Dear Colin

Thanks for your interesting info. I have however a calculation problem, which I maybe make a mistske. In Kents mail he mentioned the cost for him for dingy/ solar arch (480 pw at least) about 18k US$.

You paid by Riza 25% less including all the extras (duty/transport/Vat)

I have it done also there. Its not Riza , its a exellent subcontracor , who did the job. And the very good electrician, paid by Riza, Tamar his name. 

That means you paid about 13500 US$ fot the complete arch incloudind the high performance batterie solar controler ?

I hope I do not disturbe you with my question, only I was wondering about the real cost.

Best regards

Hanspeter

Tamango 2, SM #16

Von meinem iPad gesendet

Am 29.02.2016 um 13:36 schrieb Colin Streeter colin.d.streeter@... [amelyachtowners] <amelyachtowners@...>:

 

Hi Kent

Sorry for the delay as I just noticed your post now, and also thanks to Bill for the feedback on the US2200 which seem like a good option too with a slightly smaller footprint and height than the Trojans. A couple answers to Kent's questions:

1) Your cost estimates are about right for the arch and panels. We, along with many others on this site went with Riza's arch and had it shipped to Australia. The cost, even after having to pay import duty, customs, Australian GST was still about 25% cheaper than if I had a local Brisbane s/s welder make it for me. More importantly though was the fine job Riza did on it as he has all the curves in the right places compared to what I local welder would have done. We constantly have people stop at our dock and enquire where we had it made.

2) The downside I referred to is moving the engine battery from the internal battery compartment to the engine room and making up a new fibreglass waterproof battery box to sit across the engine and genset bearers against the rear wall of the engine room to the RHS of the Racor fuel filter with a separate set of battery switches. Whilst there are advantages in having a shorter cable run to start the motors, we have always been extremely reluctant to change anything on our boat from the original design as the previous owner had taken such great care of the boat with everything in almost "as new" condition when we got it despite it's age. Such a decision for us is a major issue (as was the decision to put an arch on the boat) to think very carefully about however there would be huge benefits in having 675 amp hours available.

3)  I am absolutely no expert in these matters compared to all the other regular contributors on this forum however I did notice from all the discussions that Danny has had his batteries (in the above format) since 2009 and that they are still going strong which could possibly be linked to having over 650 amp hours of storage (on the older 8+1 battery design SM2000) and never needing to run it down much compared to the rest of us with 650 amp hours storage and his solar and wind generator setup. I note you also picked up on this potential benefit of more battery longevity with a potentially higher amp hour storage.

This is very tempting indeed but today I fitted the first 8 Trojan T 105's (we now have 450 amp hours instead of the previous 360) and it is clear that I cannot fit another 4 in there due to the height of the box at the aft end where the last 2 batteries would need to go being only 265mm and the batteries 270mm. We would not want a situation where there is no air circulation room above the batteries. There is however a huge amount of room remaining - in fact enough to put in an additional two spare 12v engine started batteries (which are lower) - but not the required height for the 6v's. Based on this we will now stay with the 450 amp hours in the interim and see how we go. 

Colin Streeter

Island Pearl II, Amel 53 #332

Brisbane

On Sun, Feb 28, 2016 at 2:26 AM, Kent Robertson karkauai@... [amelyachtowners] <amelyachtowners@...> wrote:

 

Hey Colin, et al,

I've been watching this thread with great interest.  It's great to hear all the different solutions to the Amel power  needs.  I'm still using the original configuration of 8 flooded lead acid 12v for the house bank.  They are inexpensive and easy to find anywhere.  I charge for an hour or a little more twice a day without supplemental solar or wind. I run the desalinator when charging  in clean water, and run the washer about twice a week.  I discharge to no lower than 24v, usually ~24.4v.

I'm really intrigued by the 12-6v house bank idea.  675 AH is significantly more than what I have, but not twice as much.  I would still have to charge twice a day without adding solar/wind.  The advantage seems to me to be discharging the batteries less, at least theoretically improving their longevity.    From experience of those who have done this, could I expect the batteries to last a lot longer (mine last 3-4 years now)?

If I were to add solar and/or wind I would want to add an arch/davits (on my wish list anyway) which would cost a total of ?$18-22K (is that a reasonable guesstimate for arch/davits/solar/ wind?).  Could I eliminate charging for the most part, or at least reduce my charging to once a day?  I would still need to run the generator to run the washer and watermaker which I would probably do at least twice a week.

I'm mostly thinking that the reduction in running the generator or added convenience would not justify the cost, unless adding solar and wind would mostly eliminate the need for daily charging.

Colin, you said you were going offline with this discussion after saying "Of course there are some downsides to this too".  Aside from the cost and added complexity and maintenance required when adding solar/wind, what other downsides do you anticipate?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts,

Kent

SM243

Kristy

On Feb 26, 2016, at 8:32 PM, Colin Streeter colin.d.streeter@... [amelyachtowners] <amelyachtowners@...> wrote:

 

Hi Danny
Thanks, having done the measurements I can see how they would fit in with 3  banks of 4 x 6v if the engine battery is moved to the engine bay. This would leave plenty space in the the battery compartment and take our house battery  amps from 360 amps @ 24v (old 90amp 12v x 8 bat system) to 675amps @ 24v. Aĺl this in the smaller / older SM2000 8 house battery compartment.

Of course there are some downsides to this too. Will contact you direct as this thread has potentially gone on a little too long on the same topic now.

Colin Streeter
Island Pearl II, Amel 53 #332
Brisbane

On 27 Feb 2016 10:51 am, "simms simms@... [amelyachtowners]" <amelyachtowners@...> wrote:

 

Sorry Colin I missed the word "Trojan" in my last post. Pointless without it

Cheers

Danny

Sent from Samsung Mobile

-------- Original message --------

From: "simms simms@... [amelyachtowners]"

Date:27/02/2016 11:29 (GMT+12:00)

To: amelyachtowners@...

Subject: Re: [Amel Yacht Owners] Re: Batteries - What type house batteries to use what voltage charge from Solar/Wind?

Hi Colin.  Ocean pearl had 12 six volt golf cart batteries on purchase and they fitted. 
Cheers
Danny 
Sm 299 
Ocean pearl 


Sent from Samsung Mobile

-------- Original message --------

From: "Colin Streeter colin.d.streeter@... [amelyachtowners]" <amelyachtowners@...>

Date:27/02/2016  03:18  (GMT+12:00)

To: amelyachtowners@...

Thanks Eric for following up. I will look out for those ones too as I am keen to see the dimensions for fit.  The best price on a Trojan T-105 here today was AUD$275. There is another USA brand equivalent called a US2200 with the same physical dimensions and 7 AMPS more storage at $235 each. The battery salesman recons that these are just as good as the Trojans ... but I have not heard of these before so am not so sure?

Interestingly we took our battery compartment internal measurements this afternoon and the height is problematic as the compartment is 1610mm long x 385mm wide but the depth slopes slightly from 260mm at the af

--

Colin Streeter

0411 016 445