I am converting a 2012 Ram C/V into a mini camper. I will be upgrading the alternator from factory 160 amp to 250 amp. For house power I will have a Pecron e3600lfp and ep3000-48 expansion battery for a total of about 6 kWh. I will also have a Jinko 535w bi-facial solar panel on the roof and a Charger 1. I am also upgrading the stereo to include new head unit amp 2 sets of component speakers and a 12" sealed subwoofer. I plan to also upgrade the wiring in the engine bay to Big 3 1/0 wires and run an additional 1/0 pos and neg wires to buses in the back with lugs for the amp and Charger 1. Additionally, I will have a Bluetti Fridge and maybe the AC180T that came with it, and an air conditioner. Now, having said all that, I want to know if I can run an additional Charger 1 for days when the solar is not keeping up. So, 2 Charger 1s, 600w amp, 50-ish quart fridge/freezer, and air conditioner in addition to all my other standard stuff, like lights, AC/Heat, stereo head unit reverse camera, etc. keeping in mind the upgraded wiring and alternator with 90 additional amps which will produce 125 amps at idle.
Thanks in advance.
@TomG
Confirmed by the technical team: Two Charger1 devices cannot be connected to one vehicle. Otherwise, sampling abnormalities will occur.
What does that mean? What are sampling abnormalities and how do they affect the Charger 1?
Charger 1 monitors input voltage via monitoring circuits that tells it when to start or stop charging, how much current to draw, stuff like that. I believe it talks with the CAN bus network on the vehicle that is equipped with “smart” alternators. If you run two in parallel they can interfere with each other’s readings as they would be sampling voltage at overlapping patterns causing one of them to think something is potentially wrong resulting in false readings. The DJI Power Super Fast Car Charger can do 1000W.
How can you tell if your alternator is smart or not? I will be upgrading it to 250 amp, what if it is not smart? Any way around this “gotcha”?
Pretty much if you have auto start stop, push button start, BMS, etc., you likely use a smart alternator. Even if it was not a “smart” alternator its ultimately the Bluetti unit that is sensing a potential voltage fluctuation and as a result will likely fault and shut itself off to “preserve” the battery. Likewise the smart alternator provides a variable voltage unlike a dumb alternator which just supplies power “all the time” so there has to be some sort of trigger (from ECU) that tells it when to start or stop charging. Also keep in mind that you are running two units at around 47A each (12X47=560W) means you are putting a constant load of near 100A on the alternator. What is the continuous output rating of the 250A alternator at idle? Do you have sufficient fans/cooling? It might be able to supply that load constant when you are driving but what about if you idle? Idling is essentially what causes the Charger 1 to kill the alternator because the load is near 100%. Not sure if you ran two could it handle that for a long time or not.
The alternator I am looking at puts out 125 amps at idle. Other than the Charger1s turning off and on, is there anything else that would be bad? I can also turn down the charge rate in the app if I am going to be doing any excessive idling.
Also, since this is a 2012, I don’t have any auto start/stop, push button start, etc. It is just the cargo version of a mid-trim level Grand Caravan.
Nothing else I can think of other than the operability, which if they clash and don’t run, defeats the entire purpose of running them together at once.
I watched a couple of videos on the EcoFlow and DJI and they are both proprietary to their products. I have already purchased 2 of the Charger1s, so I think I will give it a try and see what happens both at idle and driving. If they simply won’t work together, I guess I will sell one of them and rely on the solar panel for additional charging or maybe even get a dual fuel generator with a TT-30 output for quick charging. Would rather not go that route due to the weight and noise. Then there is also electric charging stations, but I would have to research to see what I need to do to use the Pecron’s 30amp input.
I watched a couple of videos on the EcoFlow and DJI and they are both proprietary to their products.
