Collectors

Hi, it was just to make life easy & look at a panel/meter that would give me the info if 1 battery on a bank is starting to break down, to save having to take hydrometer readings & alike. I see there is plenty of meters to read a bank or even 2-3 banks, but not individual batteries in a bank. I would have thought larger boats with larger banks would have this facility. May look into 1 meter & 4 shunts with a rotary switch to select each battery or similar

Hi, is there a way to individual monitor each of batteries condition in a bank "of 4". Total 12 volt = 480amp/h .

Thanks for the replies everyone, & sorry for not getting back. I didn't get any notifications, yet the notify me box was ticked. Its looking like its choosing a lift out point with a short lorry ride & a lift back in."shame" Couldn't quite get enough info on the Nene up to the wash. But getting the boat out might be a good opportunity for some maintenance.

Hi, more a query for a friend if you can help, please. Is there a way of getting from the UK southern region to the north with a 10' wide beam via rivers/canals? I see from maps you can get to Peterborough, Birmingham & even Stourport i think, But not beyond to the north in a 10' boat. It even looks like he can't even reach the Wash & a short trip on the sea. Is there a way?. Thanks ?

Eh! Thanks for the quick reply's. was just thinking that 3kw would be pushing a 13amp plug as i have seen a few of these getting hot in the past with this sort of load. (even though it's only 12.5amp) Think the 2 leads might not be that great an idea as i would also be putting 2 fuse's in the circuit with the 13 amp fuses in the plug tops. Sounds like it might be best to limit it down to 2kw. Cheers. PS. The 60amp switch was just one i had in an old spare fuse board.

Hi, i would like to run power out my 3000watt inverter into a fuse board with a 60amp main switch & then of to different circuits via 4 rcbo's. On the inverter i have 2 x 13amp outlets, can i use 2 leads from the inverter outlets to the main 60amp switch & double them up at this point to spread any load across these 2 inverter outlets. Many thanks Chris.

Must admit that i personally think the things are a blight on the land scape & very noisy in certain conditions. Believe me you wont want to be mooring within a mile of one of these things on a windy night. The only reasons these are going up on the canals, is that some one is making a lot of money out of the project outside the people that use, live & run the canals. Personally I'm still in favorer of flooding more valleys & going with hydro schemes. This will also give space to build more marinas & accommodation for canal & other boat users. The bonus is also looking at beautifully lake's & hill's, & not these giant monstrosity's perched on top of a hill that every one can see & hear from miles away.

Must admit I am not sure how the Lecky board meters calculate this. But if a lot of items are running close to things like cable sizing, then these will also become a resistance in them selves & up the wattage, which would show on the meter. I would assume this will also apply to appliances plugged in when in use. Hopefully one of the sparks will see this & correct me to how a meter works.

Hi, if you voltage is dropping to around the 200volt mark, I would be careful about damaging certain appliance. (Motors are not a lover of this). The other problem with this sort of volt drop is that it will increase the amperage being drawn & presumably increase the cost of your bill being that is is worked out on the amperage being used. IE: the lower the voltage the higher the cost through a bad supply. ???? Just a thought. Chris.

I might be wrong? But could you use a coil instead of a shunt. I know the ones on this site sell at about £20.00, but are in the US & dont have an EU outlet. But one of the members might know where to get one.???? Only an idea. Chris.

Many thanks Chris, will give it a try. Cheers.

Hi, thanks everyone for your input. Chris, would the 4 way switch be better with just 4 d/pole switches (1 off 1 on to read) or could I get away with a rotary switch like this revised link. (Hadn't put any fusing in as yet on the meter side as yet) Thanks. Chris.

Hi Chris, Thanks for getting back. (I have been playing)! Link to diagram This is roughly the set up with your Ebay suggestion.(Thank for the saving) Wasn’t quite sure where you were thinking of the 4 pole switch was to be installed? Chris.

Hi, I plan to have the normal 2 bank battery system (engine/domestic) but am a bit confused on the domestic side in the way the batteries should be charged & monitored. If I have a bank of 4x150amp hour batteries on the domestic side that are all linked together. Is there a way to monitor individual batteries within the bank to make sure they are all getting the correct charge? I was only thinking that its not normally good to have a duff battery amongst the good ones, & wanted to pick up on this as soon as poss should it arise. These 4 batteries will be wire individually to a local bus bar with equal length leads to each of the 4 domestic batteries. Any thoughts or ideas? Cheers Chris.

I don’t know! I look for ages. And your kind self pop’s along in under 15 minutes, & post's just what I am looking for.. What can I say? Brilliant! Many thanks’ Gary. Chris.

