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Messages - Michael

#16
Stu, thank you for the reference to Jim Moe's article.  From that article, which touches on all sorts of good things, I take away relevant to the current situation that:

(1) fuses should be rated at 150% of the charger capacity [which I think but will check will mean a 45 amp fuse for the XC3012];
(2) the fuses can be conveniently located in the battery box; and
(3) the AYBC code requires the fuses.

Conclusion: we will install fuses (or circuit breakers) in the battery compartment on the charger-to-battery cable runs.

#17
Jon/Tony:

Hali came equipped to us with the heavy (1/0 gauge) wires between the battery charger and the batteries.   The cable runs are less than six feet, from the charger beneath the built-in garbage can to the battery boxes beneath the aft settee in the salon.  My hunch was that any possible power draw (from charger to battery or vice versa) could not exceed the rating for that wire, so there would be no fire hazard if we dispensed with fuses or circuit breakers.

But doubting my hunches might be good policy:  I blew a fuse on my new Fluke multimeter last week.

Yours is an interesting point, Jon, that the other purpose of the fuse or circuit breaker is to protect the Xantrex XC3012 itself from, I suppose, a surge of power from the batteries.

For what its worth, a posting in an electric vehicle discussion (at http://www.evdl.org/archive/index.html#nabble-p17725445)(found on a Google search and of unknown authority), indicates that 1/0 gauge wire is rated to support up to 120 amperes in a cable run of 120 feet at 60 degrees centigrade with a 1-3% drop in voltage.

Am I correct in thinking that in calculating the possibility that a surge of power from the batteries might overheat the wire or damage the XC3012, we would assume the possibility of a dead short drawing the maximum current over a short period of time through the wire and into the battery charger?  And therefore, that we could look to some short term output rating (cold cranking amps?) for the batteries (flooded lead acid Interstate 4Ds) to determine whether the wire rating or amp rating for the battery charger might be exceeded?

Now that I begin trying to figure this out, it begins to seem like a better and better idea just to follow the Xantrex suggestion and put a fuse or circuit breaker into the lines.  Do you think that I would be right in taking the Xantrex XC3012 30 amp rating as the appropriate figure and using a 30 amp circuit breaker? [Later edit: no.  See Jim Moe tech note cited by Stu Jackson at post #62 below and see post #63.] (It seems to me that that the rating for the 1/0 gauge wire being substantially higher, the "weak link" would be the battery charger itself and that the circuit breaker should therefore be selected with protection of the battery charger in mind.) The slithering sound you hear is me skating here.

Regards.


   
#18
At the end of the long and winding road, a summary of our conclusions about the problems and a statement of what we did aboard Hali to sort them out might be in order.

To get where we are, we relied on help from this thread and related threads more often than it is possible to give credits for.

Many thanks to all of you.

1.  the propane monitor and carbon monoxide monitors aboard Hali were being triggered by hydrogen boiled off the new house batteries during charging by the old Flyback 20-3 battery charger.  We could not make any other theory fit all the known facts.  However, if the propane or carbon monoxide detector goes off again, we will try not to assume we know why.

2.   the battery charger might have been working overtime because of higher-than-necessary demands for electricity caused by unnecessary cycling of the bilge pump.  Solving the bilge pump cycling problem became important.

3.   the bilge pump was cycling on too often because we didn't do a good job of packing the stuffing box last summer: the stuffing box, both at rest and when the propeller shaft was engaged, was throwing off too much water.

4.   following Ron's advice, we re-packed the stuffing box with dripless Goretex GFO.  It took two attempts for us to get the nut-tghtening just right:  the secret seems to be to tighten the large nut barely hand tight, at least at first (although the retaining nut needs to be tight).  The bilge now stays virtually dry: water rarely covers even the bottom surface and never (so far) reaches a level high enough to activate the bilge pump.  A corollary benefit is that the keel bolts may have stopped rusting.

5.   following Ron Hill and Jon Schneider's advice here, we installed two (plastic) vents into the below-settee battery containing space, one facing forward and one facing athwartships.  Whether this will keep the concentration of hydrogen gas below Randy Davison's explosive proportions, remains to be seen.  As Stu Jackson pointed out, it might just help escape the gas to activate the alarms -- good deeds rarely go unpunished.

6.   we have held off installing Tony Wright's solar ventilator in the hatch.  Its on our "maybe" list.