Ah good catch I missed that. Yeah I found a video on YT of someone talking about the Charger 1 and he mentioned that DJI brand ONLY works with DJI brand power stations. I’m not sure but while your alternator is 250A is there an upper limit to what your lead acid battery will safely accept? Your discharge rate would be way beyond what is normal for lead acid. 46X2= 92Ah, assuming you have a 80Ah battery its well over 1C. Does the alternator keep the battery topped off at the rate of discharge of 92AH per hour? I get its 250A but what does the actual lead acid battery accept, or what is acceptable before heat damage occurs? In other words is 92AH just simply TOO Much? The alternator not being the problem but the battery handling that continuous high discharge or charge? So assume your lead acid battery can only charge at 60AH and you consume 92Ah, you are losing battery power. Maybe I’m not thinking clearly here but I thought there was an upper limit of how fast a battery would accept a charge. The alternator can supply plenty of power but that doesn’t mean the battery will take 100Ah of charge. Or am I wrong?
I will have to research the battery specs. If I need to replace the battery with a higher ah rating, is there anything you would recommend? How big would I need to go? What chemistry would be better for long term high output…lead acid, AGM, lithium iron phosphate…?
My battery is from Walmart 12/24, Group Size H7, DIN H7, EN LN4, and BCI 94R.
I called Interstate Batteries and spoke with one of their “experts”. I explained everything I am trying to do and he recommended their AGM 100 AH deep cycle as an add-on battery connected directly to the alternator and situated in the back of the van near where the power station, expansion battery, and the Charger1s will be. Will need a 1/0 positive cable then can use a chassis ground in the back. I could run both Charger1s off of it or run 1 off each battery. How does this sound to you? Any recommendations or other thoughts?
You would likely need a battery isolator because they are connected in parallel to the alternator. This means they will charge at the same rate and discharge into other. Ignore what I said above. This is what happens when you trust ChatGPT. It’s crap sometimes. They were referring to the charge rate and discharge rates, but that’s WITHOUT the alternator! Once you turn the engine on, the alternator IS the power source and the starter battery is just a bus to which current flows through. The battery will never discharge at a high rate. The only time it should ever discharge is if your load exceeds the amp rating of the alternator. In other words if you bought a 160A alternator and was consuming 170A from your accessories you are LOSING 10A, so battery would discharge at that rate. I swear I’m done with ChatGPT’s crap. Highly inaccurate half the dang time.
You should be fine. If both charger 1s do not work well together with the single starter battery I would do the suggestion and add the 2nd battery (alternator will happily supply the power) and add a battery isolator as well so they both charge at their proper rates.
So TLDR - Your biggest problem will be making sure you do not excessively idle because the alternator will be at near 100% load constant running at just idle and heat is the enemy of the alternator. Just simply driving the car 35-40MPH will make the load go down to like 25%. A happy alt.
Would isolating the batteries help with the sampling anomalies, particularly if each Charger 1 is connected to its own battery?
It would eliminate the problem because the current would be flowing only one way.
Is that with 1 C1 per battery or both C1s on the deep cycle? And if 1 C1 per battery, would I need 2 isolators, one for each leg off the alternator?
Two separate isolated issues. The battery isolator is for isolating the charging profiles of each battery. Splitting into two auxiliary batteries is what is recommended to prevent sampling anomalies. One charger per battery bank is recommended. Since you need to keep the starter battery and auxiliary battery topped off by alternator it is recommended you isolate the charging since they both have different charging profiles. One likes to charge at 14.2V the other at 14.7V. Charging both types in parallel from a single source (i.e. alternator) without isolation risks undercharging one or overcharging the other. If I’m not mistaken AGM has a lower charging profile than flooded. The long terms effects of overcharging is gassing. It will cause you to lose O2 and H. You’ll lose conductivity and it will fail short term. Rule of thumb is to avoid mixing different charging chemistries.
LOL…sounds like I will be sleeping in a tent because the van is going to be full batteries, power stations and appliances.
So, I need to basically add the 250A alternator, leave the starting battery system alone, add 2 AGM deep cycle batteries and run a C1 off each one. So where does the isolator go and how is it wired up?