Battery Charger Fried last weeked

[pablosgirl]

Hi Von,
I really appreciate that bit of knowledge.  It will save some time and hassel on  ordering the wrong power supply for the fridge.  Where in the boat did you mount the ac/dc pwr supply?
Paul

[Ron Volk]

Paul,

I contacted MeanWell and they said that the original pwr. sup. was sufficient for the compressor but it looks like some components would heat up and shut down the supply for a while.  Since I added the more robust one there has been no problems.
The pwr sup is mounted in the hanging locker under the chart table on the outboard side of the bulkhead.  The Tyco 4-45F11 12V DC plug-in relay & socket is mounted in the rats nest behind the ac/dc switch panel. The on/off AC switch is mounted thru the switch panel face in the AC section.
It didn't work at first, but I found that there was no connection on the relay internally between contacts 85 & 87 (as shown in the picture in Tech Wiki) after taking care of this it worked as shown.
I have the output voltage set to 13.2V (supposedly proper for max. effort for my compressor).
I bought the pwr sup thru Jameco Electronics & the relay on Ebay.

[mainesail]

Had a very intresting experience on the boat last weekend.  We were staying on the boat in the slip and in the middle of the night were awakened to the sound and lights of what seemed like arc welding.  I got out of the v-berth very quickly and scrambled to the dock to throw the shore power breaker.  After some investigation and venting the boat of all the smoke, I found the source to be the battery charger which was mounted under the nav table on the hanging locker bulkhead.

Scary stuff and why I generally prefer solar charging at a dock rather than a charger that can fail, ruin a bank or burn up the boat. What if you were not there? Would have been deemed another "electrical fire" to add to the 55% of all boat fires are electrical in nature statistic...

Solar also isolates you from AC/DC issues with other boats because you don't need to plug into shore power.. Charger failures are all to common.

After this experience I have a whole lot of questions to answer.
1) why did the main ac breaker in the electrical panel not trip ( it trips each time I run the water heater and the microwave or toaster at the same time)?

I will ask another question and that is, why the charger did not have its own branch circuit breaker of about 15A max? Was the wire feeding the 20A charger from the main breaker 10GA? The branch breaker powering the charger should trip first but may not in an internal overheat situation until an actual short occurs.

2) why did the reverse polarity light come on during the light show?

Most likely because the charger eventually shorted to ground internally sending AC voltage to the green case ground which would then power the reverse polarity light. Was there a LARGE green earth wire for the case ground installed? All chargers should have a green earth ground wire attached to the case at no less than one size smaller than the DC charging output wires.

3) Fried the microwave and the fluorescent light bulb in the main salon ac light fixture but not the coffee pot or alarm clock, strange huh?

Reverse polarity can fry some devices, but not all.

The battery charger was a Charles Marine C-Charger 2000Sp 20A model which the PO bought at WM.

I am not a huge fan of the less expensive Charles chargers but they are by no means the worst. My guess is this was installation related or the bank load was too much for the charger. It also does not sound like it was installed in an area where it could sufficiently cool and dissipate heat.. Chargers can fail on either the AC or DC side but the grounds for DC and AC are one in the same. Once the charger failed to groud the circuit breaker should have tripped. I suspect someone, perhaps the same PO that installed the charger, has disconnected your AC/DC ground tie? Disconnecting this important tie can prevent the breakers from properly tripping if your shore power ground is unreliable as they very often are.


 

Any one else have one of these or experienced a similar event?  After spending most of the week reading up on battery chargers on this site and tentatively deciding on a Xantrex unit I went to WM.  After explaing my situation to my good buddy at WM, my new purchase decision has been further muddled by WM possibly offering me access to their buyer protection service.  They are possibly going to give me a credit toward another Charles Marine battery charger!

Personally I don't think the Xantrex is any better than the Charles but make sure each of them is installed correctly with enough ventilation and proper wiring and over current protection..

Looking for any information on a better way in general to protect the boat from any battery charger doing the same thing and is it worth the possible savings with taking up WM on their gracious offer?

Consider solar or one of the Sterling Pro Charge Ultra or Promariner ProNautic P chargers that carry a 5 year warranty...

[Kevin Henderson]

Mainesail... I always appreciate your well thought out approach to so many issues that confront all boat owners.  I often use the Compass Marine site to "learn a little more".
I've been thinking for awhile now of replacing my Xantrex Tru Charge charger and had seriously thought of just getting the new Trucharge II.  However, after following this thread and popping my head into WM I had seen the Pro Mariner ProNautic charger at WM and thought it looked surprisingly like the Sterling model.  After reading your post and finding out the ProMariner is essentially the same thing I feel confident that I will get the ProNautic charger for a replacement. 

And for pablosgirl... I'm very happy that your situation did not turn out any worse than it did.  It sounds scary and something none of us want to be faced with.   

[Stewartn]

More Charger Questions: C43, #1472, mfg 2000 has a "Fly Back" Batt charger installed as OEM. Twice in the past two seasons it blew a 20 amp fuse. (Says on the front it's a 20 amp charger). Yesterday and the day before, as usual in the Spring, I connected the AC power cord and engaged the charger. It read 25 amps then 20 and stayed there for 4-5 hrs before I decided to shut it down. The Link monitor shows the Batts as full (100%). But, the green light (showing float)never appeared. Any thoughts? Thx all.

[efhughes3]

Ron, there was a batch of Xantrex chargers that had the fans put in backwards!

Here's a link to Maine Sail's suggested charger:  http://forums.catalina.sailboatowners.com/showthread.php?t=136765

I recently put in a ProMariner Pronautic 20amp charger, based on Maine Sail's recommendation-it IS identical to the Sterling. With the optional remote monitor panel, I don't think it was much more than $300, if that.

[Stu Jackson]

More Charger Questions: C43, #1472, mfg 2000 has a "Fly Back" Batt charger installed as OEM. Twice in the past two seasons it blew a 20 amp fuse. (Says on the front it's a 20 amp charger). Yesterday and the day before, as usual in the Spring, I connected the AC power cord and engaged the charger. It read 25 amps then 20 and stayed there for 4-5 hrs before I decided to shut it down. The Link monitor shows the Batts as full (100%). But, the green light (showing float)never appeared. Any thoughts? Thx all.

Please, please, please...

Read the CRITICAL UPGRADES topic.

http://c34.org/bbs/index.php/topic,5078.msg43151.html#msg43151

[pablosgirl]

An Update to my battery charger issue.  I have included a photo of the fried charger bellow:


After ordering parts from Defender and other suppliers, I began the install of the charger that Ron was so kind to sell us.  The first thing that I found was that all the DC wiring from the old battery charger was way under sized for the 12 foot run between the batteries and the charge (located on the bulkhead under the chart table).  The wires were all 12 gauge!  So I spent a day fishing 8 gauge wire under the cabin sole to the batteries and the engine.  But the real surprise came when I went to install the 15 AMP AC breaker for the battery charger.  After tracing the wires I found that both the AC outlets and the battery charger had been rewired to a bus bar that had the hot lead from the shore power cable connected to it.  The PO had bypassed all the AC breakers on the boat and was relying on the 50 AMP shore power breaker on the dock!!!!   No wonder that the breaker did not trip while the charger was frying itself.  note: I have two 30 AMP shore power cords into a "y" adapter that connects to the dock 50 AMP service. One of the 30 AMP cords is just for the air conditioner  the other is the original factory cord.

Needless to say I rewired the outlets and the battery charger to their respective breakers.  It is nice to be able to turn the battery charger off and still have dock power available for lights and AC.

Next on to the cold machine AC power supply install.  I will post pictures when I am finished with that.