Hank the Tanks Dodgy battery and solar system

rugbyken said:
when we were last at goosnargh i had 2 x 100A renogy solar panels from amazon. delivered on site the panels were £70 each and i ordered a victron controller bits silkaflex gaskets etc all for less than £130 took a couple of hrs to fit the panels and about an hour for jeff to wire it up , i know lithiums are going down in price but panels now are ridiculously cheap i. believe robmac got a 300+ for about the same price
Click to expand...
I got 2 x 425W at £60 a piece Ken.
 
Nabsim said:
What makes you think it would be better? I have one x Votronic 250 duo and 1 x Victron 100/20. In operation while harvesting there is no difference, (each having an identical 150W panel). The Votronic send a trickle to the starter battery that the Victron does not. The Votronic units are tiny compared to Victron but do not suffer heat problems. The Victron has bluetooth built in that my Votronic don't.

The Votronic has been in use now for 6 years without a single problem, cant remember when I added the Victron, maybe 3 years, again with no problem.

In my opinion Victron is NOT better than Votronic. They do make different things, or do it in a different way so a lot of things are not a straight comparison. Votronic are used a lot in emergency vehicles across Europe.
Click to expand...

The later Victron's don't suffer heat problems either Neil, but I can only go by what I've read and friends experiences. Bluetooth monitoring and control makes a big difference though which Votronic does not have - as you said.

But, regarding Victron being the best I am going on what people write on here mainly, and as I said friends experiences which is why I went that way.
 
Nabsim said:
No Kev, what he needs is a realistic daily use figure then he can plan properly lol

I don't think he uses a lot of power, remember being a bit shocked when he first mentioned lithium lol

There are people can manage fine on a single 100/120Ah lead acid battery for several days on end in darkest Winter in the UK
Click to expand...
Precisely Neil. And if my hunch is correct he's actually using less power than he thinks he is, consequently he could actually use his existing system harder and he possibly doesn't need to upgrade it at all.🫣
 
merl said:
Short answer to that statement is "It can't be" MPPT is measurably significantly more efficient.
I think the reason why you've come to that conclusion is because you're not discharging the battery as low in Hank II compared to Hank I. This is why you also suspected that Hank II is less efficient and probably has a higher parasitic/standing current draw than Hank 1.
Essentially ALL of your reported issues and inconsistencies can be explained by inaccuracies/differences in display readings you're relying on for information re battery capacity and thus Hank 2 doesn't appear to be operating to quite the same level of efficiency as Hank1 was. In reality all you're doing is not discharging Hank 2's battery quite as much as Hank1.
Click to expand...

Interesting post. However from what I observed the opposite was true from your first sentence. When I fitted the AGM 120 on the old van that I bought off RichardHelen off here it was amazing. It rarely dropped much below 12.5 in summer according to the read out on the MPPT controller. This one though with the new 120 lead acid seemed to drop much faster, often down to 12.1. or 12.2 by bed time after a full day of sun. This is what frustrated me. This was according to the plug in voltage checker. Never saw any dimness in lights though or a reduction in power in the water etc. I think there is more of a parasitic draw though on the new van. @yeoblade discovered that on the Sargent system.

As regards MPPT being better. That is what everyone says and I always thought it was (it probably is) but when I was having a discussion with one of the experts (either the guy at Van Bitz or Off grid solutions) he actually scoffed a bit at that which I found surprising. The other thing that might be possible though is the panel on my new van is better and more higher wattage than the old one. I think its physically larger so maybe 120 instead of 100 like the old one.
 
Nabsim said:
What makes you think it would be better? I have one x Votronic 250 duo and 1 x Victron 100/20. In operation while harvesting there is no difference, (each having an identical 150W panel). The Votronic send a trickle to the starter battery that the Victron does not. The Votronic units are tiny compared to Victron but do not suffer heat problems. The Victron has bluetooth built in that my Votronic don't.

The Votronic has been in use now for 6 years without a single problem, cant remember when I added the Victron, maybe 3 years, again with no problem.

In my opinion Victron is NOT better than Votronic. They do make different things, or do it in a different way so a lot of things are not a straight comparison. Votronic are used a lot in emergency vehicles across Europe.
Click to expand...

I'll accept what you say about reliability Neil as I have no experience of them other than what I've read.

However, I was wrong about the price as I was comparing Trev's (MPP250) link to my own Victron 100/50. The equivalent Victron to the MPP250 is about 40 quid cheaper!
 
I like Victron .....I've tried various other manufacturers in the past ....

Some of which have in fairness worked OK ...
HOWEVER ....sticking with Victron makes it easy to build an integrated power management system ...

(IF that is important to you )
That is largely just plug and play ...

It ALSO does exactly what it says,on the tin ....and in lots of cases more than it says .
 
mistericeman said:
I like Victron .....I've tried various other manufacturers in the past ....

Some of which have in fairness worked OK ...
HOWEVER ....sticking with Victron makes it easy to build an integrated power management system ...

(IF that is important to you )
That is largely just plug and play ...

It ALSO does exactly what it says,on the tin ....and in lots of cases more than it says .
Click to expand...

A 5 year guarantee doesn't hurt either.

But each to their own, I'm happy with my choices.
 
