More Alternator problems

[TheBiscuits]

17 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

I lost the will to live too but am now curious as to what an A to B is actually supposed to do. Will it ‘work’ with just one alternator? Or is it specifically for joining together a pair of alternators?

Whichever, why is it called an A to B?

It's for connecting Alternators to Batteries.  I use wires

 

[WotEver]

28 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

So is it fixed?

Yes. It was never actually broken... kind of. 

18 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

why is it called an A to B?

Last part of your post first - Alternator to Battery charger. 

18 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

I lost the will to live too but am now curious as to what an A to B is actually supposed to do. Will it ‘work’ with just one alternator? Or is it specifically for joining together a pair of alternators?

You connect one or more alternators to its input. It then outputs a higher voltage than the ‘naked’ alternator achieves, mimicking the charge curve of a mains charger as opposed to the soft curves of a standard alternator. 

In Charles’s online video it makes a huge difference, using a low-voltage alternator and too-thin cabling. In the real world with modern alternators and decent wiring the difference it makes to charge times will be minimal. 

[MtB]

Just now, TheBiscuits said:

It's for connecting Alternators to Batteries.  I use wires

 

 

Yes I got that far. But back in the day when I was trying to learn about alternators and battery charging I could never quite grasp what the manu was claiming it did.

(Technically I mean, not the marketing puff and waffle.)

P.s. Thanks Tony. Cross posted. 

[WotEver]

47 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

My thoughts all along hence my first post last week started:

"I'm a bit late to the party here Dr Bob, but have you had the Beta alternators connected to their respective batteries without the Sterling gizmo linking them up?"

We were all saying the same thing in one form or another. Eventually Snib’s post prompted Dr Bob to actually try it. Voilá, no problem. 

[Dr Bob]

13 minutes ago, WotEver said:

We were all saying the same thing in one form or another. Eventually Snib’s post prompted Dr Bob to actually try it. Voilá, no problem. 

Snib's post was the first one that said how to do it without a spanner. I don't do high amp electrics with spanners.

The AtoB let's me get 14.6V in. The bare alternator does not.

It might yet end up in the cut......but not yet.

[MtB]

8 minutes ago, Dr Bob said:

Snib's post was the first one that said how to do it without a spanner. I don't do high amp electrics with spanners.

 

It can get expensive in spanners can't it!

[roland elsdon]

I looked at A to B when I put in a 12 v water heater ,to boost the alternators output. Then I realised that by  buying  an A to B I was simply adding to C and H where C =cost and H = Heat. I then realised that by spending money on W I could save both C and H , and not have to find a cool dark place for an A to B. So I did.

[nicknorman]

1 hour ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

Yes I got that far. But back in the day when I was trying to learn about alternators and battery charging I could never quite grasp what the manu was claiming it did.

(Technically I mean, not the marketing puff and waffle.)

P.s. Thanks Tony. Cross posted. 

It is a device that passes power through it whilst changing the products - volts and amps. So it increases the volts to an optimum charging voltage, with maximum amps decreasing slightly as a consequence. A bit like that boost converter you got for charging one 12v battery from another. At high charge currents, the alternator voltage is pulled down to around 13v to ensure maximum power from the alternator.

The charging voltage is temperature compensated and can have remote voltage sensing to allow for cable voltage drop. Different battery types can be selected to give different charging profiles. The profiles include float, so for prolonged engine running the batteries don’t get unnecessarily over-charged, and an equalise mode. There is also an alternator temperature sensor that reduces the demand from the alternator if it gets too hot.

It also looks after split charging.

Altogether a useful but of kit IMO. Not strictly necessary, and we don’t have one, but we have other means of achieving much the same (travelpower into a Combi). So personally I wouldn’t remove it provided it’s working properly.

I wouldn’t pay for an A2B but if I had one, and dr Bob’s setup, I would wire the small alternator direct to the engine battery andnthe large alternator via the A2B to the domestic. But I would also want to have adequate monitoring and be able to remove the A2B from circuit if it malfunctioned.

i remain a bit unsure of the diagnosis arrived at. If one alternator regulates at 14.4v and one at 14.6v then, when connected together, there will be some imbalance in the % of their output currents. However it doesn’t seem feasible that this would translate to the small alternator producing max current and the big one only 1% of its output. Something else is or was going on.

