[Archived]

The GFCI will trip because there is no ground circuit when our bus is connected to shore power. New or old a GFCI will trip every single time except on Thompson coaches because of how the electrical system is set up.

At to Tom’s question, the charging current setting on an inverter (leave only the one for the refrigerator on) should be such that it will not trip the 20 amp circuit even with the inverters bulk charging and the refrigerator on.

For long term storage the inverter(s) will be in float unless you use a lot of battery power such as lights. On those inverters that always start in bulk as soon as power is applied you need to set the current limits low enough to allow refrigerator operation.

I see no need at all for a separate charger unless you need to leave the GFCI in place. In that case the inverters are not going to be charging anything because you cannot have the coach connected to shore power.

[John]

The Vantare Inverters should not be set to charge higher than 15 amps each. Any higher , robs Amps you can use for other items, since all power goes through the Inverters all the time.

The time to recharge your batteries may be normal, due to the age of your batteries. If I run mine down, it will take 3-4 hours of Gen time to get back to Float mode.

I like the Vantare set up, once you get used to it.

[Archived]

I raised my charging current on both legs to 30 amp and last night the generator only ran about three hours to get the batteries charged.

Thanks everyone

[Archived]

Just keep in mind if you are on shore power and your batteries are drawing charging current at the level you have them set at, you might trip shore power breakers if you try to run too much electric load.

Most owners will set the charging current low so heavy loads such as AC units can run on shore power, and then at night when lights are off and there are lighter loads the inverters will charge the batteries to full during the night.

[Archived]

I also do not like how long the gen has to run right now to recharge my new Lifelines. I read on Lifelines website that they can handle a LOT of incoming amps to charge.

I might experiement on my next trip where I will only be on Generator power setting each inveter to charge at 50 amps. Still leave me 60 amps of gen power which I will not be using anywhere near that much.

Any drawbacks to this?

[Jerry]

No drawbacks as long as you have the amps to run other devices. I think you’ll find a 30 amp setting on 24 volt will get you good results, but try different settings to see what works best for you. Also remember, bulk/absorption run time is programmable at which time the inverters switch to float.

[Archived]

I dry camp a lot put about 1000 hours on gen since April till now , at night if I do not need heat or AC I let batteries do there thing when I get up start gen for few hours then off then start at noon for couple hours , then at 5:00 start gen until bed batteries are charged , my inverters are set at 50 amps charge but can change them very easy so no power issues when pluged in , when pluged in to 50 amp I put them at 15 amps each or 20 amps each it works for me , I dry camp every week at least 3 days for 40 weeks

[Peter]

We were warned to NEVER set the chargers to more than 15amps on each leg which is the default charging amperage on our Vantare.

I wonder why? Can you burn up the chargers? Curious now?

Diane

[Peter]

Diane I changed my inverters to pure sine wave for the sub zero fridge they are magnums easy to change charge rate on both inveters

[Glenn]

Thanks Peter,

The Vantare were easy to change too… haven’t messed with the Hearts in our Liberty but haven’t needed to either so far all has worked well even though I have heard otherwise about the Heart Inverters.

Not ready to go down that road yet I guess.

Cheers, Diane

[Jeff]

After reading this entire thread I tried to adjust my chargers higher for dry camping charging and the Trace Remotes top out at 25amps maximum. My coach and Inverters are a 1997. I presuem this is normal but others spoke of going higher so maybe there is anohter setting in the remotes that governs the Battery Charging limits on the number 10 screen ?

I also appear to have an inoperative cooling fan on one of my inverters. Is there a protection circuit on the inverter to shut it down if it overheats ? Other than my noticing the lack of noise I’ve had no signs that the cooling fan may have stopped.

Further, what does it mean when the “A/C 1 Good” light blinks continously which happens sometimes if I’m using a cheater box for shore power. I also do not know what the “A/C 2 Good” light is for and have never seen it come on until recently. I do not have the owners manuals.

[Archived]

I have three Hearts hooked up to a single bank of 8, 4ds. all invert but one only charges when the generator is turned on, so I set it a 50 amps., the other two charge on gen or shore. If in storage I only turn one on at a setting of 15 amps., so I can float charge my batteries and run my refer and water heater ( keeps the water bay warm). It is my understanding and I don’t think it is clear on this thread that if I set the two shore line inverters to 15 amp charging current I am really pulling 30 amps on the main power curcuit. For this reason I turn off one of the two shoreline inverters. I think you can be pulling more amps then you think if you have mulitple inverters turned on. Three inverters set at 15 or 20 amps is really pulling 45 or 60 amps of current not 15 or 20 from your power source like you may think.

[Archived]

The charging current on inverters is usually determined by either how fast you want the batteries to charge when dry camping such that the generator run time can be minimized, or conversely by what other loads you are running when on shore power so the inverters when charging are not going to trip the shore power breakers.

Those are the extremes. But if you use a lot of DC power such as all the lights being on, the inverter charging current should be at least enough to offset the DC loads otherwise you are discharging the batteries.

It is all about determining how you use the coach and managing the available power.

[AL]

Does anyone know if the maximum charge rate allowed on 2500 watt Trace Inverter/chargers circa 1997 is 25amp ?

[Peter]

Jeff,

Have you tried this page to see if the owners manual for your inverter model number is listed.

http://www.xantrex.com/power-products-support/document-downloads/discontinued-products/discontinued-products-inverter-chargers.aspx