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Trevor Bird avatar image
Trevor Bird asked

Can the Buck Boost be used for Victron Smart Lithium Battery charging?

We have a system with Lynx Smart BMS, Lynx Distributers, 3 x Victron Smart Lithium 24v, 200Ah batteries and Smart Battery protects on charge and load side. We are trying to increase charge current from two parallel alternators ( we have 3 x 24/17 Orions in parallel) and note the Buck Boost has a product rated at 24volts and 50 amps. If we put two of these in parallel (100A) that provides the current we are seeking.

Given the Buck Boost is a power supply and not a charger, can the buck boost be used for charging Victron Smart Lithium batteries? We would use the ATC output from the Lynx Smart BMS to Pin2 (green wire) of the Buck Boost but simply using a power supply to charge such expensive batteries doesn’t seem correct. Maybe control of the Buck Boost by the external BMS is the modern way to charge lithiums. It seems for Lithiums, Bulk, Absorption and Float seems to be unnecessary and is a hang over from the days of FLA and AGM. Any thoughts on this?

battery charging
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Alistair Warburton avatar image Alistair Warburton commented ·
I am not an expert and know nothing about Victron batteries, specifically, so this is not an answer but I suspect you will eventually be told that an appropriate charging profile is recommended, if not required.

That said... Have you considered using a solar product, ergo a supported charger, with its input supplied by the boosters?

Out of the box I grant you, but provided the boost units are isolated, to avoid ground/chassis loops, that would perhaps be worth investigating.

I am assuming here that the buck/boost units do not support variable output voltage or cant be controlled, in that respect, form a GX product. If they do, and can, then large OS on a Cerbo could manage things using Node Red. However that would not be a supported solution and would lack hardware cut-off circuitry.

To be clear I am not recommending any of this, just trying to offer further point for consideration. Out of the box isn't always bad, if it was Victron wouldn't be building in new openings!

Al

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Trevor Bird avatar image Trevor Bird Alistair Warburton commented ·
@Alistair Warburton Thanks for the reply......No our intention is now to have 6 Orions in Parallel. The best way is to use an external regulator on the alternators but unfortunately we cannot touch the alternators as the complete engine setup is to be left so no warranty is put at risk. I have tried to find a better Victron solution but cannot find one. The 6 Orions sound like a poor solution but we have to do something and I cannot get any serious information about using the buck boost ffor this purpose. The batteries are too expensive to take a risk.
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klim8skeptic avatar image klim8skeptic ♦ Trevor Bird commented ·
Any room for an auxiliary alternator?
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