Hey yall. It says the dc charge enhancer can be used with a lead acid battery but what about a lithium?
My friend is building a van. Wondering if we can run a dc to dc charger from the alternator to the lithium battery while also having the bluetti dc charge enhancer connected to the lithium battery and bluetti ac200p at the same time.
If the lithium battery has a built in balancer, then you can use it for energy storage just as a lead acid battery.
Wex, I am understanding your question to be can a lithium battery be connected to the input side of the DO50S. If that is the case, then yes any source of electrical power within the input specs may be utilized and the D050S does not know the source of the energy.
And yes, you should be fine running the DC to DC charger from the alternator to the lithium battery assuming your DC to DC charger can output the voltage and amperage requirements of the lithium battery of choice.
Awesome thank you for the response!
Scott,
Do you think it’s possible to also connect a mppt solar charge controller to the lithium battery in addition to the setup i described above?
Here’s a crude diagram.
Yes, that should work
Wex,
For other readers, a couple of additional design considerations may be worth mentioning.
Scott wisely reminded us that the “DC-DC charger” at top-left must implement the charging requirements of whatever “12V lithium” battery you choose. Incorrectly charging a lithium battery can damage it, and is sometimes hazardous. Of course, the same is true of the “MPPT solar charge controller” at bottom-left—it must respect the battery’s charging requirements.
When the “12V lithium” battery is in a low state of charge, the “DC-DC charger” will likely be running at its maximum capacity. That’s fine, but make sure you understand the maximum current the “DC-DC charger” will be pulling from the van in that state. The wiring connecting van to DC-DC charger must be sized appropriately, and the van’s alternator must be able to handle that load plus the worst-case other loads already in the van’s electrical system. If you push the alternator too far, it will be destroyed.
Please remember that every circuit in your diagram could start a fire if the wiring develops a fault over time, e.g. a loose (high-resistance) connection, metal fatigue inside the wire due to vibration, or a short-circuit. Every circuit in your diagram should be protected by a fuse or circuit breaker, sized appropriately for the gauge of wire in that circuit, and placed at the correct location in the circuit.
Of course! And i appreciate the detailed response!
Hi all, I’d like to revive / glom-onto this topic if I may.
I too am interested in a relatively inexpensive battery capacity boost to my AC200P. I use it heavily on long weekends for work, but not much during the week, so it would make a lot of sense to capture some of the otherwise wasted energy when it’s just sitting there 3-4 days per week.
I could obviously throw a big heavy lead acid battery in there, but I’m hoping not to add any more extra weight than necessary to my work trailer .
So, I’d prefer to use a light LifePo4 battery (at least 20ah, maybe up to 10x that), which raises two questions.
Bluetti says my D050S is only good for Lead Acid, but will it really try to draw too much current and destroy itself from a LifePo4? I mean, even a small SLA can crank out a LOT of current too (around 60-120am when used for starter motors), so what is the real limitation where they restrict us to SLAs ?
Obviously I could use an extra panel (or inconveniently reroute existing panels) to charge this extra LifePo4, but to somewhat simplify, I was thinking of drawing off one of the AC200Ps DC outputs to charge the LifePo4, usings a small 8-10A DC-DC converter to charge either one of those LifePo4s with built-in BMS, or a separate battery/BMS combo.
I suppose I could also, albeit even less efficiently, dump power from an AC200P 120V outlet to a cheap conventional LifePo4 charger, but that seems a distant plan C given the obvious multiple conversion inefficiencies (though still better than not capturing the power at all.
I’ve love to hear anyone elses input on yeahs or nays to technical limitations that are not occuring to me on this.
Thanks
Roger
Hi, I have an AC200Max and next to it a separate 5kWh third party LiFePO4 battery. Every night I charge the AC200Max from the external battery via a D050S. I have used this solution for 6 months now and it works great. Just put a fuse in line (I put a 15A fuse, the D050S draws close to10A while charging and limits the current) between battery and the enhancer so you have everything protected in case something was to happen. The argument about only using lead acid makes no sense to me. The D050S is good for up to 60V so no issue there.
Thanks Danimus! The lead acid makes no sense to me, other than I guess if someone gets it wrong or shorts, a given size Li can put out a lot higher current. Even then though, a lead-acid can already do hundreds of amps briefly, so this remains a mystery.
Thanks for your words. I’m realizing that though I’m not yet overpaneled enough (theoretical 860w) on my PV input, I’m really more battery limited right now (heavy use 2 or 3 days, and then very light for 3 or 4 days each week) so I want to start banking some of this energy during my majority light days and have it useable at night on the heavy weekend use days.
So, may I ask just what battery you have. 12v or more? You said 5kwh? Wow, you better than tripled your original unit.
So, do we conclude, that given reasonable voltage, the D050s will just sip from whatever LifePo4 at it’s self-allowed 10A and no problems.
Again, would like to know more about your battery if you have a moment.
Oh, and how you’re charging it. I’m toying with both a separate charger that I could switch a bank of my panels to when the AC200P is full, or using the 12V out and a small dc-dc boost converter to charge the Aux battery directly from the AC200P.
Thanks
Roger
@rogblu , yes, I decided not to save on battery capacity as that is a limiting factor in my case. The 2200W power level is not an issue. I also use two B230 batteries already in addition to the external battery (The AC200Max is limited to 2 connected B230’s). The external battery is a 48V (this is key for max charge power) LFP battery to get maximum power from the D050S, close to 500W (48Vx10A =480W), charging the Bluetti. Just like you mentioned/suggested, I have some panels dedicated on a separate charge controller for this battery and my main panels connected directly to the AC200Max. Got the charging on a timer with a DC switch, so every night I charge the AC200Max 4 hours from the external battery and if the Bluetti gets full, the D050S simply stops charging. It definitely controls the charge current and will not allow more than the 10A it is rated for. A good system which provides me at least 2 days of buffer when it is cloudy or raining.
I was thinking of getting D050S, but haven’t decided if I will need it or if it will work. I will have 1200 solar eventually on the trailer.
Question: Can it be used to plug it to AC and charge it along with the AC charger that came with it. In other words, can I hook up both unit to my Honda 2000 watt generator in order to get over 800 watt total charging.
I used the PV cable and battery clips to my 3 x 100 amp lifepo4 and got 330 watt charge and i plug the ac charger to my honda generator and that gave me about 400 watt. I plug my rv cable into the 30amp plug. Work great, no issue running Air conditioner for short period of time, takes about 1200 watt full, just the fan take 200 watt. Use it in the morning to run our coffee machine, avoiding generator noise at 5:00 am.
We are back home, so everything is put back to normal. It was a test run and it worked.
Once we get our solar panel installed, we will see if it will work over a period of week without resorting to honda generator and weather dependent too.
The DO50S charge enhancer cannot be used with AC power. DC input only.
Hi Aly
The D050S brick, besides only taking DC input, plugs into the same port as the original AC charger brick, so there’s no chance of using both bricks at the same time.
Both of my Honda generators have a 12v output, and if yours has one, you could connect that up to the D050S, but at only 12v and 10A, you’re not going to get much more than 100W.
What you could do is plug a charger, say a nominal 48Vdc (or one of the newer 52v ones from a scooter) into your generator and route that into the DC050S and get something approaching 500w.
hth
Roger
Thank for the info. It was helpful.
I suspected it wouldn’t work for what i had in mind. Hard to tell from the advertisement.
Will stick with our generator and battery bank until i complete the 1200 watt solar dyi project.
