For me it would mean a lot of messing about fitting a Zig as all the 12v stuff is already wired into the leisure battery. All I want is something to stop the LB running down when I'm on site and hooked up. Question is which charger is most suitable for the job?
I was just going use a normal battery charger that I can wire into the proper hook up mains connectors and have it connected to battery terminals via an isolator switch. I know its a bit more manual faffing but those all in one units cost a lot ,take up quite a bit of space and as mentioned if you are already wired up more work. Each to their own i supose.
In all honesty i never use the c-tek on "supply" it really is there to keep the leisure charged whilst on hook up and the fridge is running (all my van things are 12v), if i'd have thought it through when i 1st did all mine i reckon i could have just fitted a cheapo battery charger to charge it as it was being used and it would have done the same thing.
If it's a compressor fridge, the motor shouldn't be running all the time. In theory the battery will take up any short-fall in supply and when the motor stops the charger will top up the battery. If you have an expensive gel or AGM leisure battery, I'd probably go for a Ctek as they have more charging programmes available which suit these batteries, as well as a supply mode. I think the Ctek is therefore a more flexible battery charger. If you have a basic "wet" lead acid leisure battery and just want more supply capacity - the Amperor range looks better value. It's a higher capacity power supply with fewer charging options. However, I say this without having owned either - so you'll have to make your own mind up!
Dont know but i opted for the ctek 7 amp model like quite a few on here. It lives under the drivers seat and feeds into the fusebox for "leisure fed" stuff. Provided all your wiring back to the battery is in excess of 7 amd and sufficiently big enough to avoid significant volt drop it doesnt matter where you connect it to. Ive done mine so i can just unpug it and use it elsewhere should i need to - takes a couple of seconds to take out!
I think I get the picture now. If you're drawing say 10 amps, the battery is supplying most of the current so it doesn't blow the charger which can be rated at say 5 or 7 amps. Right??
Anybody use a solar panel for a short term fix. I do a lot of wild camping in the middle of nowhere and as long as you're not running loads of draining stuff, should be ok.
