Dump load control


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pollenface

Regular Member

Joined: 01/09/2020
Location: Australia
Posts: 47
Posted: 11:41pm 20 Oct 2020      

I'm curious how others are controlling the connect/disconnect of their dump load.

I don't want to spend hundreds of dollars so I've purchased a cheap prebuilt adjustable voltage sensing relay and piggy backed it to a dual battery relay which runs a few other devices upwards of 13.3v

I've had a lot of reliability with other cheaply sourced prebuilt modules (eg. step up/down converters, 12v remote switches, temperature controlled relays), so I thought I would try it out.

I have set mine to dump @ 14.6v (not sure what is ideal) but due to limitations of my hardware am not able to set a disconnect voltage higher than 12.8v - I would like perhaps 13.5-14v disconnect (again not sure what is ideal), the bank in question is sealed lead acid/agm.

I've seen a dump load relay (and heater) kit on ebay which connects at 15v and disconnects at 14.95v. I didn't like the idea of that. I would think that the moment the load powers up it would immediately disconnect from the voltage sag.

The turbine is just a cheap 400watter which I'm experimenting with.

Edited 2020-10-21 09:51 by pollenface