Battery monitor

[Mr. Sandman]

I have an older (2003) on-board battery charger/Inverter that uses a somewhat crude Xantrex monitor. It is good at telling you how the charger / inverter is performing but not about DC usage or charging from external sources (ie. alternator). I was going to add a few Amp meters to the system and re-wire a few things to determine the charge and drain rates of boat battery banks. I even bought a fancy digital amp meter and shunt to see exactly what the alternator is putting out and exactly where it is going (that is how much is going to each bank).

However, the newer monitors by xantrex (and others) appear to be even better. I am now thinking of just adding one of these which can monitor both banks and display charging/discharing rates



The reason I am doing this is I upgraded my alternator to a high output and somewhat smarter unit by balmar that has a very nice external regulator that can adjust the charging profile to that required by any battery. (I needed a AGM profile) Most alternators are dumb and just dump a charge at a constant voltage witch will reduce the life of modern battery's. Anyway I want to see exactly what this is putting out and where exactly it is going as well as how many hours of juice I have left.


Have any of you guys tried these monitors?

Battery Chargers | LinkLITE Battery Monitor | Xantrex

[likwid]

Parent's boat has that. Can't really comment on it other than "it works as intended".

[Mr. Sandman]

Well I hooked up the Xanax Linklite monitor... My installation of the LinkLite Battery monitor is for with two banks of batteries. One bank is a single AGM group 31 starting battery and the other bank is the House bank consisting of 2 AGM 8D's. I never really knew how much was left in the house bank until I installed this and that is the main reason I purchased it. It is very useful and well worth the money. As good as it is I think they could have made the unit even better and expandable.

1) It really only monitors one battery bank. (in terms of amp hours used and % charge). It "monitors" voltage of a second bank but that is it. This is OK and I figured that out from watching a video review on YouTube but the advertisements and info make it sound like it it can do two banks. I realize I could have bought 2 of these to monitor amp hours of both banks but this works OK, it was the house bank that concerned me as this sees the most discharge. I think they could have come up with a unit that was expandable for multiple banks using multiple shunts. But for what it is it works well.

2) The connection kit is separate. While I suppose you could rig up your own and save a few bucks I would highly recommend you just buy the kit. It should be part of the overall package. The connection kit is overpriced but you get the right twisted paired wires all color coded along with the fused ends and directions for doing an easy install. If you have ever worked in the bilge of a boat doing wiring this kit is not a luxury but a necessity.

3)the menu layout is simple and the display is easy to understand.

4) The directions were understandable but could have been laid out in a more clear manner. Also I prefer instructions that don't have multiple languages on the same page like that...Print up instructions in multiple languages, this way I can discard what I don't want. Boaters tend to save instructions for everything installed on their boat and to save something in a foreign language is not needed.

It can also be set up with alarms and generator ignition but I have not used any of those features. But I did not see any instructions on how to tap into those features either. I think for the money it is very useful. You can finally see real instantaneous amp draw, voltage, and it keeps track of amp-hour usage. You can enter the amp-hour rating of your bank so it computes the percent remaining.
It would be nice if they added a battery temperature monitor. Some alternators have sensors that adjust the field strength if the battery get too hot but I would like to see the temperature in degrees so I can know what is going on.

In my case I also added a second ammeter just for monitoring the total output of the alternator. Now I can see exactly how much is being put out, and where it is going as well as how much is being used and what the battery charge status is.

[zacs]

good review. thanks!