I have four (4) 170ah 12V batteries that I'm using with a 1.5KVA 24V Liminous Inverter.
I acquired and started using them by December 2013, but 2 months ago the charging began to be inconsistent and soon stopped completely.
They were checked today and 1 of the 4 batteries is bad and another battery is week. And the two have been taken for charging (maybe boosting) with a better charging device.

Two things have been mentioned as the possible cause of the battery failures.
1. The batteries were on bare cement floor (They have now been lifted).
2. The 1.5KVA battery can't charge all 4 batteries efficiently. The advice is to get a specialized charger for charging purpose.

I have lost confidence on the suppliers. It took more than three months to deliver the initial system, and when there was this problem, it took over two months to get support from them.

I'll like to make my findings and source for the charger else where if that is actually what would solve my problem.

So I'll like to know the following;
1. If getting a dedicated charger would be a solution to this problem.
2. What brand, capacity of charger would be suitable
3. If the charger can be powered by a 2.8KVA petrol generator which also has a chest deep freezer to support among other things.
4. What is the cost of the charger and possibly where it can be sourced.
5. Any other useful advice for me to maintain and enjoy the inverter system.

Thanks

No experts in the forum?

uken73,
yeah,i use external charger with three battery banks of 24volts on my numeric 2kva inverter,you can get an external 20amps to 30amps 24volts battery charger to support d inverter charger but best results is wen used with phcn or ur generator should be at least 5kva.
normal battery chargers used by technicians to charge car batteries with 24volts support is wat i have been using for months now.
i also wired a electronic timer to d charger since its a manual start,this cuts off d charger after a pre defined time to avoid over charging d batteries.

davechika: uken73,
yeah,i use external charger with three battery banks of 24volts on my numeric 2kva inverter,you can get an external 20amps to 30amps 24volts battery charger to support d inverter charger but best results is wen used with phcn or ur generator should be at least 5kva.
normal battery chargers used by technicians to charge car batteries with 24volts support is wat i have been using for months now.
i also wired a electronic timer to d charger since its a manual start,this cuts off d charger after a pre defined time to avoid over charging d batteries.

Thanks for the response. But I have a few questions.
1. As you operate with a timer, does it mean you have to wait for the batteries to be fully discharged before charging it, so as to conform to your timer's timing?
2. And when you are charging with this external charger, is the inverter also running (like charging some of the the 3 batteries)?
3. Do you know if there is a 1.5KVA option? Though 7.5KVA & 12KVA diesel generators are available, they are alternately used sparingly to power bigger equipment, the Gen that would mostly be used is a 2.8/3KVA petrol gen which would not power a 2KVA Inverter along with other loads conveniently.
4. What is the cost of the external charger?

Thanks.

You can get a 24V 30A 4-stage intelligent battery charger. May cost you about 90K. It is intelligent, senses and displays the charging current and voltage. When the battery bank is fully charged, it goes to float and you can switch off.
It is also low power consuming, consuming less than 1 KW. I installed the 24V, 20A version about 6 months ago and it works perfectly. It charges over a wide range of voltage 90-240V.

In the picture posted below, the charging voltage is 27.6V while the charging current is 0.4A. If you need one, send me a message.

dsunmade: You can get a 24V 30A 4-stage intelligent battery charger. May cost you even more about 70-80k. It is intelligent, senses and displays the charging current and voltage. When the battery bank is fully charged, it goes to float and you can switch off.
It is also low power consuming, consuming less than 1 KW. I use the 24V, 20A version with my setup and it works perfectly.

Thank you very much for this. Please would this specification do for 4 170ah 12V batteries? How much is the 20A version you are using and what is the name of the product so that I can research and read more about it? Thank you.

For the 4 170ah batteries, you are probably running them in 2 parallel strings of 24v, 340Ah. For good charging results, you need a charger close to 10% of your bank's Ah which comes out as 34A. The name of the charger is Sterling pro charge ultra. The Sterling pro charge 24V 20A version is about 60k. I use the 24V, 20A charger for 2 200Ah batteries. For the 4 batteries, the 24V, 30A version is better.

Ok. Thank you dsunmade.

dsunmade: For the 4 170ah batteries, you are probably running them in 2 parallel strings of 24v, 340Ah. For good charging results, you need a charger close to 10% of your bank's Ah which comes out as 34A. The name of the charger is Sterling pro charge ultra. The Sterling pro charge 24V 20A version is about 60k. I use the 24V, 20A charger for 2 200Ah batteries. For the 4 batteries, the 24V, 30A version is better.

uken73.
sorry for replying late,with dsunmade auto stater u probably dnt need an external timer cos dis does all that automatically,yes d inverter runs while d battery charger is connected nd running....if u wanna u a generator,use not below 5kva to safeguard to batts lifetime cos d freq stability of d big gens are within plus minus 5%.
in my area i hav phcn at least 6hrs a day which is quite reasonable to get my batts nearky to 100% charged.

