I have an Electracraft boat, meant to run off shore power, however my dock has none. I’d love to hear your recommendations and/or understand which Victron parts I need (including solar charger, inverter, converter, fuses and/or cables) in order to trickle charge the system so it’s ready to go when I want to use it. The solar panel would ideally be a semi-portable 400W solar suitcase, or something similar. Thank you, SO much!
To start with, the PV panel open circuit voltage should be typically ~80 - 90V for charging a 48V system, though it can go as low as 55V. This normally means at least 2 solar panels in series. So your options are limited by how much solar you can put on the boat.
It would be possible to let a single 400W panel charge the 12V system, then use a dc/dc converter to charge the 48V bank.
It all depends on how large your power consumption is, and where you are in the world (as solar power input changes with location).
You may look into boost solar controllers rather than the buck controllers that the majority of MPPTs (including from Victron) are; Genasun makes good little boost controllers that can charge a higher-voltage battery from a lower-voltage PV array.
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Thanks, Mike. The solar gets plenty of sun here in Westlake Village, CA. I appreciate the help!
I’ll look into this, thanks, Justin!