24 Volt Lithium House Bank Upgrade- Silent Ship

[scottinsydney]

So back to the original solar inverter project that stalled due to our lockdowns last year. We have started to prepare the roof for the new solar farm.

We have killed all the lichen over a six month period and cleaned and sanded the flybridge roof. Any bare aluminium will now be touched up with aircraft etch primer. We will apply one thick coat of epoxy primer and two coats of two pack exterior which should last 20 years.

There will be 3 x 400 watt solar panels and one smaller solar panel for the port / house lead acid. (As we have found out during summer, one panel replaces what was used at night, two panels will replace what is used during the day and three panels will put positive charge into the battery.

The old Furuno 6' antenna array has been taken down. The old 32v CRT screen in the wheelhouse will be removed this week along with the Furuno LCD slave screen on the flybridge. (These will be free to any HOFers for a small donation to charity.)

A Furuno Wifi radar and 6" Scanstrut radar strut has been ordered which will mix with a Digital Boat AIS transponder /Wifi router. Meaning an Ipad is not dedicated to just the radar function.

As we took down the radar array yesterday we started on other jobs such as repairing blistering paintwork on some of the flybridge ceiling panels. Lots of corroded aluminium trim can be replaced with polished 316. Still trying to work out if corroded ceiling lights are AC or DC. None of them work and we don't know where they turn on/off.

radar1.JPG
Prior to cleaning


radar2.JPG
Removing the old antenna array.


radar3.JPG

Removing 30 years of old antennas required access from underneath.
Light fittings were causing paint blisters due to dissimilar metals.

[zigzag930]

Following with great interest...

One question. How are you dealing with the BMS disconnecting the LifePo's so that the alternator doesn't fry? Does the Daly BMS provide some sort of signal prior to disconnecting the batteries so that you can turn off the field to the alternator?

I believe the Victron BMS does this, but not sure any other BMS systems provide that feature.

[scottinsydney]

The big lithium battery is charged only by the Victron inverter/charger and solar. Its not connected to the alternators in any way.

The Victron gear has its own safety settings for overcharge and discharge. The 250amp internal Daly BMS has its own Bluetooth enabled settings. The Victron settings will shut down its gear first, followed by the BMS if something is still connected.

The big battery has now been operating for 5 months and after the first couple of weeks did not need any tweaking to any settings.

roof.jpg

Antenna array removed. Some bare aluminium waiting to be etch primed. The seams between the roof panels have been scaped back of old sealant and new two pack paint compatible sealant applied. (Looks like I mistakenly purchased black sealant. Hope it paints out!)

With any luck and dry weather we will have the primer rolled on Thursday.

[scottinsydney]

The flybridge roof is finally painted with an epoxy primer and two coats of two pack white paint.

We tested the new Furuno Wifi radar in situ and its fantastic on the iPad. It will do what we need. And I like not having the huge old radar display sitting on the wheelhouse dash.

However the solid 12' x 15' aluminium flybridge roof leads to a weaker signal for the wheelhouse iPad. So we took the radar down and opened the radome to see what the wifi antenna setup looked like.

radar7.jpg

As you can see in the photo below there is only a small wifi antenna at about 7pm. This antenna has been disconnected and the local RF Shop is making us a new IP68 weatherproof high gain antenna with 4' lead. The new antenna will feed down through the existing roof opening under the 10" Scanstrut. The cable will be 4mm diameter and UV resistant. We will drill a 7mm hole in the radome's base for the stainless cable gland. I suppose we have already voided the warranty. We will run the dehumidifiers before we close the radome up.

radar8.jpg

(For the techies... there will be a loss of signal associated with the 4' cable run, but this is less than the signal loss being experienced in the wheelhouse. The new high gain antenna should then even things out.)

The only thing that looks different is the new radome is so small compared to the 6' whirligig array.

radar6.jpg

I have posted in the Parts forum that the old CRT display and array are available for parts.

[scottinsydney]

A year into this project now and finally the solar panels are now mounted to the flybridge roof. The panel edges have been painted white.

