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christopher-swindell avatar image
christopher-swindell asked

Connecting a Orion smart tr isolated 12/12 30 in a Ford E350

Ill be connecting a Orion smart tr isolated 12/12 30 to my E350, and I had a couple questions:

-Do I need to run a new wire from the alternator, or does the existing/stock connection from the alternator to the starter battery suffice for for this?

-The wires from the starter battery to the orion will be between 15 and 20 feet, does a 6AWG wire suffice for that distance? The chart in the manual is not totally clear about the run length. The chart says minimum 16mm^2 (6awg) at 5meters (16' 5"), but its unclear if 16mm^2 is safe from 2m-5m or for 5m or more.

orion-tr smartinstallation
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2 Answers
guyvic avatar image
guyvic answered ·

I’ve ran 6AWG from my F150 battery terminals with a BlueSea MRBF Terminal Fuse Block and 60 amp fuse 17’ to an Anderson connector at the rear bumper then another 9’ to the Orion in my travel trailer. The Orion performed well and charged my Battle Born 100 AH in 2 hours. The Orion gets very hot which Victron says is normal.

My new trailer positions the battery 28’ away from the Anderson connector and I’m contemplating re-running the 17’ through the truck with 4AWG and another 28’ of 4 AWG through the trailer then terminated down to a 6 AWG at the Orion.

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christopher-swindell avatar image christopher-swindell commented ·

Was that a 30a isolated?

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guyvic avatar image guyvic christopher-swindell commented ·

Non-isolated; the truck and trailer have common grounds.

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dancaskie avatar image dancaskie commented ·
I just did this with my F150- did you find a way to keep the output at 14v? my truck keeps dropping to 13.1- I assume controlled by the smart alternator ECM setup. looking for a way to do the good old High idle switch or something to tell the computer when I press "tow/haul" go to max output maybe..?
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kevgermany avatar image kevgermany ♦♦ dancaskie commented ·
Ignore the truck side. Just change the settings in the Orion to keep it running when the smart alternator drops the voltage. But make sure you don't set it so low that it's running permanently and killing your starter. You might need to use the green LH connections for this.
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guyvic avatar image
guyvic answered ·

Non-isolated; the truck and trailer have a common ground.

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