Battery amp hrs

[Kent and Sharon]

Just relaced my house batteries with interstate u2200. The amp hour rating is 234. The original setting on the inverter (RS 2000) was 440 amp hours. (the default). Called zantrex and they told me with 8 house batteries the setting should be 4x234 or 936. Has anyone else run into this?. I wonder if the 440 setting hurt my original batteries? Thanks Kent

[Kent and Sharon]

Just relaced my house batteries with interstate u2200. The amp hour rating is 234. The original setting on the inverter (RS 2000) was 440 amp hours. (the default). Called zantrex and they told me with 8 house batteries the setting should be 4x234 or 936. Has anyone else run into this?. I wonder if the 440 setting hurt my original batteries? Thanks Kent

[Ed-Sommers]

Nothing is hurt. That info is needed and used in the mathematical computations for the read outs is all.

Your readings like "Percentages" were wrong but that's about it.

Ed

[silverleaf-tim]

I doubt anything was hurt by that.... however I believe the RS2000 uses the amp hours data for more than just readouts on the display... most inverters use the amp hour setting to determine how fast and long to charge the battery bank....I would suggest setting it properly now that you have the new batteries just to be safe.... hope that helps ya out some... happy new year!

[dgerstel]

The Xantrex RS2000 uses the battery Ah setting to limit the amount of amps used to charge the batteries in each stage of charging. The bulk charging rate is 20% of the battery Ah set in the control panel, as listed in the Xantrex reference. This is 88 amps, during the bulk charge, with the default setting of 440 Ah. With your new settings your system will bulk charge at the full 100 Ah rating output of your RS2000. It is important to check the settings, it they are off it can affect how your RS2000 functions.

[Chuck & Marca]

When we had our inverter checked at Victorville, CA, the technicians there said our setting needed to be higher than 440 so they set it up to 880 (for eight house batteries). We seemed to be going through a lot of distilled water and often could actually hear the batteries "boiling". Also, the charger seemed to stay in bulk charge way too long. So, we called Xantrex Technical Support and the person we talked to "had a fit" that they were set at 880 and told us to decrease it. After stepping it down in stages and monitoring the batteries, we are at 540 and all seems to be working fine with no battery "boiling" and we have correct top-off voltages. At the higher setting, the charger seemed to stay in bulk charging too long before going to absorption and float. Now, it takes a little longer to charge but at least we don't have the battery "boiling" situation. One other factor that I should mention is our Xantrex reads our batteries .5V lower than they are by other measures. This could explain why the higher setting impacted us so much.

It would be great if the information we all receive regarding Xantrex were consistent.

P.S. Our inverter settings are received in our coach via the Silverleaf as we have an APEX; however, Silverleaf indicated they only monitor and report the Xantrex settings and do not change anything.

[silverleaf-tim]

good info... you are correct on the silverleaf info... we tie directly into your xantrex rs2000 via RV-C and simply display the data we receive from the inverter and allow you to enable/disable features....

[BryanL]

Make sure you normalize your amp hours numbers to the system voltage. A 234 AH 6v battery contributes 117AH at 12v to your battery bank as far as the inverter is concerned (assuming 12v system).

Or you can just figure 110 AH per battery if you are running the typical group 27 or T105 sized batteries. Or you can figure about 2 AH @12v per pound of battery if using 8D's or such.

Most water loss problems are from storage maintenance with a float voltage too high.

It is difficult to run too much current into an RV battery system IF (a) the battery hasn't been abused by running it too far down and (b) the charging system is designed to function at voltages safe for RV appliances.

Even if you have batteries run too far down, they will rapidly get back up to limit charge current so a bit of excess current should not cause problems.

You should expect the initial stage of charging to 'boil' the battery. A bit of bubbling the electrolyte is a good sign at this stage. Just not too much! You can often tell if you have a bad cell by looking at differences in bubbling between cells (but don't do this without using safety goggles and appropriate safety measures).

[SRAlpine]

I just bought a couple of new starting batteries. I told them I need to add water to my house batteries a couple of times a month while it is in storage (plugged in) and they were surprised. They suggested I only turn the charger on my Xantrex on when the voltage gets below 12v. Does anyone else have a problem with their house batteries using lots of water when on shore power?

[BryanL]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Does anyone else have a problem with their house batteries using lots of water when on shore power? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
many do. it is an indication that the float voltage is too high. This is a common problem with inverter-chargers and solar controllers that depend upon float voltage only for storage maintenance.

Unless you have a converter like the PD+CW or WFCO that has special consideration for storage maintenance, your least expensive option is to get a BatteryMINDer to maintain the battery in storage. These provide sulfation inhibition as well as good battery storage maintenance.

[SRAlpine]

Thanks! I'll look into the batteryMINDer.

[RV Wizard]

You should not be having to add water so often. I have had to add water twice in 7 years on my house batteries and I keep it plugged in nearly 24/7 and the inverter/charger is always on. I would diagnose as to the condition of each battery; more preferred each cell. If you have a weak cell the charger will try to bring it up and boil the whole bank. Here are some links that will help with batteries and such:
http://www.usbattery.com/care.htm
http://www.dcbattery.com/faq.html#1
http://www.windsun.com/Batteri...m#Battery%20Charging
http://www.rvsolarelectric.com/sources.htm
http://www.batteryfaq.org

[SRAlpine]

Thank you. I suspected they were using way too much water. I'll check out the links you sent. Meanwhile, the BatteryMINDer seems to be the simplest solution.