Talking of cleaner, without visitors, the Seagulls have used my spreaders as perches and made a mess on my teak decks. However, the MPPT Controller and Remote Display Unit has come back after being checked out and skip has fitted them, to the new instructions mind you. These entail the dramatic increase in the size of the cabling that was used before, so effectively he's had to re-wire it. Battery bank 1 which contains four batteries and there have been some issues with fluid levels, is not sitting too pretty with a retained voltage of 11.9v. If my engine is run then the alternator instantly pumps in around 50amps and raises the voltage to 14.4v battery bank 1, then starts to lose its ability to retain the charge and until recently stopped at 11.9v, it now sits at 12.1v and skipper at the weekend ran all my nav instruments and both radios, till it eventually dropped.
So with my new found attachment, the 1200, does it work? Skip isn't yet convinced that it does, yes, the display unit comes up with lots of lovely figures, but those figures include the generation of power through Solar panels, I haven't any! So, yes, he's turned it off and on again and this time he's left leaving the Solar part on too and reset all the data. Now admittedly, whilst the UK in the main is enjoying this warm sunny weather, it does, of course, mean that there's little in the way of predominant wind, relying on afternoon sea breezes to spin the turbine.
WG - Wind Generator at standby
PV - Solar Panel switched off
Clearly what the MPPT does inside is a trade secret, but it seems that the AC generator starts to produce power in 6 kts of wind, so recently Skip took a reading of between 6.0- 10.0v AC, on the input side. Clearly, or rather as Skip understands it, in order to recharge batteries the flow needs to be reversed and so an input higher than the static or output voltage needs to be obtained. So this clever little MPPT Controller must work like an inverter and is able to increase the power out from that it's received, to a point. So whilst I have four brand new batteries on standby in the galley, Skip has retained the old one's so that he's hoping to see an increase in voltage from 11.9 to a healthy 12.7v or higher. 13.0v is the point when the MPPT light goes to green anything below that and it's yellow to orange, then below 12.0v, it's red. So that's his thinking, how can he tell if it's working if new ones, fully charged are fitted, fair point.
MPPT Controller
Maximum Power Point Tracking
So leaving the trials and tribulations of the Rutland behind us, what's next?
Well, there's still the Webasto heater to sort out. This is scheduled to be taken to Swanage in July when the guy in Swanage is at his quietest, strange that if he just fixes heaters! So fingers crossed he can get the unit tuned to run on red diesel and keep running and then Skip can get the last lengths of ducting and connectors he needs to finish the work he started over winter done. It would be good to be able to extend the sailing season in the knowledge that the main cabin will be heated and that the saloon heads can become the drying room so that wet oilys can not only be dried but can be put on warm.
Then there's the non-working log. This is usually an earth problem and Skip has removed it and taken it home to be tested, it's back so I assume it works, just another little job that needs to be completed. Then if we're talking about jobs that need starting there's that list that just doesn't go away.
Still it's the Round the Island Race coming up soon, so hopefully, I will be out there again, if the house doesn't take preference.
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Before that though, skipper & crew came down last Sunday (25/06), not to work or to mess about with the Rutland, but to take me out. We headed out into the Solent and headed west, the wind around 18kts from the southwest meant a beat. Eventually, the pair got their act together and I was being trimmed properly, the apparent wind speed increased to 25kts across the bow and we were zig-zagging back and forth and starting to point higher.
Once the guys got into a rhythm, skip went down below and came up smiling, the turbine had pushed both battery banks up to 13.0v and the controller was showing two green lights, he even saw an impressive 200w being generated from the turbine. With no set plan to head anywhere, but obviously set out to test the turbine and its system on open water, we turned and headed back to home. Although that did bring with it one obvious problem. With my engine on, the system should recognise that the batteries are being charged further by the alternator and so slow the turbine down. This wasn't happening and the turbine spun as it had previously, the display unit recorded it was charging, so there's still gremlins to be rid.
