Thanks for the great feedback Ty. I appreciate it!

Glad you found it helpful. Thanks for the great feedback!

@@thedudefromU Just a little redundancy. If the switch should fail by shorting out, the heater would stay on, potentially overheating the battery and/or draining it. Having two in series will reduce this possibility. Of course, if either switch fails in the open mode, the heater won’t come on at all, but I feel this is the lesser evil. Just my opinion.

@@thedudefromU The parts sources are listed in the description under the video. If you don’t see it, tap on the “more” tab. We also did a blog on the subject which can be found here: justalittlefurther.com/just-a-little-further/2024/1/31/an-easy-diy-battery. It also lists the parts sources.

@@El_Rudo It’s a little confusing, but you want the normally closed version. A normally open switch will turn the heater on whenever the temperature goes above 40 degrees - the opposite of what we want.

@@JustALittleFurther thanks for your response. Yes, the NO/NC concept is doing my head in when it comes to these temperature switches. Even asking AI like Gemini and GPT I am getting different answers depending how I phrase the question. I just wanted to make sure before ordering because It almost ordered the NO version. So if I wanted to go belt with suspenders for safety, could I also put in say a 20c NO temperature switch, like someone else mentioned in the comments? My intention would be to shut the whole thing down if the external battery temperature hit 20c. I am going to have a master physical switch to turn the circuit on when the temperature during the day gets to below 10c.

Hi Matas, this is very strange. I can think of three possibilities: 1. A short in the wire from the alternator/house battery to the Renogy; 2. Something miswired on the Renogy - something connected to the wrong terminal; or 3. A defective Renogy. You can eliminate #1 by disconnecting the alternator/battery cable at the Renogy end and see whether the problem persists. #2 seems most likely to me, especially since the solar panel also doesn't seem to be working as expected. I'd very carefully re-read the manual and double check each wire and connection. (It's really easy to make a mistake - I'm embarrassed to admit I miswired a connection on the Renogy myself just a few months ago when I was adding a rear camera to my van). Good luck and let us all know what the problem turns out to be.

@@JustALittleFurther Thank you for taking the time to respond, Once fixed i will add a solution but for now. Further question if possible please, the Negative from the starter battery should it run to rheology MMPT or is it fine (From what I have done and read) to use the ground from MMPT to chassis i have removed paint and made it bare metal and used good nut and bolt From Renogy themselves an answer is We were able to confirm with our technical specialists that what you're experiencing with the battery charger is normal as this is how the unit works. So as long as the battery needs charging, even if the engine is off, the battery charger will charge the auxiliary battery from the starter battery. We apologize if this is not what you expected of the unit. We recommend installing a disconnect switch between the starter battery and the battery charger. The battery charger will stop taking charge from the starter battery by the following: 1. If the starter battery's voltage is 11.5V the battery charger will stop operating. 2. You can put a disconnect switch in between the starter battery and the battery charger so that you can cut off the power supply from the starter battery. This has been confirmed that installing a disconnect switch between the starter battery and the battery charger will resolve the issue. It's strange as my starter battery is below 10.4v and it's still dropping but the isolation switch could be a simple/stupid fix.

@@matasjarutis3499 using the chassis as the return for the solar panel should be okay. Renogy’s response doesn’t seem very helpful at all, though. Another thought that comes to mind, however, and might explain all the symptoms: is it possible that the solar panel output is reversed? If the solar panel +wire was grounded and the -wire connected to the PV+ terminal? Another possibility is that the blocking diode in the solar panel is blown, i.e. shorted, which might cause the battery to drain when there’s no sunlight.

@@iamlegend3669 In some older homes, the ground was the metal sheathing of metal conduit. If this is what you have, just make sure the metal conduit has a good, solid connection with the metal switch box. The switch itself will be connected to ground when it is screwed onto the box.

@JustALittleFurther Got it thanks!

@@inspectorh4548 Good suggestion. Thanks

@@charleswillard775 The heaters have some hysteresis. They don’t heat up or cool off immediately. When the batteries reach 5C, the switch turns the heater off, but it takes a while for the heating pad to cool down, and the temperature keeps rising for awhile. The reverse happens when the temp drops below 5C… it takes awhile for the pad to heat up again, so the temperature of the battery continues to drop. Hope this helps, and glad you liked the video.

@JustALittleFurther thanks for the explanation

Battery will rarely be right at 5C and will be below 5C when heaters are warming it up (staying on non stop) and heaters always off when above 5C. When battery is around 5C it will cycle on/off to keep it around 5C, which is great.

@@mattfowler3718 Good question… they go to the house battery

@@andrewgronquist2523 Putting the heater under the battery seems like a good idea. I’d still suggest keeping the temp sensors on the side of the battery, however. I have no quantitative evidence to support this, but it seems like this would better measure the temperature of the battery mass than it would on the top. Please keep us posted on how it works in those cold Colorado nights.

Heat on sides or bottom will transfer heat equally well because conductive heat is not affected by gravity. There is some gap between sides of battery and case so a small amount of convection occurs. Once one part of battery is warm most of the battery is near the same temperature especially since there are not a lot of watts involved (very slow heating) so heat is equalized well. Lithium conducts heat extremely well. Putting heaters on bottom places weight on them and possibly some movement so reliability could be less. BMS is on top of battery so placing heaters above it possibly would not transfer heat as well to battery (likely would work) and I am not as comfortable applying heat directly above BMS for durability reasons. Most of this is speculation on my part, though. I will be using batteries in very cold conditions in January or February. If anything interesting occurs I'll try to check back in. Some of use will be in Colorado and New Mexico. Last year it was in the teens...