Edited April 3, 2018 by nicknorman

[Dr Bob]

9 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

Which is exactly how Beta Marine supply the engine.  It's almost like they have some experience in this field, and provide the correct kit with their inland marine engines to suit normal usage patterns.

 

Sorry Biscuits, but that is exactly the problem. They dont supply kit that suits normal usage patterns... if cc'ing in winter is counted as normal. The maximum out put of my alternator was 13.9V in absorption when we bought the boat. Original wiring. Connections all good - new batteries only a few months old. Even if the wiring was ok, it wouldnt go above 14.2V. Not good enough for engine charging in deep winter. I need 14.4V + extra for cold batteries.....so 14.6V. Never going to get there with the original beta set up.

Now, in addition to the above, you may not have read my previous posts but our previous lumpy water boat that we lived on and sailed to the med and back over 5 years, was bought new at 3 times the price of this NB, supplied with a Volvo penta 2040 engine with one 70A alternator. That alternator never got past 13.9V. Brand new engine. Brand new wiring. I bought an AtoB for that and it was brilliant for the 5 years we used the boat allowing us to get over 14V during absorbtion. The battery bank lasted 5 years plus while we were full time liveaboards with little access to shore power for 6 months of the year.

I read all the bad stuff about Sterling on here but I know how difficult it is to charge batteries and with the knowledge I have gained here and my previous experience of closely monitoring voltage at rest, I have been able to get a reasonably high voltage during absorption and that is down to the AtoB. My current domestic bank (6*110) now 12 months old looks like it has lost little capacity compared to what I had 12 months ago (v.cheap wet lead acids) - maybe 5%, 10% at most - based on 'at rest' voltages and Ahrs used. If I hadnt bought the AtoB they may well have been shot by now.

If its down to 0°C overnight. What voltage do you want to charge at after you start your engine and you are in absorption? 14.2V or 14.6V? I was thinking about Trojans for the future. What voltage then? The Sterling will go to 14.8V + temperature compensation.

[nicknorman]

On 02/04/2018 at 09:45, Sir Nibble said:

14V from the alternator is test passed. Current is completely irrelevant. Was the small alternator still connected to the AtoB? If so they are still both connected to the domestics.

No, if the alternator is supposed to output 14.4v (which is what you said earlier) and is only outputting 14v at a very light load of 1A, it is either faulty or has a regulator set very low. Either way it is not suitable for charging the batteries directly.

[nicknorman]

11 minutes ago, Dr Bob said:

Sorry Biscuits, but that is exactly the problem. They dont supply kit that suits normal usage patterns... if cc'ing in winter is counted as normal. The maximum out put of my alternator was 13.9V in absorption when we bought the boat. Original wiring. Connections all good - new batteries only a few months old. Even if the wiring was ok, it wouldnt go above 14.2V. Not good enough for engine charging in deep winter. I need 14.4V + extra for cold batteries.....so 14.6V. Never going to get there with the original beta set up.

Now, in addition to the above, you may not have read my previous posts but our previous lumpy water boat that we lived on and sailed to the med and back over 5 years, was bought new at 3 times the price of this NB, supplied with a Volvo penta 2040 engine with one 70A alternator. That alternator never got past 13.9V. Brand new engine. Brand new wiring. I bought an AtoB for that and it was brilliant for the 5 years we used the boat allowing us to get over 14V during absorbtion. The battery bank lasted 5 years plus while we were full time liveaboards with little access to shore power for 6 months of the year.

I read all the bad stuff about Sterling on here but I know how difficult it is to charge batteries and with the knowledge I have gained here and my previous experience of closely monitoring voltage at rest, I have been able to get a reasonably high voltage during absorption and that is down to the AtoB. My current domestic bank (6*110) now 12 months old looks like it has lost little capacity compared to what I had 12 months ago (v.cheap wet lead acids) - maybe 5%, 10% at most - based on 'at rest' voltages and Ahrs used. If I hadnt bought the AtoB they may well have been shot by now.

If its down to 0°C overnight. What voltage do you want to charge at after you start your engine and you are in absorption? 14.2V or 14.6V? I was thinking about Trojans for the future. What voltage then? The Sterling will go to 14.8V + temperature compensation.

