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Charging four 12v batteries wired in parallel
Posted: Tue Apr 20, 2021 11:33 am
by chuckster
I am going to connect a 200w 12v "suitcase" solar system to charge my coach's house batteries and found a wiring diagram for 'perfectly balanced battery charging'. I am no electrician but it seems that the points it gives you to hook up a charger to batteries wired this way should be 12v, no? When I measure the voltage at battery C at the "+" and battery B at the "-" I read a little over 6V on my multimeter. I was expecting that the points the charger connect to would read 12V. Should I be connecting a 12v charger to a place that has 6V? This doesn't seem right to me.
I have attached the diagram I am referencing.
- Battery connections.jpg (139.99 KiB) Viewed 2050 times
Re: Charging four 12v batteries wired in parallel
Posted: Tue Apr 20, 2021 12:32 pm
by ProCycle
I can't think of any way you could measure 6 volts there unless you have four 6v batteries wired in series parallel.
That's what is in my Ivory - four 6 volt batteries.
You definitely do not want to put 12v charging current to a 6v battery or circuit.
Re: Charging four 12v batteries wired in parallel
Posted: Wed Apr 21, 2021 8:50 am
by chuckster
ProCycle wrote: ↑Tue Apr 20, 2021 12:32 pm
I can't think of any way you could measure 6 volts there unless you have four 6v batteries wired in series parallel.
That's what is in my Ivory - four 6 volt batteries.
You definitely do not want to put 12v charging current to a 6v battery or circuit.
Jeff,
You’re absolutely right. I had assumed they were 12v because the voltage is not marked anywhere. I looked up the model and sure enough they are 6v. Measuring across an individual battery’s posts does produce a 6v reading. Upon closer inspection, these are wired series/parallel to produce 12v. Lesson learned BEFORE the mistakes...inspect very carefully!
Regards,