Peter Kennedy has been in business since 1991 designing, installing and servicing marine electrical systems. The purpose of this blog is to offer support to both professional installers and do-it-yourself boat owners who wish to undertake this work themselves.
Here are the recommended charge settings for Victron Lithium Ion batteries, taken from the Victron battery manual
4.2 Charge voltage
- Recommended charge voltage: 14V-14,4V per battery (14,2V recommended),
- Absorption time: 2 hrs for a 100% charge, or a few minutes for a 98% charge.
- Maximum charge voltage: 14,4V resp
- Recommended storage/float voltage: 13,5V
- Batteries must be regularly (at least once every month) charged to 14V (max. 14,4V) in order to fully balance the cells.
There is quite a difference between the two. So by applying the Victron recommendations to the Balmar program this is what I came up with:
- Start delay is the same
- High Voltage limit: I would make it 14.2 (even though 14.4 is allowed why push the limit if 14.2 is recommended)
- Compensation limit: 14.2 (There should be no temperature compensation, see last line above)
- Bulk voltage 14.2
- Absorption voltage 14.2
- Absorption time * see note below but keep as is for now
- Float voltage 13.5
- Max Bat temp leave as is
- Max alt temp leave as is
- Batt temp compensation leave as is (zero)
*You can only define the minimum absorption time, not the
max absorption time. You may have to tweak this a bit. The purpose
of the absorption time is to equalize the cells. You just have to do that
from time to time, so if you go to a dock the MultiPlus does it for you and you
don’t necessarily have to do it on the water. If you never go to the dock
you might have to monitor it a few times to see what happens when you leave it set
to 18 minutes