I can’t be bothered to look back to see how old your engine is, but our Beta is 2010 and the domestic alternator (Iskra) puts out around 14.5v. Keeps our Trojans quite happy in summer, but in winter I give them the occasional kicking at the end of charging with the travelpower /Combi at 15v.

[Dr Bob]

10 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

It is a device that passes power through it whilst changing the products - volts and amps. So it increases the volts to an optimum charging voltage, with maximum amps decreasing slightly as a consequence. A bit like that boost converter you got for charging one 12v battery from another. At high charge currents, the alternator voltage is pulled down to around 13v to ensure maximum power from the alternator.

The charging voltage is temperature compensated and can have remote voltage sensing to allow for cable voltage drop. Different battery types can be selected to give different charging profiles. The profiles include float, so for prolonged engine running the batteries don’t get unnecessarily over-charged, and an equalise mode. There is also an alternator temperature sensor that reduces the demand from the alternator if it gets too hot.

It also looks after split charging.

Altogether a useful but of kit IMO. Not strictly necessary, and we don’t have one, but we have other means of achieving much the same (travelpower into a Combi). So personally I wouldn’t remove it provided it’s working properly.

I wouldn’t pay for an A2B but if I had one, and dr Bob’s setup, I would wire the small alternator direct to the engine battery andnthe large alternator via the A2B to the domestic. But I would also want to have adequate monitoring and be able to remove the A2B from circuit if it malfunctioned.

i remain a bit unsure of the diagnosis arrived at. If one alternator regulates at 14.4v and one at 14.6v then, when connected together, there will be some imbalance in the % of their output currents. However it doesn’t seem feasible that this would translate to the small alternator producing max current and the big one only 1% of its output. Something else is or was going on.

I fully agree Nick with everything you say. My last post crossed with yours.

Yes that is the way I have now wired it up and all working well, but need a days cruising to be fully sure. I can fully monitor via the BMV and clamp meter and I can now see how to quickly take the AtoB out of circuit. That clamp meter is a very very useful bit of kit  for £35.

I too am unsure why the 55A is at full power, unless there is a fault in the AtoB. All paralleled alternators will be pairs of different alternators and if this is normal behavior then some one would have spotted it before. On my old boat we just had one alternator. I have emailed Charles to ask them the question. Let's see what they come back with.

2 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

I can’t be bothered to look back to see how old your engine is, but our Beta is 2010 and the domestic alternator (Iskra) puts out around 14.5v. Keeps our Trojans quite happy in summer, but in winter I give them the occasional kicking at the end of charging with the travelpower /Combi at 15v.

It's 2002 vintage.

 

[Sir Nibble]

6 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

No, if the alternator is supposed to output 14.4v (which is what you said earlier) and is only outputting 14v at a very light load of 1A, it is either faulty or has a regulator set very low. Either way it is not suitable for charging the batteries directly.

Accepted. But I have no idea of the quality or calibration of the instrument used and in my experience regulator failure manifests as all or nothing. An actual variation in the set point is vanishingly rare.

[nicknorman]

11 minutes ago, Dr Bob said:

I too am unsure why the 55A is at full power, unless there is a fault in the AtoB. All paralleled alternators will be pairs of different alternators and if this is normal behavior then some one would have spotted it before. On my old boat we just had one alternator. I have emailed Charles to ask them the question. Let's see what they come back with.

The previous imbalance in currents between the paralleled alternators is nothing to do with the A2B. The clue is in the test results - 14v at 1A for the big alternator on its own. Put that sort of alternator in parallel with one regulating at 14.6v and the large current imbalance is inevitable.

The only question is why the low voltage from the 90A alt. The answer will transpire when you are charging batteries that want to take plenty of current. If the A2B and 90A alternator can push getting on for 90A into the batteries (you may get a bit less than 90A due to the voltage step up/current step down on the A2B) the alternator is not faulty but just has a very low regulation voltage. This sort of regulation voltage is used for engines running for very long periods, to avoid over-gassing batteries.

But if you can never get more than say 50A out of the system, it means the 90A alternator is damaged, maybe a diode out.

7 minutes ago, Sir Nibble said:

Accepted. But I have no idea of the quality or calibration of the instrument used and in my experience regulator failure manifests as all or nothing. An actual variation in the set point is vanishingly rare.