7.    following advice from here and other threads, we junked the Alltech Flyback 20-3 battery charger...and are glad of it.

8.   going out on a limb, albeit following Jon's lead but before getting the comfort of John Nixon's cautious approval of the Xantrex XC3012 battery charger, we bought one.  It passed Mike Vaccaro's 6.6% test, even if we boost Hali's housebank to the more usual 440 amp hours size.  And it alternates in charging our two battery banks so quickly (about every 15 seconds according to the user manual) that there is no grounds for my previous apprehension that information about the charging of more than one battery bank would not be readily available on the charger panel.  We located the remote control/monitor panel where it can be easily seen, beside the chart table.

9.  we have started a battery log and are recording terminal voltages, the specific gravity of the fluid in each battery cell, and when we top up the cells with fluid.  This data collection is running ahead of our understanding, but the data will be there for later.

10.  we changed from using one house battery at a time to using both house batteries at a time by the simple expedient of selecting "Both" on our battery selector switch instead of 1 or 2.  But based on what was written by Stu Jackson (to whom we owe the information that led to this change), Hali's battery configuration is a bit unusual (two small house batteries treated separately and the separate starting battery not linked to the main battery selector switch) so this easy solution might not work for many others.

11.  we charge both house batteries separately, to take advantage of the ability of the Xantrex XC3012 to charge up to three separate batteries or banks of batteries.

12.  we haven't yet bitten the bullet and bought a battery monitor, but one is on the wish list.

13.  Our actual power use remains unknown, but we have taken a first crack at preparing an energy budget.

14.  Mike recommended installing a fuse or circuit breaker between the new charger and the battery.  Xantrex makes a similar recommendation.  We haven't done it yet.  My reading of the Xantrex user manual leads me to believe that the purpose of the fuse or circuit breaker is to prevent the wire (from charger to battery) from burning out if overloaded.  We are using 0/1 wire.  There was never a fuse or breaker in the old configuration.  Does Mike or anyone know more about this?

15.  we bought a magnifying glass, for use on charts and to go with the deer stalker.

Problems paired up and climbed onto the ark together.  The sounding of the alarms initially led in many directions.  Even when resolved into one direction, the line led from alarms to batteries to battery charger to bilge pump to stuffing box.


#19
Waterdog, Gertie has a sharp eye.  She can read.  Her eye did not fall on "to" as the dominant part of Ron's speech. She does not believe he would write "to" when he means "from".  She remains concerned.  She also maintains her membership in the WCTU.  Regards.  Gertie's nephew.
#20
Main Message Board / Re: forward hatch
June 22, 2008, 08:37:00 AM
Mert, nice detailed post (and welcome aboard).
#21
Ron, did you write what my aunt Gertrude thinks you wrote?
#22
Just as "47" [modification: the ayes have "42"] was the answer to the universe on The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (that was the answer, wasn't it; that was the name of the show, wasn't it?) so digital calipers are the answer for newcomers with misgivings about their place on this board.  The calipers let you measure the growth in thickness of your hide: about .0001" usually per event, and almost always within 12-24 hours after reading that Waterdog and four others answered your dingleberry question -- see most recently in the year 1492 at c:/kslg=gddakekejkstg.  After .0005" of increase in thickness of your skin, around post #50, confidence rises.  But you notice that you must have been washing behind your ears recently, because there is something wet back there.

The cognitive dissonance leads to great threads, great posts.  We dig deeper. We have to: the skin we are going through is thicker.  Surely we can't be as stupid as we fear.  We try harder.  Sometimes now only one or two posts have gone before...and the wiser heads nod and are kind enough to refer only obliquely to that history.  And then there is the new, virgin, untouched topic, fresher than a spring flower, more important than a raw water strainer at freeze-up on Lake Michigan.  You have arrived.  After 30, 40, 50, 60, or 70+ years of life, you have become useful.  Welcome to the c34 Message Board.  You belong.  And you belonged from the minute you first signed on.

     
#23
Dear Steve:

Cripes, your thread has touched a romantic nerve and set a thousand arm chairs are a'sail.

If Stu or the other first dozen volunteers strike out, or you need a third mate, I'm tempted to volunteer, pack my sextant, Bur Ord parachute, and wife's nerve for the voyage, at least part way to SF. (Victoria is part-way from Vancouver, isn't it?  This lest my wife read this post.)