I like Victron stuff too. Could be down to marketing, could be the colour, could be they seem to be recommended by those that know far more, or a combination. But I do know it's all work well in my van.

As far as Barry's van is concerned, I think I'd go along the lines he is, keep as is, add battery at most and see how it goes.

Who knows what's round the corner, may be sensible to have an electric scooter in a few years, and that will be the time to spend the big £'s on the set up.
 
mark61 said:
I like Victron stuff too. Could be down to marketing, could be the colour, could be they seem to be recommended by those that know far more, or a combination. But I do know it's all work well in my van.

As far as Barry's van is concerned, I think I'd go along the lines he is, keep as is, add battery at most and see how it goes.

Who knows what's round the corner, may be sensible to have an electric scooter in a few years, and that will be the time to spend the big £'s on the set up.
Click to expand...

What strikes me is that we don't seem to know what the future of LPG will be.

If it becomes harder and harder to get, and I can see that happening - it is already, then I would imagine that large solar/inverter systems will be in big demand and I expect the price will then go up again as will Diesel cookers etc. (if they're not outlawed!) change seems to happen very quickly these days.

As I've said before, I only want to fit this system once and I'm happy to go with Victron.

Electric Scooter - now there's an idea! :unsure:
 
mark61 said:
I like Victron stuff too. Could be down to marketing, could be the colour, could be they seem to be recommended by those that know far more, or a combination. But I do know it's all work well in my van.

As far as Barry's van is concerned, I think I'd go along the lines he is, keep as is, add battery at most and see how it goes.

Who knows what's round the corner, may be sensible to have an electric scooter in a few years, and that will be the time to spend the big £'s on the set up.
Click to expand...
And the chances are the ££££££ will not be as big and the kit better.
 
Or you could buy of temu, wonder if its real mppt or just a rebadged pwm. :unsure:
mppt controller.jpg
 
I think I'm all or nothing me. Its the Cava Cork scenario again. I loved old Hank because it was so simple and basic and easy to fix. I loved the idea of an all singing all dancing Lithium system and I still do but the "Cava Cork" bit of my addled brain would equally be as chuffed if I sort this myself for the price of a proper good night on the piss with Rob. The downside is if I dont go down to Wantage to get the all singing dancing system I was going to call on Rob on the way back for proper piss up. :D
 
barryd said:
when I was having a discussion with one of the experts (either the guy at Van Bitz or Off grid solutions) he actually scoffed a bit
Click to expand...
You can't argue with the laws of physics, not even if you're an 'Expert' from Vanbits or Off-grid solutions🤣.
My guess is that Hank1 reported a slightly higher voltage than Hank2 would have done with the same battery swapped between the 2 vans, this would be simply down to inaccuracies of whatever you are getting the readings from. What did you experience that would contradict my idea Baz? I've read every post🥱and can't find anything, in fact it would explain everything.
The old display panel in my van reads nearly 200mv higher than it should, another van (or plug in voltage display) could easily read 200mv low, that's nearly half a volt difference between the 2 vans more than enough to completely throw you off target WRT operating efficiency.
Tell you what, fully charge your battery, switch on the telly, lights etc, and anything that you can plug into the 12v side that'll take a constant current indefinitely ( not a laptop or phone charger because that will slow down/stop taking current when it's full). Note how long they've been running before you reach the point where the voltage readings would suggest to you that you would have to be conservative with usage going forward (You seem to suggest 12V?) and then continue to run the equipment as before. I reckon you'll get considerably longer than you think before you go flat.
Yep, it'll be 1 full discharge cycle down to nearly zero but it won't kill the battery and you'll now have a much greater knowledge re your actual battery capacity.
Hey! If you owned a DC clamp meter you could actually measure the current at the same time and get a much greater insight into what's going on and what to expect going forward 🥱🥱🥱.
 
barryd said:
I think I'm all or nothing me. Its the Cava Cork scenario again. I loved old Hank because it was so simple and basic and easy to fix. I loved the idea of an all singing all dancing Lithium system and I still do but the "Cava Cork" bit of my addled brain would equally be as chuffed if I sort this myself for the price of a proper good night on the piss with Rob. The downside is if I dont go down to Wantage to get the all singing dancing system I was going to call on Rob on the way back for proper piss up. :D
Click to expand...

Yes get yourself to Wantage Barry and call in here on the way back.

That's settled then! 😁
 
Whole heap of comparing apples with tomatoes ....

2 totally different vans

2 totally different sets of equipment
And little if any actual scientific/factual comparisons or measurements .

IF its working for you ....great
IF it isn't then do what you need to,to actually make it work for you ....

There have been a raft of options offered covering pretty much every permutation of useage/cost/tech ....

And still we are going around in the same circle ....
 
Robmac said:
I still have the same one still in it's box somewhere.

I bought it when I first got this van and never fitted it because I went down the MPPT route instead. Probably would have been ok.
Click to expand...
I used one of these with 200w of solar and 300 ah of flooded lead acid on the transit ...

Highest I ever saw was 10a on a full sun day in middle of summer

Often see 20 or so amps now from 400w of solar and mppt controller feeding 3 x 100ah agm ...

Not in anyway scientific tho
as so many changes ....
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Users who viewed this discussion (Total:0)

Back
Top