Question on cabling for SmartShunt

DIY
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1

Hi

First time post, looking for some advice, please

I have a ‘house’ battery bank of 5 x [new] 85AH AGM batteries, and want to buy and fit a Smartshunt to monitor them.

Looking at the Wiring Unlimited book, it seems my battery bank cabling is sub-optimal, and should be changed. Currently I have ‘daisy-chain’ of cables joining the batteries in parallel, with the negative cables also daisy-chained to the Start battery and heavy-user battery sets, all on a common negative circuit which goes to a bus bar and then cables disappear from there to other parts of the boat.

It’s a polyester/GRP boat, so no ‘earth/ground’ to a steel hull.

I’m thinking the easiest/cheapest solution would be to change the negative cables to connect the Shunt to Service Battery 5 negative pole, and then the ‘load’ side of shunt into the existing negative cables, starting with the Start battery. This would leave the positive side unchanged, with the positive cables from Charger/load splitter connecting to Service Battery 1

Would this work and not cause issues?

Would it also make it possible to use the Auxiliary cable to monitor the SoC for the Start battery?

Used a different browser and could paste drawing below…hope it is legible

image
image1267×713 113 KB

Thanks in advance

Steve

2

it will work!

3

Thanks RL :slight_smile:

Would the Auxiliary also work in the proposed situation for Start battery state of charge?

Regrads

Steve

4

The auxiliary connection will work as you have drawn it. The auxiliary reading is voltage only, it does not report starter battery SOC.

5

No, only the Voltage. You can read the resting voltage to calculate the SOC when you enter the boat or an hour after running engine

6

Thanks for quick responses RL :slight_smile:

I meant Voltage on the start battery, not the ‘full monty’ status as for the Service bank

I’ve now ordered a SmartShunt, and look forward to getting to work once it arrives and I’ve sorted some new cables

Regards

Steve