Regardless, the parachute is yours for the asking.  We all know it is essential.  After reading Pardey a few years ago and therefore realizing that surviving my roaring twenties, thirties, and forties without one in the back of the MG was mere blind good fortune, I stumbled into a surplus military supplies store in Oceanside (you know the place, we have all been there, where the owner weighs a few hundred pounds of retired muscle and talks fondly of killing a bushmaster snake with that same type of machete on sale in the corner while on duty sleeping in a hammock strung between two Central American trees in a hurricane) where there was a fantastic supply of these cargo 'chutes, everyone stamped just as Pardy said they would be: "Bur Ord", for Bureau of Ordnance, and not even used by those tuna boats out of San Clemente (or wherever).  Hardly a voyage on Hali goes by where we don't deploy the canopy and ride down the face of 40-foot waves like a baby sleeping in the arms of a giant.  Unaccountably, the lines of the 'chute are as clean as at the day it was born to a virgin seamstress in distressed circumstances somewhere near Raleigh, North Carolina, and immediately impressed into duty aboard the nearest C130.

All the planning is wonderful, and I don't suggest you curtail it in the least (I will come to the rudder in a minute), but I remember, when planning an Atlantic crossing on a cat, writing to my friend, the owner of the cat, who (with the cat) was holed up in Majorca, having sailed, somewhat thoughtless, into that island while asleep (like the guy in the used military goods store apparently but not as quick to avoid near-death).  Anyway, my email inquiry was, "Do you have a liferaft?"  To which my friend (you can tell he was the executive type) replied, "Cats don't sink."  He turned out to be quite right.  After several of us had to leave the boat in Gran Canaria, he sailed on with a skeleton crew, running out of food and drink almost immediately and diverting to the Cape Verde Islands; running out of food and drink again, but being reprovisioned on Christmas day by a Greek freighter several days out of St. Lucia.  Plan, plan, plan...but go.

The rudder.  Do our boats ever settle down in heavy seas?  I think you can probably pack enough of everything except sleep to get you to SF.  This is by way of argument for a third crew member at least.  It is the tiredness that gets you.  With three, preferrably four, you can set up reasonable watches.

Cripes, I envy you the voyage.  Have fun.



#24
We bought and installed a Xantrex XC3012 battery charger last week about the same time as John Nixon's review appeared here.  Fortunately, John seemed moderately favourable to this Xantrex offering.

However, only after doing the installation, talking "battery talk" with a friend who designs and builds DC power supplies, and re-reading John's review were we able to begin to appreciate how much John has put into that review.  It is worth reading and re-reading before making a decision on what battery charger to buy.

As I am incapable of speaking to the technical issues, this post will restrict itself to some practical aspects of dealing with the XC3012 in the context of a 1997 Catalina 34 where the battery charger is located in the galley sink cupboard beneath the built-in garbage can.

As John's review makes clear, the XC3012 comes with a small detachable control/display panel.  The detachable character of this panel is particularly useful in our application because it would be awkward to open the cupboard doors beneath the galley sink and stoop down to look at the panel beneath the built-in garbage can each time you wanted to see battery charging information.  Far better to have the panel where it will catch your attention.

For us Catalina 34 owners, it is also a good thing that the control/display panel is detachable because the height of the XC3012 with the panel in place in its plastic housing atop the main body of the XC3012 unit would make it well nigh impossible to place the XC3012 beneath the built-in garbage can.

As it is, the plastic housing for the control/display panel atop the XC3012 becomes (we think) redundant once you decide to mount the panel remotely.   Removing the plastic housing shaves a few inches off the height of the XC3012, with the result that the XC3012 unit fits quite nicely immediately beneath the built-in garbage can.  But don't be complacent about the height.  Locate the XC3012 as high as you can beneath the garbage can to give you working room below the charger, where you will need the room to get at the terminals, control connections, and AC connections.

In addition to housing the removable control/display panel, the plastic housing might serve some purpose in protecting the ventilation at the top of the XC3012 from water.  But given where we located the battery charger (beneath the shelf that supports the garbage can) we didn't think sacrificing the plastic housing was too risky from this point of view.

