Buy an intelligent charger that has the "power source" option. This will keep the batteries at a safe floating voltage at all times. The ctek remember this setting between power cycles and start automatically each time (at least my old one).
If you want to quickly make a full charge you need to switch to charge mode and turn of all loads.
Be careful if you use a "smart" charger and have loads active when you charge. If something draws current the charger can be confused and wait too long before going to trickle/standby charge. The battery can then be damaged. Charging with a fixed voltage (like an old stupid charger) can be safer in such cases.
I made an observation during our latest trip that as the stock batterycharger died in our caravan and i replaced it temporarily with my ctek 5.0 polar the fan on my truma heater suddenly spun alot faster. Probably because of the fact that the battery had run out of juice and now my ctek was charging the battery with close to 15v.
I am also in the market for a charger well suited for constant loads.
Buy an intelligent charger that has the "power source" option. This will keep the batteries at a safe floating voltage at all times. The ctek remember this setting between power cycles and start automatically each time (at least my old one).
If you want to quickly make a full charge you need to switch to charge mode and turn of all loads.
Will it still charge a battery safely on that setting?
13.5V - 13.8V is the recommended float voltage at room temperature. It should be safe for continuous operation. The "best" float voltage decreases with increasing temperature, so about 13.5V is a good choice if the batteries can get hot.
The Biltema charger in post #1 gives 13.5V in the "supply" mode, so it should be suitable for keeping the battery charged for a long time when loads are connected and used at the same time. The corresponding model from Ctek is the MXS25 which gives 13.6V in the supply mode. It costs almost twice as much as the Biltema model. The Ctek MXS25 has a temperature compensated charging voltage, but the manual doesn't say if that function is available in the supply mode.
Thanks for the compare the Biltema and CTEK that explane a lot for me
I understand that they are almost the same except the price
The Biltema also have a temperature sensor but I do not know how that works
Will it still charge a battery safely on that setting?
Yes. The bulk charge (first 70-80%) will charge at full current (speed) but the remaining charge will take much longer time to complete (more than24 hrs). On the other hand you can safely leave the batteries at this voltage forever and also at the same time use electrical consumers whenever you want. Your batteries will last longer also.
I receive this answer from Biltema today : As long as the charger is connected to the battery it will hold it´s memory.
That is what I need so I am going to buy this loader.
Thank you all for helping me.
Hej here I am again because I do not know if the charger works as it should work
I check tonight and the voltage goes up to 14,6V
Is that correct ?
For the information :
I set it up for 12V
With the mode button I went to the car simbol whch mean 14,4V - 25,0A
With the display button I can switch between voltage which is 14,6V - current is 32 and then I think SOC which is 95
But most important for me is the voltage which is 14,6V and I thought for mt wet semi traction battery it should be max 14,4V
If SOC is at 95% normally you would have a very low charging current. “32” can not be 32 amps, could it be 3,2 amps?
14,6 is a tad high but not alarming.
Great thank you so much.
I can not look straight on the display because I fix it to the wall and just befor is a 2e radio so I can not see if it is 32 or 3,2 or maybe 0,32
But if 14,6 is not alarming for my 20Ah battery then I keep it running.
Yesterday evening when I post this I switch it off because I don´t want to damage the battery and I just restart it and after checking it stops at 13.6V and it say full
Sounds good but strainge yesterday loading with 14,6V - maybe 3,2A and now full whitout night loading !
Here you can see how I fix it with the 2e radio in front
martin43 skrev:
