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Battery help

I'm pretty sure that I am the "jest" half and Jim gets the complimenting half! Since I was the one with the stupid questions and queries, and Jim and the others were the ones coming to my rescue!!

Not to mention you can't take anything too seriously from a guy with the handle "goldnrod" I mean really!!
 
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Uhh, it's me again. So what do you fine folks think about these battery monitors?

http://www.victronenergy.com/battery-monitors

Sorry, the link was all screwy, either the 600 or 602

They seem super easy to install and seem to tell a TON of useful information, especially for my setup.
 
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You're killing me Tom!!! It's RED!! Haha its a bit expensive, and I really like how easy the Victron hooks up, but I don't know.
 
This is the one offshore guys use. It tells you how your batteries are actually performing not just whether they're dead!
 
The Victron one does too, but yours is red!! I like the Victron one uses just an RJ12 cable for all the connections. But I gotta take a closer look at that newmar.
 
That looks way too difficult for me to hook up...lol
 
"When properly installed, calibrated and monitored they can extend the life of a battery bank especially when used smartly."

Sums it up rather nicely I think. Of course if one uses the batteries 'smartly', is a monitor really necessary? :p

See Derrick, you can't hog the whole 'jest part'.
 
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Well Jim, we all still know you're the brains of this particular operation!! Haha
 
Derrick, you are too kind. I think in this situation the battery monitors would be a personal preference thing. In my opinion, the battery monitors would only add to the life of the batteries if you carefully kept them in calibration, and modified your usage and/or charging habits as indicated by the monitor. Probably not going to happen if the monitor is tied to the 'Stereo Bank', at least not after a few beverages. Having said that, if you are just looking for an (as accurate as possible) indication of remaining Stereo Play time, one of these would be a nice addition. I'm thinking a single bank Victron would be fine as you would likely be most interested in Current Draw (to see a snapshot of how many amps are being pulled by the stereo), Amp hours consumed (to see how much of the battery capacity the monitor calculates has already been used), and State of Charge (to see how much battery capacity the monitor calculates remains). Another feature that would be nice to have but that I do not see listed, would be some sort of alarm to warn when a certain threshold of remain charge has been reached. This could prevent overtaxing a battery which over time would shorten it's life. Some such alarm that is user configurable would make for 'set and forget' functionality, of which I am a big fan.

*edit - just read the manual for the Victron 602s. There is a user configurable low voltage alarm! Also there is a TTG or Time to Go display which displays the calculated amount of time remaining before the battery is drained at present amp load. It would be very nice indeed if this were configurable to provide TTG to a certain amount of remaining capacity, rather than 0.
 
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That's what I was thinking Jim. The TTG could be handy as a rough gauge, if I have the stereo on and I'm only going to have 5 hours left, I could dial it down a bit to get a longer play time. The toughest part would be calibration, although I think you can input what the batteries rated ah are and then it automatically senses when the charger has charged to full and uses that as a start point. Although I could be getting the two mixed up since I was reading both manuals and comparing. I wonder if one of you could draw out a rough schematic idea of how I would wire all this? I know it's stupid that I'm asking someone else to do my work for me, but I think, scratch that, KNOW that a few on here have FAR better understanding of how everything ties together! If anyone feels like it, here is what I have,

Bennington switch (1,2,1+2,off) , the distribution hub, group 24 charging off the motor on position 1 of switch, 3 group 31's in parallel on position 2, the Victron monitor shunt, Pronautic 50A charger on the 31's, all house and starting will be on 24, all stereo deck and amps will be on 31's. I might try to draw this out tonight, but I suck at this!! Haha also need to know where to fuse and with what. Wow. This is going to suck.
 
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Okay, I tried, does this make sense? And does it work? Sorry for my grade 4 printing, it's what I do. Haha any tips on where and what I need for fuses would be great! Thanks!

 
Here, is this one clearer?

 
Looks pretty good, but you will need to tie the ground from the House/Start bank to the Stereo Battery bank (or negative connection from motor). Fuses are easy, you just need to know what gauge wire you are protecting. I'll dig up a chart. The hard part will be determining what gauge wire, this is done by load and length (voltage drop) - no need to worry about 'engine room' calcs as you have an outboard.
 
The Blue Sea circuit wizard could help, especially for main branches off of your stereo bank:

http://circuitwizard.bluesea.com/

Here is basic marine wire info over at iboats:

http://www.iboats.com/basics/marine_wire.html

Here is a write up on fuse selection and sizing guidelines that I like:

http://www.bcae1.com/fuses.htm

Ok article on sizing amplifier wiring:

http://knowledge.sonicelectronix.com/car-audio-and-video/car-amplifiers/what-gauge-wire-do-i-need-to-install-my-amplifier.html

Some of the equipment will specify wire size and fusing for you, you just need to consult the manuals and know approximately how long a wire run you will have. One tip, when calculating wire run, remember it is 'round trip' so count length of both positive and negative paths (which may not always be equal).
 
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Thanks Jim. So where do I tie the ground back in? It has to be after the shunt, so if I brought the Neg from the start batt to the load side of the shunt would that work? Although will that then take readings on the draw on the start batt and the charge of the motor?
 
Ok Jim, so looking at my schematic, and the link I posted earlier in #87, I'm thinking that if I hook the ground wire from the starting battery to the 'Battery' side of the shunt instead of the 'Load' side it should work. That way it wont read the load being placed on the starting battery, BUT, will it then recognize the charge from the motor? Or even will it take the ah available in the starting battery so I would think I would have more available run time than in reality? The switch position will always be in 1 or Off.
 
Oh, and thanks for the links Jim, that fuse one is a definite interesting read! As for wire, I will be running Wet Wire from Wet Sounds, 1/0 for main power from batteries to the helm, then from the distribution blocks to 4G to the individual amps. Wet Sounds actually has a 4 Amp Rear (longer cables) wiring kit that comes with everything you need!
 
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