The plastic housing is secured to the "roof" of the XC3012 by four screws.  To get at these screws, you need to open up the XC3012, but even then it is only possible to get at the heads of two of the screws.  (This plastic housing -- like the plastic shell that goes over the front of the XC3012 that we also discarded - looks like something of an afterthought by Xantrex.)  We unscrewed the two screws whose heads we could get at then resorted to cutting the other two screws with a hacksaw where they emerged from the XC3012 main box and entered posts in the plastic housing.  We fished the screw heads out of the main box and threw away the plastic housing.  (Did we also lose any chance of making warranty claims?)

The new XC3012 is larger than the old Alltech Flyback 20-3 that it replaced on Hali and therefore it needed a bigger backing plate.  We glassed 1/2" plywood beneath the garbage can to enlarge the old backing plate.  With a coat of white bilgecoat over the new fiberglass, the backing plate now looks almost like part of the original construction.

Where to locate the control/display panel remotely was an issue.  The "telephone wire" that connects the control/display panel to the XC3012 is short, so placing the panel any distance from the battery charger involves getting a new telephone wire with connectors or getting an extension.  The good thing is that these four-wire connectors and telephone wires are universally available.

We first considered installing the control/display panel about calf height at the port side of the salon table aft settee, just next to our newly installed battery compartment ventilator.  (For discussion of installing a battery compartment vent, see Ron Hill's reply #33 and Jon Schneider's reply #34 at http://c34.org/bbs/index.php/topic,4313.30.html.) There (on the outside of the settee battery compartment) the control/display panel would be readable by anyone sitting at the chart table, but probably only if you formed the conscious intention to read it and went looking for it.  This location on the outside of the settee battery compartment would have had the advantage of a very short control cable run from the battery charger. In fact, the original control/display panel cable would probably have sufficed.  But we finally decided that that location was not one where most people would expect to look for an instrument and not one where reading the control/display panel could happen routinely and unintentionally as we wanted, so we cut the control/display panel into the white wall beneath the electrical panel above the chart table where people can see it easily at any time.  We fished the control/display panel's four-wire control cable up behind the electrical panel and there added an extension cable to the battery charger.

Following Stu Jackson's advice (see reply #8 at http://c34.org/bbs/index.php/topic,973.0.html), we recently decided to treat our two 4D house batteries as one bank when discharging from them.  To do this, we now use the "Both" switch all the time when operating under battery power.  However, as the XC3012 can charge, and monitor the charging of, three batteries (or three battery banks), it seemed a waste to treat both house batteries as one bank when charging them.  Accordingly, we set up the new charger so that it charges and monitors each of the house batteries separately. (We think that by charging each house battery separately we get more appropriate charging of each battery and specific information --from the control/display panel--about the condition of each battery.)

The Xantrex XC3012 comes with only one temperature sensor but with a capacity to handle three temperature sensors.  Xantrex recommends the use of a temperature sensor with each battery or battery bank that is separately charged.  Apparently the charger assumes a default temperature when there is no temperature sensor but achieves better charging when a temperature sensor provides actual battery temperature data to the charger.  Since in our installation we are charging each house battery separately, we bought a second temperature sensor.

To do the installation work, you will need to remove the "shelf" beneath the galley sink.

We found there was just sufficient room beneath the new charger to install a three gang terminal bus that is needed to connect the AC power feed to the battery charger's input pigtails.

The XC3012 has three positive and one common negative terminals.  You will want rubber terminal boots on the battery wires and over each of these terminals.  We haven't found a good place to get these but fortunately there were already good ones on the two positive battery wires.  The Xantrex-supplied terminal boots don't seem perfectly suited for the task but we used one of them on the common negative terminal.  Making the terminal connections in the limited space beneath the sink is a challenge but do-able.  (As mentioned previously, remember to situate the charger as high up beneath the built-in garbage can as possible.)

Clicking the "telephone connectors" of the temperature sensors and remote charger monitor into place on the base of the XC3012 is relatively easy but it is finnicky work to get them out again.  When trying to disconnect them, I was cursing and asking myself whether Xantrex engineers every do usability testing.  Don't click these connections into place until you are sure you won't likely have to remove them any time soon.

We haven't connected our independent starter battery to the XC3012 and haven't decided whether we will.  Hali's starter battery is used little -- since we solved a hard starting problem with huge help from this board a year ago (see http://c34.org/bbs/index.php/topic,3347.0.html), Hali has started first time every time -- and is charged every time the engine runs.  But there is a third positive terminal on the XC3012 to which the starting battery (or perhaps an AGM battery for the windlass as Jon Schneider is contemplating) could be connected to. 

