cotswoldphoto
New Member
- Joined
- Oct 23, 2019
- Messages
- 7
Is it OK to ask questions here?
My wife and I are planning to build a narrowboat (we are in England, and a narrowboat is a flat bottom steel hulled boat, in this case 57 foot long by 6 foot 10 inches wide - loaded weight about 14 tons, that you cruise on canals).
Traditionally, these are propelled by a 40(ish) hp diesel engine and have one starter battery and maybe one or two leisure batteries (both charged via alternators). Typically Lead Acid. They might have inverters, and a few have one or two solar panels. Some boats use the main engine for 12V DC and 240V AC electric power as well, but they are very inefficient being used like that, others have a separate diesel generator.
Given our climate - cold, wet, cloudy with occasional sunny days - it would require a tennis court sized array of panels to charge a battery banks to run most things on the boat, and at best you might fit 4 or 6 panels on the boat roof. Also, it is necessary to walk on the roof quite a lot, and the boat has to go through tunnels and under bridges often with only a few inches clearance (above or at the sides). So, solar is possible, but only as a top up bonus.
Often boats will rent a 'permanent' mooring to get a shore power hookup.
We plan to become permanent cruisers, which means no shore power. The canal licence provides regular access to water, waste (trash and toilet) disposal. But, we want to use an electric propulsion motor. That will be a Marlin 8 motor; 48V 8kW. To power that, Lynch, who make the motor, recommend a 800W Lead Acid deep discharge bank, or a 400A Lithium battery bank with the ability of 2C discharge. The only real choice here in the UK is Victron batteries (hideously expensive), or buying off Aliexpress. My experience with Aliexpress makes me very wary of buying built batteries, so I plan to bulk buy 32700 7A cells (I will assume they will really be 5A). Adding in the other electrical needs of the boat, make that 48V at 560A. That means 1792 cells (I will probably buy 2000). I will stuff these in to some marine battery boxes.
There will be a marine diesel generator on board. That is likely to be the Pegaru 9000V (8kW 240 AC) as it is a marine unit that can hook in to a traditional narrowboat fuel, cooling (calorifier) and muffler system.
So far so good. For the inverter and charging system, we will use (maybe more than one) Victron Quattro charger/invertors. For the solar panels, six cheap poly crystalline 100W 18V panels.
So, some things I have figured. You can see, a lot I have not. What other bits to I need? Do I build the cells into batteries? Does each have its own BMS? Lots of questions. Most of the lights on the boat are 12V LED, but I can see two types of these also. Voltage regulated ones seem to be the ones to get. I presume I need a transformer to take the 48V down to 12V, but where? Once at the power bank (at the rear of the boat), or in multiple locations in the boat, closer to where the 12V would be needed?
On cables, is High performance Solar PV Cable the same as marine grade? The stuff I see here, each strand is tinned with copper core, and insulation layer, and then an outer XLPE cover (red or black).
I am sure I will have a whole bunch more of questions, so any help would be much appreciated.
My wife and I are planning to build a narrowboat (we are in England, and a narrowboat is a flat bottom steel hulled boat, in this case 57 foot long by 6 foot 10 inches wide - loaded weight about 14 tons, that you cruise on canals).
Traditionally, these are propelled by a 40(ish) hp diesel engine and have one starter battery and maybe one or two leisure batteries (both charged via alternators). Typically Lead Acid. They might have inverters, and a few have one or two solar panels. Some boats use the main engine for 12V DC and 240V AC electric power as well, but they are very inefficient being used like that, others have a separate diesel generator.
Given our climate - cold, wet, cloudy with occasional sunny days - it would require a tennis court sized array of panels to charge a battery banks to run most things on the boat, and at best you might fit 4 or 6 panels on the boat roof. Also, it is necessary to walk on the roof quite a lot, and the boat has to go through tunnels and under bridges often with only a few inches clearance (above or at the sides). So, solar is possible, but only as a top up bonus.
Often boats will rent a 'permanent' mooring to get a shore power hookup.
We plan to become permanent cruisers, which means no shore power. The canal licence provides regular access to water, waste (trash and toilet) disposal. But, we want to use an electric propulsion motor. That will be a Marlin 8 motor; 48V 8kW. To power that, Lynch, who make the motor, recommend a 800W Lead Acid deep discharge bank, or a 400A Lithium battery bank with the ability of 2C discharge. The only real choice here in the UK is Victron batteries (hideously expensive), or buying off Aliexpress. My experience with Aliexpress makes me very wary of buying built batteries, so I plan to bulk buy 32700 7A cells (I will assume they will really be 5A). Adding in the other electrical needs of the boat, make that 48V at 560A. That means 1792 cells (I will probably buy 2000). I will stuff these in to some marine battery boxes.
There will be a marine diesel generator on board. That is likely to be the Pegaru 9000V (8kW 240 AC) as it is a marine unit that can hook in to a traditional narrowboat fuel, cooling (calorifier) and muffler system.
So far so good. For the inverter and charging system, we will use (maybe more than one) Victron Quattro charger/invertors. For the solar panels, six cheap poly crystalline 100W 18V panels.
So, some things I have figured. You can see, a lot I have not. What other bits to I need? Do I build the cells into batteries? Does each have its own BMS? Lots of questions. Most of the lights on the boat are 12V LED, but I can see two types of these also. Voltage regulated ones seem to be the ones to get. I presume I need a transformer to take the 48V down to 12V, but where? Once at the power bank (at the rear of the boat), or in multiple locations in the boat, closer to where the 12V would be needed?
On cables, is High performance Solar PV Cable the same as marine grade? The stuff I see here, each strand is tinned with copper core, and insulation layer, and then an outer XLPE cover (red or black).
I am sure I will have a whole bunch more of questions, so any help would be much appreciated.