Hawkmoth

I do believe what you've been told is correct. The state of charge in your battery will determine the start voltage when your alternator spins up. The time taken for the voltage to rise depends on the power output of the alternator, and the size of your battery bank. If you have a good alternator controller then the voltage will rise to the set charge voltage for that particular type of battery. 14.4v, 14.8v or 15v. It should maintain this until the controller determines that the battery is charged, and then drop to float, 13.2v. Remember though, it does depend on having a proper controller on the alternator, check this out.

Hate to be a rule stickler and tattle tale but there does seem to be conflict of opinion on whether it's CCers or CMers t these places. How about taking pics to prove one way or the other and sending them on to C&RT. Maybe it does take us doing our own policing.

As a liveaboard nearly continuous cruiser (summer) my batteries are important to me. Some may say I'm paranoid about them. When I designed the electrical system on our boat we decided to go for mains powered most things. At the time my understanding of battery use and limitations was almost non existent, but I soon learned. I now have nearly £2k of batteries on our boat. 2X 210 amp Lifelines as a second domestic bank = £1k, and 12V 900Amp/hr of traction cells as the main domestic bank. Cost £900.00. So £1000 for batteries isn't OTT.

You can find it in almost any motoring shop. It stands for Automatic Transmission Fluid. The oil you put into an automatic gearbox on cars.

I've had a bit of experience with battery monitors and my advice is not to rely on them. The best indication of your SOC is the voltage when no or very little drain is on the bank. It is recommended, I believe, not to let the battery go below 12.2 volts (for a 12 volt system). From what I read on expert sites???? a battery is considered fully charged when the charge rate falls TO 3% of the capacity at the rated charge voltage. ie a 200 A/h bank is charged when the rate falls to 6 amps AT THE RATED CHARGE VOLTAGE FOR THAT TYPE OF BATTERY.

I did ask and was told the guarantee will run out as the original heater, that is 2 years or 2000 hours. I don't want to involve the law until I've found out if ITR or Calcutt can resolve the problem. It's just that I would like to know if anyone else has had this problem.

After all the usual already discussed problems with an Erberspacher we decided to bite the bullet and fork out for a Hurricane. Lovely, at first. After about 11 months the compressor started to get noisy and finally at one year it failed completely. Calcutt were very good, and fitted a new one straight away, but this one has now been getting noisy and showing the same signs of failure. I have been in touch with Calcutt who admit there is a problem with a newer design of compressor and I'm worried that even if they fit another new one the guarantee will run out in few more months and we may be left with having to buy a new one every year or so. Anyone out there in the same boat?

Thanks Cat. That 's about where I was thinking. A car pulley may be a bit too small in diameter because the engine usually revs slowly so the Travel Power has a large drive wheel on the crank to turn the alternator faster. My prefrered option is to try to use the present polybelt drive pulley and fit some form of jockey wheels to ensure that the belt goes around both driven pulleys properly, and tightly.

Can anyone help? I have a Vetus 4.17 engine in my boat. This drives a standard (?) alternator and a Travel Power 3.5 Kva unit. I would like to fit a 200 amp/h alternator which I have purchased in order to charge my second set of batteries. This alternator is of course larger than the standard one fitted at the moment, and also requires a poly V belt like the one used on the Travel Power. Is there anyone out there who has done this mod and could advise?