We have set the XC3012 to three-stage charging.  So far, it seems to run like a charm.  We haven't had enough experience with the system yet to know whether it will go into the pseudo-inactive float mode that John Nixon mentions in his review.

For the next few weeks anyway, we are likely to be "pluggers", that is, leaving Hali plugged into shore power when we are away from her, and "chargers", that is, leaving the new battery charger turned on while we are away from Hali.

We had run Hali's house bank down a bit in the days when we were swapping out the old Flyback 20-3 and installing the new XC3012.  After the XC3012 was installed and we were still on the boat, we saw the system bulk charging and absorb charging but never getting to float charging.  We saw a surprising 15.7 volts of charging at one point...and are still not sure what was going on.  A few days later, we took Hali out and on returning to the dock and plugging the system in, the charger very quickly was in float charge mode.  So it seems to have brought the batteries back to full charge.

Given that Hali has all lead acid batteries and her house batteries could be set up as one bank and her starting battery does not need to be charged from the AC-DC system, we could have purchased the Xantrex TrueCharge+40 and probably been happy with it.  However, the price difference between the Xantrex XC3012 and the TrueCharge+40 was so small here in Vancouver, that we opted for the newer XC3012.

#25
John - Purchase of an XC3012 for Hali is on hold pending your comparison of the Xantrex battery chargers!  We are looking forward to your installment #3.

#26
Stu, thank you for Nigel Calder's "one big house bank" article...and for a particular thought that it led to.

Calder's article makes the point that battery longevity increases when batteries are discharged less on each cycle.  Therefore, the argument (from lots of points of view: economy, ecology, saving the pinkies when changing batteries less frequently,etc....) is to combine the house batteries in the biggest bank possible.

But is there, I wondered, an argument to be made in favour of not combining the batteries in order to maintain the redundancy that separated battery banks provide?  By creating one big house bank, are we putting all our eggs in one basket?  (If so, I see that the discussion could take on something of the flavour of the "plugger/unplugger" debate, with people coming to different conclusions depending on how they relate to safety, convenience, risk, etc.)

Does having a battery monitor alleviate your concern, Stu, that there will be a bank robbery of the "one big bank"?

Asking these questions led me to question whether having redundant house battery power is really an essential virtue.  In a pinch, without house batteries, we can raise the anchor by hand, eat steak before the fridge thaws, helm instead of autopilot, conn without GPS, talk on a handlheld instead of a fixed radio...

All that looked fine, until...nav lights.  On my little Vivacity, which has a sketchy electrical system, we have always carried oil lamps for navigation in case the electrical system failed; but on Hali, oil lamps weren't even on our To Get list until your reference to Nigel Calder's article triggered this line of thought, Stu.

Pending feedback from the message board, my conclusion is that for Hali a single big battery bank would be fine, if we get a battery monitor and backup oil navigation lamps.  (If Hali had radar, I would want a redundant house battery.)

Mike:

Hali's house bank capacity, at 325Ah, is well shy of the 440Ah norm that has been mentioned.  Assuming we can live with that battery capacity...and perhaps it is not so difficult to do here in the NW where we do not need air conditioners and the refrigerator does not need to work too hard...the 30 amp Xantrex XC3012 battery charger we have been discussing should have no trouble charging the house batteries beyond the 6.6% of capacity you mentioned, even at the 23 amp rate that Jon has noticed.

 
#27
Stu:

1.  But you do love your battery monitor now.  It shows despite your denial to Jon.

2.  Perhaps we should change the name of this thread to "Carbon monoxide (?) mystery and battery charging issues" as we revert to the battery issues continually.  (Indeed, yes, I think the carbon monoxide and propane issues are now pretty much dead...and the propane can has gone back aboard.  The ladies needed it for tea this weekend.)

3.  A first cut at Hali's energy budget gives me 325 Ah available (not including charging off the engine or anything from the starting battery), daysail usage of 59 Ah, overnight usage of 89 Ah, and "at sea" usage of 205 Ah.

4.  Those figures - they require some shoving around and accept some of your figures without customizing them for Hali - make me also keen on a battery monitor.

5.  As far as I can tell (which is probably not the wisest thing to say in the circumstances), Hali's 1-2-B switch does not connect to the starting battery bank at all.  The starting battery, located aft of the stuffing box, has its own On-Off switch in the aft cabin.  We never run the battery selector switch on B.  Even days of the month, we select house battery #1.  Odd days of the month we select house battery #2.