Thank you davechika. With the information provided by both of you, I think I've got most of the information I need. I'm think I would have to suspend the idea for now. Power though greatly improved around my area, we often have some extended periods without power. I'm not ready to be running those heavy duty generators just for charging the batteries. Besides cost, they are very noisy. I appreciate the information provided.

uken73: Thank you davechika. With the information provided by both of you, I think I've got most of the information I need. I'm think I would have to suspend the idea for now. Power though greatly improved around my area, we often have some extended periods without power. I'm not ready to be running those heavy duty generators just for charging the batteries. Besides cost, they are very noisy. I appreciate the information provided.

You don't need such a big gen to run the charger. With my 2.5Kva Sumec generator, I run my inverter, my battery charger, chest freezer, refrigerator, TV, all house lights and occasionally, washing machine at the same time without the generator groaning. The charger is very energy efficient, with the 24V 20A consuming about 700W at full steam.

dsunmade: You don't need such a big gen to run the charger. With my 2.5Kva Sumec generator, I run my inverter, my battery charger, chest freezer, refrigerator, TV, all house lights and occasionally, washing machine at the same time without the generator groaning. The charger is very energy efficient, with the 24V 20A consuming about 700W at full steam.

hi dsunmade
can you send me an email to nonye4real@gmail.com? please
i'm interested in the sterling pro charger with some other questions i would like to ask you

Thanks

dsunmade: You don't need such a big gen to run the charger. With my 2.5Kva Sumec generator, I run my inverter, my battery charger, chest freezer, refrigerator, TV, all house lights and occasionally, washing machine at the same time without the generator groaning. The charger is very energy efficient, with the 24V 20A consuming about 700W at full steam.

That was based on davechika's advice to use at least a 5KVA Gen. I also have a 2.8/3KVA Gen which I use most of the times. It powers my chest freezer, 1.5KVA Inverter, laptop & lighting (hardly have time to watch TV, it's almost always off), but the gen groans when the Inverter is on.

Since, you say the power is below 1000W, then I should plan for it, though I'm confused on what the connection will look like. Would the Inverter need to be on too while the external charger is charging the batteries? If I have to run both the external charge & the Inverter at the same time, that would be too much for the 2.8/3KVA Gen. Can you talk about this?

It depends on the way your inverter is connected. The way I wired my house, all the non-heavy load in my house is wired through the inverter such that I don't notice when there is power outage. So, my inverter is always on.

If your inverter is wired like mine, then you have to run the charger and inverter at the same time. If you wired it such that you can switch between public supply/generator and inverter, you can disconnect the inverter while charging using the intelligent charger. However, if you use both the inverter and charger at the same time, the batteries will charge faster.

You can also reduce the load on the generator by making use of energy saving bulbs and switching off appliances that you are not using.

dsunmade: You don't need such a big gen to run the charger. With my 2.5Kva Sumec generator, I run my inverter, my battery charger, chest freezer, refrigerator, TV, all house lights and occasionally, washing machine at the same time without the generator groaning. The charger is very energy efficient, with the 24V 20A consuming about 700W at full steam.

dsunmade
ur trying to tell me dat u load 700watts + plus etc (ur talking about close to 1000watts of load)nd ur generator doesnt labour,its either u cnt differenciate a genset on labour or load from a normal running gen with less load.

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davechika:

dsunmade
ur trying to tell me dat u load 700watts + plus etc (ur talking about close to 1000watts of load)nd ur generator doesnt labour,its either u cnt differenciate a genset on labour or load from a normal running gen with less load.

The gen is built to carry loads. As long as the load is not excessive, it should not groan. However, the generator is only a few months old.

Sorry guys, nairaland spambot had banned me on this thread for a few days for no reason and also hid my response. Ban was lifted yesterday. Thanks for all the information provided. I don't know what triggers it, so I would avoid asking re-posting what I had posted or adding further questions. Thanks guys.

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dsunmade:
You can get a 24V 30A 4-stage intelligent battery charger. May cost you about 90K. It is intelligent, senses and displays the charging current and voltage. When the battery bank is fully charged, it goes to float and you can switch off.
It is also low power consuming, consuming less than 1 KW. I installed the 24V, 20A version about 6 months ago and it works perfectly. It charges over a wide range of voltage 90-240V.

In the picture posted below, the charging voltage is 27.6V while the charging current is 0.4A. If you need one, send me a message.

Hello Dsunmade, how're u doing? I just stumbled on ur post and am quite interested in the charge; can I source it locally or do I have to order from you?

Hoping to hear from you soon, regards

Thanks