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smokeyj · 12-20-2009, 02:44 PM

It is not wasteful as it only shunts excess energy (that which would in fact damage the battery)

If the dump load instead of being a FET was say an element in a hot water tank then no waste at all.

I lost track of how much money you are plunking down on all this but the fancy chargers with MPPT (Maximum Power Point Tracking) features should extract more power from the panel.

If the panel and load are well matched like in this case a 48V battery and 60V panel the boost is maybe 10%. If the panel and load are mismatched like in your case the MPPT should get close to the 60W of charge power instead of 15W that you will see.

Is that worth the extra money??? You got to decide.

12-20-2009, 02:44 PM	#48 (permalink)
smokeyj EcoModding Lurker Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: san fran Posts: 48 Thanks: 0 Thanked 2 Times in 2 Posts	It is not wasteful as it only shunts excess energy (that which would in fact damage the battery) If the dump load instead of being a FET was say an element in a hot water tank then no waste at all. I lost track of how much money you are plunking down on all this but the fancy chargers with MPPT (Maximum Power Point Tracking) features should extract more power from the panel. If the panel and load are well matched like in this case a 48V battery and 60V panel the boost is maybe 10%. If the panel and load are mismatched like in your case the MPPT should get close to the 60W of charge power instead of 15W that you will see. Is that worth the extra money??? You got to decide.