6.  Given this configuration of Hali's batteries, would you be inclined to change your recommendation of a Link 10 instead of Link 20 battery monitor, Stu?  My understanding is that the Link 10 will monitor one battery (or battery bank) whereas the Link 20 will monitor two batteries (or two battery banks).  My preference for the Link 20 is that it would monitor individually both of Hali's house batteries, and that would accord with the way we use those batteries separately and with the way they are "banked" separately.  From what you said above, I infer that you were thinking that the two house batteries would be treated as one bank for monitoring purposes, so a Link 10 that monitors only one battery or battery bank would be enough to monitor those batteries (and there would be no need to monitor the starting battery).

Randy:

7.   I'm glad the Fluke was a good choice...and hope some of the purchase price goes towards your pension plan!

8.   We will probably watch the new charger in action as you describe.

9.   We haven't charged the batteries for days now, so haven't had an opportunity to test their gas discharge with the CO monitor.  It will be interesting to see whether a new charger also causes the batteries to tickle the monitors.

10.  Like you, we run heaters (or at least dry-stor fans) in the winter, so we will keep Hali plugged in during the winter.  Perhaps to plug or not to plug is also a seasonal thing.




#28
Jon:

You are correct that we do not leave Hali's refrigerator on.

I share your trepidation about taking a position contrary to Stu's good sense...and like you will probably continue to err sometimes.

More re: refrigerators.  Given the outpouring of argument in these threads in favour of cold beer, it is hard to resist concluding that, if the "unpluggers" are correct, beer (or anything else that would tend to keep refrigerators on and shore power plugged in) may be responsible for any number of sinkings, fires, explosions, etc.  My grandmother knew this to be true without needing evidence.

The Xantrex XC5012 battery charger is about $200-$225 more expensive here than the XC3012.  Although we Hali-ites are not too price sensitive, in the absence of a compelling argument (pace beer and refrigerators) for quick charging (and recalling from somewhere here that it is not the initial but the secondary or tertiary charging that takes most of the time), I am inclined to the XC3012, with the spare change saved in comparison with buying the XC5012 going towards a battery monitor, as Stu would recommend. (The Link 20 is about $400 here by one quote.)

At this point, it doesn't seem that we will be able to wait for the new TrueCharge2 line to be available although that line does seem to fill nicely the gaps in older lines of Xantrex battery chargers.

[Tony - thx for weighiing in.  Your post seen only after I posted the above.  The XC still seems to me to have some less than perfect features: for example, the optional intelligent shunt only monitors one of the battery banks; and the charging information on the XC monitor only relates to the battery being charged (although perhaps it is user-selectable).]

#29
Jon - Regarding the new TrueCharge2 battery chargers from Xantrex, I talked with the local Battery Direct outlet in Burnaby (home also to Xantrex). They have a pre-production version of the TrueCharger2 on hand but don't know when production models of the TrueCharger2 line will be made available to them for sale.  Two other Xantrex dealers here did not have them yet, and the lady at the Xantrex Outlet Store knew nothing about them.  The Battery Direct fellow thought Xantrex was still working on them.
#30
Stu:

On further thought (and listening to you, albeit slightly selectively as you will see), I think we will not try to test the Flyback20-3 for even temporary use, although I appreciated the suggestion by Randy that we do so as an interim measure.  Your pointing out some of the complexities of testing the old charger made me conclude that the time spent testing it could be better spent elsewhere.

Here in Vancouver, the TrueCharge40+ costs about $400 and we can get the XC3012 for $425.  We are inclined towards the XC3012 even though it has not been around as many blocks as the TrueCharge40+.  The XC5012, at more than $600 seems overkill...or at least over what we would like to pay.  We are keeping in mind your suggestion, which we like, of getting a battery monitor like the Link 20.

The Xantrex dealer here has used the XC3012 for a year on his boat and loves it.

We recognise that our current system does not require the XC3012 but given the small price difference and the possibility that we will mix-and-match battery types in the future (e.g., using an AGM starter battery as Jon - I think it was Jon - does), the slightly more expensive XC3012 seems justifiable.  I recognise that the motivation here is urgency and that ad hominem arguments play a larger role than understanding on my part...but that may be the way this particular decision will play out.

Yes, I have the Ample link.

Regards, and again thanks.