Adding a battery monitor???
Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2016 12:25 pm
Hi, all.
We bought hull 91 just a few months before leaving on the Great Loop and due to prioritization of projects, my hope to install a battery monitor got postponed. I installed a Victron on our former sailboat and loved having good info about the Ah's in and out, state of charge, charging current from the solar panels, etc. of the house bank. I now want to add one to our PDQ 34.
It is imperative to mount the current-sensing shunt on the 12V battery negative so that ALL loads go through the shunt. Under the lower helm seat is a post that ties together the main battery neg cable to a 2/0 cable running to the neg buss in the console, as well as 2 large (4/0) cables. One is for the inverter. I don't know what the extra one is for. Any ideas?
In any event, the logical location for the shunt is in the small space behind the house battery switch and it appears I can just make it fit. Another possibility is where the neg cable passes under the removable access panel for the aft fuel tank. There "should" never be any sparking, and diesel fuel is not that volatile, but installing it so close to the fuel tank is not my preference.
So, has anyone installed a battery monitor? If so, where did you put the shunt?
We bought hull 91 just a few months before leaving on the Great Loop and due to prioritization of projects, my hope to install a battery monitor got postponed. I installed a Victron on our former sailboat and loved having good info about the Ah's in and out, state of charge, charging current from the solar panels, etc. of the house bank. I now want to add one to our PDQ 34.
It is imperative to mount the current-sensing shunt on the 12V battery negative so that ALL loads go through the shunt. Under the lower helm seat is a post that ties together the main battery neg cable to a 2/0 cable running to the neg buss in the console, as well as 2 large (4/0) cables. One is for the inverter. I don't know what the extra one is for. Any ideas?
In any event, the logical location for the shunt is in the small space behind the house battery switch and it appears I can just make it fit. Another possibility is where the neg cable passes under the removable access panel for the aft fuel tank. There "should" never be any sparking, and diesel fuel is not that volatile, but installing it so close to the fuel tank is not my preference.
So, has anyone installed a battery monitor? If so, where did you put the shunt?