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I have two 145AH AGM 12V telecom batteries I use for emergency backup only - these batteries sit at float for 364 days per year, as they are connected to a UPS. On charger at float stage, one is at 13.40V and the other is 13.63V, so an imbalance of 0.23V. How out of balance is this? What's...

I'm a fan of Battle Born batteries but for their prices. I just saw they have some good discounts (~25% off) for what they call "B" stock: B-Stock Sale (I have no relation to BB other than being a satisfied customer)

My plan to wire up a hot tub for 240VAC. (USA). Hot tub is located about 80' from the main panel (house has normal USA 100A service). My tub only requires a 30A service on the label, and actualy would run about 20A, so I decided that 8 gauge was enough, giving a 2% or less voltage loss...

I have one of those "plug N play" hot tubs that can run on 120VAC - it heats at about 1KW. I realized after some energy auditing that this tub is using about 150 kWh/month (roughly 100 summer, 200 winter). As a test, I tried putting it in Eco mode, which drops the temperature from 104F to...

I'm on SDGE NEM 1.0 plan, and as far as I understand it, I can increase my grid-tied solar system size by up to 1KW and still stay on NEM 1.0: Customers whose system capacity is 10 kW or smaller can increase the capacity by up to 1 kW. Customers whose system capacity is larger than 10 kW can...

I'm cleaning up the wiring in my Class B RV where a previous owner did something of a hash job: they added a water heater, and took 120VAC wired from the inverter to a SPST switch on the DC panel then snaked a 120VAC extension-cord wire around to a tiny resdinential-style water heater. There...

Most electronic systems and parts, both consumer and professional, include hefty safety margins in their design and specifications: Sometimes the true specifications are much more robust than the printed ones (for example, NEC's wire ampacity rules are quite conservative, so you can probably...

I'm in SDGE and have a 5KW Solar grid tie system on NEM 1.0. Over the years, my electricity consumption has gone up, as I've changed or added: - ICE car -> EV - gas water heater -> heat pump water heater - gas furnace -> heat pump - new spa/hot tub (~ 200kWH/month) I'm now using about...

Brainstorming please: I'm looking for advice on how to improve my current setup. Home: 5KW Solar with Grid Tie inverter. Computers: I have a rack of servers, which has a home-brew UPS with about 4KWH of battery power. RV: I have a small van with a 1KWH LFP battery and 800W 120VAC inverter...

I'm in SDGE territory and have a grid tied system that I've out-grown, with an electric car, heat pump water heater, and a (sadly, resistive) hot tub. I'm thinking of expanding my system (more solar or battery), but keep seeing a lot of good reasons to pause: * legal/political: the NEM 3.0...

I have a house that has a UPS for my server rack, with extra beefy external batteries. Right now the lead acid batteries are inside the house inside the server closet. These are high-quality telecom lead acid batteries, but I’m doing some renovation and I could easily run some wires so that the...

I’m adding an inverter to my class B van which came wired for shore power only. The existing circuit has 15 amp breaker located after the GFCI device. This is different from most households, where you have the breaker in the circuit before any GFCI devices. Does it matter much?

Hi everyone - I've been lurking for a while but just joined today. Great forum! I'm upgrading my campervan solar system with Victron SmartSolar MPPT 100/20 charge controller Victron BMV 712 battery monitor Additional SunPower flexible 100W panel (total solar about 200W) I'm removing an older...