Hey Folks, connecting a smart shunt to my boat to monitor what power is being used, currently have it hooked up like this
engine ground / smart shunt / battery 1 ground / battery 2 ground/ main ground bus
batteries 1 and 2 go to a batt 1/ batt 2 selector switch which then feeds the house
i know the negative loads have to be connected after the shunt but does where i connect the positive determine which battery i will be monitoring the draw and charge?
thanks
Where you connect the positive will affect which battery you measure the voltage of, not the current. This can cause problem if you connect it to battery 1 but battery 2 is selected and in use. Therefore, I suggest you do not connect it to a battery, but the output of the selector switch so it is measuring the system voltage regardless of which battery is in use.
You can not use it as a battery monitor with switchable battery banks, you would need 2 SmartShunts, but if all you ate interested in is measuring the power use then a single SmartShunt is OK set to DC Energy Meter mode.