The roof is made of flexible aluminium sheeting over ribs, but the sheeting bends under a persons weight. In the end we used PVC solar panel mounts and adhesive sealant to bed them. We will further secure them with Eternabond tape and install a spoiler along the front edge of the forward solar panels to deflect high winds.

solar1.jpg

Solar panels came with packing the same size allowing easy template layout on the roof.


solar2.jpg

Test fitting.....Panels are 400 wats each. During a Sydney summer we should have five hours each day with all three panels in direct sunlight. During a Sydney winter they will only add some charge to the battery for a couple of hours each day. This photo was taken mid winter at 1pm.

[Felix]

I thought I read somewhere a Halon system is ineffective against a lithium battery fire? I think Boeing issued a warning against lithium batteries in the hold because the Halon system wouldn't extinguish them in a fire.
Obviously, the fire hazard thing has to be worked out before you spend a nickel.

I saw a tiny portable phone battery burn one time. It burned hot for a long time! A bilge full of 'em would really be something if burning.


Edit: Googled to confirm: http://venturaaerospace.com/halon-on...d-metal-fires/
<actually, I use DuckDuckGo and never Google>

Since the Halon system is ineffective with lithium battery fires what steps have you done in case of fire , re special housing for batteries to contain if a fire should occur and or fire extinguishers for lithium fires. Thank you

[Felix]

Can take a look at these boxes for lithium batteries.
https://www.batterysafetybox.com/lit...-box-features/

Does anyone have more info on making lithium batteries safer?

[scottinsydney]

There are plenty of other threads to read discussing lithium battery issues, however the custom made battery we chose is encased in a 2.5mm sealed stainless box and all wiring, BMS etc is greatly oversized for what's required. The fire extinguishers are being replaced with modern systems. At the end of the day, it is what it is and we are very happy with it all so far.

[scottinsydney]

I thought I would provide an update to this project which has been operating the past year.

It has all worked better that we could have expected. There have been no issues with the Victron equipment, other than understanding how it all works. The 10Kwh battery is set to operate between 15% and 90% charge. The MPPT /solar charge system seems to be able to handle a Sydney winter running the large fridge.

The three x 400w solar panels are about the right size for our needs and are nicely out of the way on the flybridge roof.

At the moment we have wired one 12K BTU aircon and the water maker into the inverter system using 1-0-2 change over switches. The water maker consumes 800w so on a sunny day we are making water for free. Or we can air condition part of the boat and make water for free.

We are now only using the generator to heat hot water or when we need more than 5000w of inverter power.

If I made one error it was purchasing the smaller 5000w inverter/charger. The Victron 8000w inverter / charger would have been much better, with its maximum output still well below the newly installed AC wiring limits and the 250amp max DC system. The AC MCBs and CBs are installed with low tripping ratings. The company that supplied the DC components also designed the wiring system for the equipment with DC fuse / switches, MCBs and CBs.

Another 10kwh battery would be nice too.

But after two years of covid delays, we now have our silent ship and are ready for summer.

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32 Volt Twin Solar Regulators for Port and Starboard Banks

In the photo below you can see the white frame painted 400w panels and new radar on the flybridge roof. Unfortunately we did not have room to place the 32v solar panel up there. This solar panel only charged the port (house) bank and not the starboard bank. The starboard bank died during our covid lockdowns through lack of charging. The solar controller has a 32v setting.

Solar panels.jpg

We contacted the Australian solar controller manufacturer www.plasmatronics.com.au to ask how we could connect two isolated battery banks to the one solar panel. They replied that their products were designed to allow two solar controllers to operate from one solar panel as long as solar input voltages could be maintained. So we did this and now both battery banks are being charged independently.

We will need to find a smaller suitable 32v solar panel arrangement to fill the space on the roof and we can then attend to updating the back flybridge deck.


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The grand plan of things is still to take the boat on a bucket list of three separate trips over three years. Starting in 2024 we plan to visit the Great Barrier Reef, New Caledonia and Papua New Guinea. We now only need some extra insurance, new carpet, a new mattress, some safety gear, some spare parts and an AIS. Plus Mr Musk's Starlink.