I’d like to use the trickle charge feature of my multiplus to keep my starter battery topped up in my camper van. However, the trickle charger is not clever enough to know when the battery is charged so I don’t use it in case it overcharges. I also have a Orion XS which reports the starter battery voltage (input voltage) to the cerbo GX which I also have installed.
If the cerbo could use the input voltage from the Orion as a function parameter for a relay, I could start and stop the trickle charge using the cerbo relay (based on the starter battery voltage level).
Welcome Rob, since you have the Cerbo GX already, you might want to look into installing VenusOS large, activate Node-RED, read that voltage from the Orion, use a node to your liking to implement your condition and output that a relais node. I’d be surprised if you’d need more than three nodes for that flow.
Thanks for the reply Jan, unfortunately I don’t have the time to invest in a node Red deployment and was hoping that this could be something that Victron could develop to make their trickle charge useful - it was frustrating to find out how limited this feature currently is and seems something they could easily fix in software.
You’d be surprised how intuitive and easy this can be with Node-RED, and how difficult to get Victron to make code base changes. And then there is this unique tendency in this forum that there are many experienced people very willing to help those that are willing to help themselves. If you change your mind, you could start a new thread in the Node-RED section to share your first steps and any difficulties you may encounter, and I’m pretty sure there will always be someone around to help you with the next step. What you can’t expect is it to be done for you though.
Awesome! I am looking for hours for a solution now.
I think the Node-RED approach is a great idea and I will give it a try. Let’s see how well I manage as a beginner. Unfortunately, Victron still hasn’t solved the issue with true bidirectional charging.
BUT:
How is it ensured in Node-RED that when the Orion responsible for charging the starter battery charges it and raises its voltage above 14 V, this voltage doesn’t falsely trigger the motor detection on the other Orion, which is responsible for charging the house battery? This would cause the second Orion to start charging the house battery even though the motor is off.
Is there a sensible enhancement to the Node-RED idea or other solutions people have found to handle this?