4 batteries, and to maximize efficiency, I am thinking about using a 24V configuration with a Orion 24/12-25 to drop this to 14.2V. Maximum current demand is 23A @ 13.8V.

How RF noisy is the 24/12-25 in the 0-30MHz range? The setup will be relatively close to the radio and antenna, so minimal EMI is ideal, at least in the spectrum in question. I've heard that Victron is generally quite good in this realm, but hadn't found any reviews/data about these DC - DC units.

In all of the Orion TR Smart mixed battery technology installation examples on the Victron website it is the lead acid starter battery that is connected to the alternator rather than the lithium bank. I am trying to understand the logic behind this to make sure that I am not missing some key point.

I am installing an Li /lead acid split system in a sailboat (12V). I have decided to have two banks; the LiFePO for the house/service systems and AGM for the high current occasional requirements (starter motor, windlass, thrusters, etc).

My charge priority is the Li bank as it is keeping the beer cold and running the navigation electronics, communications, autopilot, plus the inverter (coffee machine, microwave, washing machine….) My solar, wind and eventually hydro-generator will be connected to the Lithium bank via mppt controllers set to the Li charging profile.

My plan is to charge the AGM bank via a 360W Orion TR Smart DC-DC charger. I can set this to only connect when the engine is running, perhaps with an override should I ever leave the boat for long periods without running the engine and disconnected from shore power.

(NB I have two outputs my shore power charger with independent charging profiles so no problem with the Li/AGM mix)

My rational is that as the Li bank is the priority and will accept high currents in all states of discharge, then the alternator (engine revs. permitting) will always give its max. (approx. 100A) until the house bank is fully charged. This seems much better than prioritising the AGM bank which will take very little current as it is rarely less than 5% from maximum capacity.

If the AGM bank was connected as in the installation examples, the charging current to the Li bank would be limited by the Orion TR (30A in my case with a single unit).

Other than when starting, power is only drawn from AGM bank when the engine is running. The alternator has an intelligent controller that will be set to the lithium charging profile. This controller will derate and eventually switch off the alternator in the case of high alternator temperatures.

I add that as much as I would love to move the whole system to LiFePO to simplify charging and cabling, I am seeing sustained 700A+ thruster currents sometimes during 5s or more. As much as this current might be somewhat lower with Lithiums (as the voltage would stay up) I would still need to have additional Li batteries so that the BMS´s don’t shut down. The cost of the AGMs, Orion TR and some extra cabling seems small compared with one or two additional 100Ah Li batteries just to cope with the occasional peak current.

Does anyone see anything dubious here?

Thanks

Hi.

I'm putting together a camper electrical system and was wondering if anyone has had any success with charging 48V batteries off a 12V alternator using two Victron DC-DC chargers?

There are two options I'm considering,

1) Use two 12V/24V B2Bs connected with the outputs in series. I.e. the inputs are connected in parallel to the starter battery and the outputs are connected in series. Negative of one b2b and the positive of the other, connected to the leisure batteries and the other terminals connected.

2) Connect one 12V/24V B2B and one 24V/48V B2B in series. I.e. The inputs of the first B2B connected to the starter battery, the output of the first and input of the second connected to each other and the outputs of the second connected to the leisure batteries.

Would either of these options work or have any drawbacks?

Cheers,

Harry

Hello all,

I have installed severals orion's tr smart isolated dc-dc chargers over the past year, so it's not my first time that I'm talking about this subject. Anyway, this is my second client (rv conversion) that he's complaining that his main (vehicle) battery is completely discharged. I'm trying to figure out why the dc-dc is discharging the main battery..., it's installed, wired & protected according to the manual. I have found this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDXixCzg6iw but I tell myself that it's a smart device and it must be some of my settings (by default ones according to the battery technology) that are not good ?

Is the buck boost a better alternative ?

Thank you for sharing your experince

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Hello Community,

I have posted several questions here lately and the situation is getting weirder and weirder...

My last issue was that my orion stay in 'bulk' phase but input and output both on 13.5v(odd).

today while I was driving and monitoring my app - the charger did move to the other phases but...

absorption mode and float mode both had the same voltage values (input: 13.9 output: 14.2) even though the app settings clearly state the the float voltage should be 13.5v

after coming home I turned off the engine and let the system shut down (the app does say that it shut off due to engine should down), and checked the charge on my battery (my battery has a small screen that will show) - and it was 14.2v while resting.

I am really concern that I am overcharging my batteries and killing them, is my Orion faulty? please can someone shed some light on this weird behavior. thank you

I am attaching some screenshots for better observation

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Hello

I recently set up a Orion Tr Smart in my vehicle. It worked for about 3 weeks before (and it worked amazingly) it just stopped putting out voltage. For the time I used it, I only used it on Power Supply Mode. Now it won't work on either mode.

Both LED's on respective Hz show that it is functioning 100%. But it just shows "--" where the Output Voltage should be. I have disconnected all loads and tested at the output terminals.

I disconnected Input then reconnected to restart it and it momentarily jumps to 9V on output then dies again.

I tried the exact same tests in Charger mode and the same story.

I am a big fan of Victron products but lately I have had some disappointing experiences. In the last 4 months I have had to replace 3 x MPPT 75/15's for no apparent reason. Now hoping that it will not be the case with the Orion as well.

Any advice on the above would be highly appreciated!

Hi there,

On my way to install my Orion 12/30 in a 1990 Vanagon.

I though to install it under the seat with the heat sink mounted on the chassis of the car maybe helping it to cool down?

Is there anyone with that installed in a Vanagon and can maybe advise on a good place for installation?

Thank you

Sur un voilier Je viens d'intervenir sur un montage avec batterie lithium et un un Buckboost 100 monté schématiquement comme ceci sans batterie entre l'alternateur et le Buck boost

le propriétaire me dit que cela fait 3 fois qu'il as des problèmes d'alternateur...

je ne pense pas que ce montage est conforme? avant de le remettre en service le circuit après réparation de l'alternateur j'aimerais m'assuré que ce montage est acceptable

qu'en pensez vous ?

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