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Originally Posted by Caver
The biggest thing I would do differently is to install the charge controller closer to the battery and use a larger gauge wire between the charge controller and the batteries. The relatively long run of 10 gauge wire is limiting the maximum charge current. Ray
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Caver Ray -
That is a great update, and I'm glad to see this discussion area come to life again.
Let me make a minor comment in response to your "wire size" comment. Any wire larger than number 10 is hard to work with, so you would like to stay with #10. And there is an alternative to using heavier wire. This alternative is to choose a charge controller that has "remote sensing" capability, which is fairly common. With such a controller, you run the charge lines as you normally would, but you also run a separate pair of small wires from the controller to the battery. These small wires don't carry the charging current, so there is no voltage drop in these wires. The controller bases its charge rate on the voltage
at the battery as seen by the small wires, rather than the voltage
at the controller as seen by the large wires. As a result, you can use #10 wire for the charge lines over almost any needed distance, and mount the controller wherever it is most convenient.
Bill