@@TimCompton-q8n A very thoughtful reply as always, Tim. Thanks

@@garyferguson1552 I’m not clear on your question. If all you are doing is charging the 280 ah battery bank, why do you need a switch at all?

I'm quite sure you can use this with any lithium battery as the charging parameters are very similar if not identical.

thank you for that cheers

I don’t think you need to disconnect the shore power charger, but I think you should disconnect the charging cable from the vehicle alternator since the DC-DC charger does the same thing in a more sophisticated way. Does this cable go through some sort of battery isolator? If not, you can just connect the cable from the alternator to the input of the DC-DC charger, assuming the cable is large enough. Hope this helps.

@@Ridestereo765 It sounds like there’s only one circuit. What did you plan to control with the other switch? Is the black wire hot? I’d check the wiring at the light and see whether the white wire coming from the box with the switch is connected to the black wire on the porch light. If so, and the black wire is hot, you can connect the white and black wires as you suggested.

You will need three fuses. One on the output of the solar array which should be about 1.5 x the total amps produced by the the solar array, a 60 amp fuse on the input from the starter battery/alternator, and a 50 amp fuse on the output of the DC-DC charger. Hope this helps.

@@nineofcups1 oh thanks! i don't have solar, just from the alternator to the battery. If I decide to get a solar panel, can I also plug it directly into the dcdc or do I also need another device?

@@JoeSabolick Glad you liked it. Thanks for the feedback!

@@eedom69 we have 200 watts of solar, and the distance from the solar panels to the battery charger was about 10 feet, so 8 gauge wire was adequate for that run. The output of the battery charger can be as high as 50 amps, and that run was about 3’, so I used 6 gauge wire for that segment. Hope that helps.

@@eedom69 I got it on Amazon a few years ago. It was left over from another project.

@@jeffersonamc1177 Glad you liked it. Thanks for the feedback!

@@bogdanstoic Hi bogdanstoic, thanks for the feedback. I tend to think that since each small piece is encapsulated in epoxy and assuming there aren’t any voids, that using smaller pieces would be stronger. I have no evidence to back this up, however.

@@tristenlittke7593 not really, but I’m kinda skinny.

@@JustALittleFurther did you struggle putting bolts in frame over exhaust like flushed against bottom of vehicle

@@tristenlittke7593 it wasn’t difficult once the exhaust was dropped down enough to get the bolts in

@JustALittleFurther I had issues the bolts were flushed against a metal sheet bolted to bottom of compartment over exhaust even hammering it I had issues

@@tristenlittke7593 I don’t know what might be different about your installation. Different model year? Different brand of tow hitch? My installation went smoothly with no problems.

@@jeffmorin3482 hi Jeff - thanks for the feedback. The switch should be nc - normally closed. I’ll have to check the parts list. I put two in the circuit for redundancy, in case one fails in the shorted mode and keeps heating the battery.

The video description calls out for NO - ‘Search for “Thermal Control Switch, 5 degrees C, normally open”. Note that the temperature rating is usually in degrees C, and you want the normally open version. A normally closed switch will turn the heater on whenever the temperature goes above 40 degrees - the opposite of what we want.’

@@jeffmorin3482 I just now corrected the text and it should read correctly. Thanks again for pointing it out!

@@TimCompton-q8n Hi Tim, sounds like a nice, easy way to accomplish it. Thanks

@@87skunkape sorry, I don’t think I can help you with this question. Maybe try one of the forums like the Transit or Promaster forums?

@@TimCompton-q8n Well thought out! It never occurred to me to investigate where exactly the temperature sensor was located. It’s easy enough to relocate the heater pads, which I’ll do before next winter. And I’ll update the blog as well, giving you credit for the idea. Thanks!

@@jwgaitan4500 Thanks! I appreciate the great feedback.

I don’t remember, but as long as you don’t force it, you can’t insert it all the way if the card is upside down.

Glad you liked it… and thanks for the feedback!

Appreciate the feedback… thanks!

A flashing red alternator light means the solar array is charging the starter battery

Thanks! I appreciate the feedback.

Glad you liked it. Good luck with your project boat!

Glad you liked it. Hope your rug turns out great!

Glad you enjoyed it and thanks for the feedback!

It was working great while we were in colder areas. We’re back in Vegas now, so it’s not cold enough to come on anymore, so I’ve switched to summer mode, and removed the insulation.

@@JustALittleFurther I got all the supplies you recommended. I'll install it all in the fall. Thanks for the great advice

Glad you liked it! And don't feel bad - I do have an engineering degree and I still find much of the documentation out there to be confusing and undecipherable.

It was a fun video to make - glad you liked it!

Exactly where we were about 25 years ago. Have a great adventure!

Glad you liked it. Thanks for subscribing!

Thanks so much for the great feedback - I appreciate it!

Those improvements would address the only two issues I have with it. Thanks for the feedback.

I have my solar panels going to 2 solar charger then to the main positive bus pos/neg. Could i hooh up my alt pos at my stsrt battery with tge start bat neg ? Start batt is lead acid. Would i than take the out put of the dc to dc to my lithium/ house battery main luged pos/neg. Thank you