Hi, hope you can help? Has any one seen a simple list for what size boat will fit on which canals? I am trying to see what my limitations are if I go for a wider boat but cant seem to find this info on one simple page. IE. If I have a 12’ x 50’ I can use this list of canals. If I have a 11’ x 65’ I can use these canals Hope you have seen a link like this. Thanks. Chris

Hi, If you was worried about the gas side of things & you’re at the build stage. For the sake of some extra cabling, you could fit an burglar alarm panel that will give you the facilities of not only an alarm for the boat, but descent gas & smoke detectors can be fitted to the system with a simple relay that will shut of a 12volt gas valve if the gas alarm is activated. This can be set up in one or two ways, in that if you set the alarm when you go out, the gas valve will auto turn off or just shut off when a gas detector trips the alarm system. This will work 24 hours a day, even when your not there. You can set up loads of things on a boat via the alarm panel to monitor & do many automated things, & if you want, even send you a text message to keep you informed. It may sound over the top, but will be far, far cheaper than setting up for the amount of electric you want to use, plus with lower running costs. I personally think with the very high amperage that that is dealt with on boats using batteries; it’s a 50-50 toss up on which is worst of two evils, & don’t think gas is any more dangerous than electric if either one is fitted properly. Also you may not be to popular if you have to start the geny up late in the evening for a bit of supper, as you wont find a quite & cheap 6kva generator. Above 3kw seems to be the point where generators seem to start razing the DB level. Good luck Chris. PS. The generator can always have a gas conversion?

Hi Catweasel, Just out of curiosity, is there any spec tag on the drill? With wattage or something similar. Ditto on the sharp drills bit. Chris.

Not sure any one can work this one out until you know the load/wattage of the drill. On a drill you can get from 1.5 to 3 times increase on amps on start up & different usage of the drill (also depending on the way the motor is wound). Be interesting to see what the voltage is at the terminals of the wooden block when the trigger is pulled & then when running & then under load. Because a drill has varying loads it would be impossible to use the cable as a resistance to get the correct voltage as a volt drop will only happen when the triger is pulled. I get the impression the amp meter is not reading correctly, or if it’s a needle type? You can’t read a serge on this type of meter accurately. Chris.

Hi, There is some good boat alarms here, http://marinedirectory.ybw.com/Marine_Dire...p?category_id=2 Found the Harbor call Alarm people very helpful. You could have a look at some of the car alarms that are about. On some alarms, it may be worth making sure you can disable the shock sensors that many may have. I think you may get a lot of false alarms otherwise. If you are placing grills over roof lights or windows. Make sure you don’t stop yourself getting out of the boat in an emergency. I am looking at the security side of things myself at the moment. I am even thinking of placing heavy steel frying pans over the porthole windows with a hinge at the top & a catch at the bottom. (Don’t laugh) They wont have handles & will have a nice painted scene on both sides of each one, & it’s a lot cheaper than having them made. Chris.

You may have alredy sorted it but there is this one http://www.midlandchandlers.co.uk/contentc...gory~11291.aspx Scroll down the page on the right. Chris.

I think your find that there are many office bods at BW (not all) are sitting around on there bums doing a feasibility study on the feasibility of doing more feasibility studies to see if its feasible to put the licences up & have now found they had to raise the fee to pay for all the feasibility studies on a higher licensing. I wouldn’t be surprised if they will have to do a study on this as well. Seems to work this way on the NHS as well. Chris.

Hi, these lamps may be of some use to anyone running on invertors. It’s a 9watt GU10 type lamp for 240 volt that is a fluorescent. Will give you about 40 watt of normal light & will be a bit better than the 10 watt halogen lamps. The only problem may be for those that don’t have the depth behind the light for this type of lamp. Might fit in the eye ball style of light fitting?. Another advantage is it run a lot cooler that halogens. http://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Main_Index/Lig...Lamp/index.html The depth is about 75mm plus the lamp holder. Trying to see if there is a 12 volt version but cant find one as yet. Chris.

Hi Chris, It’s was only some information I have picked up on the web via independent sites that have nothing to gain financially like Greenpeace & others. Would never take or trust the word of manufactures. 1. Most sites & tests say there can be a 30% & more cut in DB level using LPG. This is assuming that the conversion was done by an LPG engineer & the engine was in good order to begin with. So even if it wasn’t this much I would be happy with any DB drop as a bonus for myself & any one moored near me. (I assume a small percentage of this DB drop is due to a power drop when using LPG) 2. On the side of being cheaper to run. With the introduction of tax cuts on LPG & allowing for a 10/15% drop in power there is still an overall saving of about 40% on petrol 25% on diesel in MPG. Independents & manufactures all state this. (Give or take a few percent) As I am only at the planning stages with a boat, I would of looked into fitting an LPG converted engine if the fuel was available along canals in a pump form. 3. My apologise on the engine ware. A friend of mine works for Honda development & they recently had a lot of problems with valve ware & a few other component when using LPG & it has come to light that this was to do with the engine management & electronics that caused the premature ware. (I assume something to do with possibly timing & alike) Cheers, Chris M