Battery monitoring, Gauges or SOC..........?

[Akgramps]

I am in the process of rebuilding and rewiring a 24' 1982 Glasply.

Have been thinking about how I want to monitor the batteries and charging system.

Initially I had planned on just using a digital volt gauge and 2 amp gauges, 1 on the alternator and 1 on the house battery.

I am now considering a "SOC" instrument such as the:
Xantrex LinkLITE
2025 Trimetric
Balmar smart gauge
Blue Sea VSM 422

This is a IB powered boat (mercruiser) w/ 70amp alternator (may need upgrade, but that will be a different discussion), three batteries total making 2 banks, 1 starting battery and a house bank of ~ 200-250 ah.

I haven't settled on the batteries yet, considering 2 6V golf cart batteries for the house.

I was going to avoid a SOC as most seemed like they had more functions then I needed, but then took a closer at the Trimetrics and now leaning towards the Xantrex, which seems like it will do what I need and similar cost to some quality digital volt/ amp gauges & shunts.....

Any recommendations here.....? Thanks, John

 

[Ike]

Keep it simple. Go with the volt and amp gauges.

 

[michael pierzga]

When your alternator is outputting 50 amps....how much is being added to the battery ?

This is important.

Your boat is simple, so perhaps you can guess, but on a more complex boat with many consumers running your 50 amp output could only be adding 5 amp to the battery bank and 45 amp to ships systems.

A meter that measure amps out and amps in , then calculates the difference is very worthwhile on a boat with systems like refer, electronics, autopilots,.....

These gauges are not expensive .

 

[FAST FRED]

The SOC system is the ONLY! way to know just where you are .

Think of it as your gas gauge for the house set. SOC = State of Charge.

It measures and LEARNS your battery capacity , and is accurate as the batt dies over the years.

A SOC meter should be the #1 first improvement on any boat that is going cruising , and will be anchoring out.

At under $200 its far cheaper than replacement batts , and weighs almost nothing compared to dragging big batts up and down a dock.

Monitoring your use , the SOC will easily show weather you need more and bigger house batts , or just a better volt regulator , or both a bigger house set and large alt to charge them.