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tom-dv avatar image
tom-dv asked

Charge problem with two Orion's

Hello all,

I have recently noticed a problem with the charging by my 2 Orion's. I was watching the Orion's via de the app and noticed that they go in absorption after 2 minutes every time. It makes no different the SOC is at 50% or 80% or whatever. When I only activity 1 Orion ther is no problem it will stay in Bulk untill about 80-85 % SOC. Tried with and without engine stop detection. Each one have a switch connected with a D+. All setting are exactly the same. Setting for the shunt are the one victron recommends for the victron smart lifepo4 200ah. (Although that has nothing to do with is because the shunt is only for monitoring) Has anyone already watched the Orion's via the app during drive/loading to look at what stage they are charging?

orion-tr smart
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2 Answers
d-winterburn avatar image
d-winterburn answered ·

I have 2 x Orion-Tr Smart DC-DC 12/12-30 chargers in my van build charging 600Ah of LiFePO4 batteries (BattleBorn). 2/0 cables from the starter battery feed busbars for the Orions so there is very little voltage drop. The chargers continue in Absorb (User Defined) of 14.4Vdc through to roughly 98% SOC and then both drop to Float 13.5Vdc within seconds of each other as the state of charge approaches 100%. I have had no issues with this parallel setup and it consistently yields 60-63A charge.

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nick-okelly avatar image nick-okelly commented ·

would you post a screen capture of your settings? I ask because I have the same configuration but cannot get the two Orions to stay in sync.

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kevgermany avatar image
kevgermany answered ·

There were quite a few posts recently commenting that Victron changed the charge algorithms so that LiFePo switches quite quickly to absorption.

Switching is voltage based, so first guess is that with two charging, the voltage hits absorption level quickly, but with on it takes longer for the voltage to rise.

You could confirm this by monitoring voltage during single/double charging and see if this is what's happening.

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