True, however I think the most likely explanation is a regulator intentionally set to about 14v. But doesn’t a phase out result in lowish voltage too?

Edited April 3, 2018 by nicknorman

[WotEver]

31 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

i remain a bit unsure of the diagnosis arrived at. If one alternator regulates at 14.4v and one at 14.6v then, when connected together, there will be some imbalance in the % of their output currents. However it doesn’t seem feasible that this would translate to the small alternator producing max current and the big one only 1% of its output. Something else is or was going on.

I disagree. If the alternator which regulates at 14.4V sees 14.6V on its output it will shut down. The current to the rotor will be shut off and the resultant output will be negligible. 

[WotEver]

10 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

True, however I think the most likely explanation is a regulator intentionally set to about 14v. But doesn’t a phase out result in lowish voltage too?

But we don’t know that the 90A alt only outputs 14V do we?  Dr Bob said that was what was measured when it was still paralleled with the 55A alternator. The A2B is supposed to depress the input voltage anyway so the only way to know what voltage the alternator achieves would be to remove the A2B from the circuit and take some measurements at the alternator outputs. 

We've already seen 65A with Batteries above 85% SoC so it doesn’t as yet indicate any problem at all with the alternator. 

[nicknorman]

18 minutes ago, WotEver said:

I disagree. If the alternator which regulates at 14.4V sees 14.6V on its output it will shut down. The current to the rotor will be shut off and the resultant output will be negligible. 

However these regulation curves are very soft. The one regulating at 14.6v will only achieve that with a very low load. As the load approaches maximum might produce perhaps 14v or less at the terminals. Anyway, the issue is not that one is at 14.4v and one at 14.6v, it is that one is at 14.0v and one at 14.6v. With that much imbalance in voltage, the imbalance in current is understandable.

7 minutes ago, WotEver said:

But we don’t know that the 90A alt only outputs 14V do we?  Dr Bob said that was what was measured when it was still paralleled with the 55A alternator. The A2B is supposed to depress the input voltage anyway so the only way to know what voltage the alternator achieves would be to remove the A2B from the circuit and take some measurements at the alternator outputs. 

We've already seen 65A with Batteries above 85% SoC so it doesn’t as yet indicate any problem at all with the alternator. 

The only way to get a terminal voltage of 14v from an alternator whose regulator is set to 14.4v (and is spinning adequately) is to pull current out of it, and quite a lot of current. Yes the A2B is supposed to depress the input voltage but it doesn’t do that by magic, it does that by sucking current out of it.  if the current is only 1A, it ain’t dong much sucking!

if the regulation of the 90A is set to 14v the A2B is capable of getting plenty of output from it by pulling it down to 13v but of course that will only happen after the small alternator is at or around max output. But if a phase was out on the 90A, I suspect the A2B would still be able to get a few 10s of A out of it. So I am still unsure whether it’s a phase out or a low set regulator. The test would be how much current the system can produce with well-discharged batteries.

Edited April 3, 2018 by nicknorman

[WotEver]

31 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

The test would be how much current the system can produce with well-discharged batteries

Absolutely. 

[WotEver]

Or how much voltage it produces with the A2B bypassed... 

[nicknorman]

3 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Or how much voltage it produces with the A2B bypassed... 

He has said that originally before A2B fitted, it never got above 14v.

[Dr Bob]

10 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Absolutely. 

I'm not going to do that.

6 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Or how much voltage it produces with the A2B bypassed... 

We did that with RCR and I think it was 14.1v but it is all becoming a bit of a haze as I am stuck in the pass the parcel thread.

[WotEver]

3 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

He has said that originally before A2B fitted, it never got above 14v.

Yes, and he also said that the cables were poor and that the measurement was at the batteries. 

[MtB]

9 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Yes, and he also said that the cables were poor and that the measurement was at the batteries. 

 

In which case it tells us NOTHING about the performance of the alternator...

[WotEver]

17 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

In which case it tells us NOTHING about the performance of the alternator...

Precisely. 

[Sir Nibble]

3 hours ago, WotEver said:

I disagree. If the alternator which regulates at 14.4V sees 14.6V on its output it will shut down. The current to the rotor will be shut off and the resultant output will be negligible.

Two possibilities. It was seeing 14V supplied by the smaller alternator. Second, it's machine sensed and regulates on voltage at D+ which can only be internally generated.