Using battery charger and solar

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Scout

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I have 2 125 ah batteries and a 7 stage vmaxx charger. Vmaxx told me i have to turn off the charge controller to use the charger. Is there an easy way to do this without unhooking everything?  The only solution i could think of is to get two of those red heavy duty switches and put one on the solar line and one on the charge controller turning the solar off first. I really don't want to pull fuses everytime either. Is there a better way?
 
I've been told it doesn't matter, but I'm a little bit skeptical. Likely any problem scenarios would be rare. What type of charge controller you have does make a difference, and just an awareness of that may be all the control you need. The maximum charge from an eggshell timer based charger could overcharge if you had run a plug in charger overnight. Float levels should not be an issue.

Using a circuit breaker instead of a fuse gives you the option of using the circuit breaker as a switch.

Hopefully others will chime in as well.
 
The likely problem is that one charge source gets the battery up to a voltage that the other charge source sees as full and it then stops charging.  Then customer support gets a call because the source isn't charging and the owner doesn't understand why.  

I have a 13.8 volt power supply.  I use it as a converter when I have a plug in available.  When I use it my battery never gets discharged.  There isn't much charging the next day.  So I could panic because my solar isn't working.  Duh, the battery is full.
 
No problem at all putting different charge sources in parallel.

Remind me not to buy their products
 
Did you talk to a customer service script monkey, or an engineer?

And what does a 7 stage charger do exactly, except sound good in the online description?

I would be willing to bet that what they mean is, that several of those 'stages' wont be used when it sees another charging source.
 
LINK TO MANUAL W/ FULL DESCRIPTION OF 7 STAGES
Victron controllers can be turned on and off via your cell phone / tablet.  If your controller does not have that capability then you could disconnect the mc4 cable from the panel or just toss a blanket over the solar panel itself. It is a bad idea to disconnect the panels while under a heavy load (like bulk charge mode).

Like the others said, usually both controller and charger can be hooked up without any negative effect, it looks like having a solar controller operating might negate a couple of the stages tests, but those appear to be there for trying to revive bad, nearly dead batteries (desulphation, soft start, battery test) and do not do anything for batteries in good shape already. (see the manual) . Interesting charger, seems a bit gimmicky but kind of cool too.

Seven Stage Charger: Stage 1: Desulfation Stage 2: Soft Start Stage 3: Bulk Stage 4: Absorption Stage 5: Battery Test Stage 6: Recondition Stage 7: Float Specifications: Input Voltage: 110VAC Input Current: 3.8A Bulk Charge Voltage: Up to 14.7V Float Voltage: 13.8V with Pulse Feature. Bulk Charge Current: 15A
 
I think that the solar interferes with some of the stages as stated above. The guy i talked to had to find someone else who "was more knowledgeable " he said so I guess it was tech guy who knew what he was talking about. What kind of chargers does everyone else use that can be used with solar on?
 
Any.

The charger getting confused or "interfered with" causes no harm to anything.
 
I have a combiner with my alternator. A 40 amp Pronautic 120v charger. A 45 amp TriStar controller. They all play well together.
 
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