DC Inverter Installation

2000SEARAY280SS

2000SEARAY280SS

Member
May 7, 2007
919
Potomac River
Boat Info
ArrowCat 30ES
Engines
Twin Verados 250
Well I have gotten the Inverter kit together to install this Spring 2008. It is exciting to think I have this installation to look forward to. Work just keeps getting in the way. I will keep you guys posted as I progress. Striper season starts here next weekend and I have a few things to do prior to launch next week.

The inverter is a Xantrex Prosine 2.0 that I got from Jim. It is a remanufactured unit with a full warrantee.

The large cables came from the vendor that the Prosine folks recommended. Check out there product lit.

Jim hooked me up with all of the Blue Sea electrical components, fuses and switches.

I got the wiring materials from various online sources.

The batteries are NAPA deep cycle group 27 with 105 amp hours each. $75.00 each.

There has been a lot talk about batteries on the site and this is how I reasoned the choice.
If I use the Inverter a lot and the batteries wear out then I will upgrade to a better brand. If I do not then I have not invested a lot in batteries that are not being used. We shall see how it works out.:thumbsup:
 

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Started the install this week and things are going pretty well. I will get some photos and post for your inspection. I have the ACR and the batteries installed and the cabling for the DC part of the inverter run.

I had to remove the sink and bait well station to get to the hull access and it made all the difference. I think I am going to rotate the station 90 degrees so that it sits behind the captain’s chair like on the newer Amberjacks. We shall see. It sure frees up a lot of room in the cockpit.
 
2000SEARAY280SS said:
Started the install this week and things are going pretty well. I will get some photos and post for your inspection. I have the ACR and the batteries installed and the cabling for the DC part of the inverter run.

I had to remove the sink and bait well station to get to the hull access and it made all the difference. I think I am going to rotate the station 90 degrees so that it sits behind the captain’s chair like on the newer Amberjacks. We shall see. It sure frees up a lot of room in the cockpit.
Click to expand...

I'm watching................
 
Yeah, I went to the boat(she's in a storage yard) yesterday to figure out how I want to mount the GPS. I would have brought it home to work on it, but it was snowing.

Yeah Snow in April.....in The PAC NW that's unheard of.
 
Here is a quick power point of the general wiring diagram for my installation. I figure the set up should power every thing in the main except the original battery charger. I will just need to make sure it is off when running on the inverter.

I do not recommend anyone use this as a template for an installation you are considering and I make no claims to its accuracy for your boat. Read and understand your manuals before any installation. Blaa Blaa Blaa. Read as do not be stupid.
 

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The batteries are on the starboard side aft. The fuse and the battery switch are inside the starboard exterior hull to interior hull cavity. All of the DC to inverter cables are 250MCM marine.

The ACR has two Blue Sea fuse blocks attached to the A and B Battery posts under the little red caps. They are very compact and easy to install. I mounted the ACR to the bulk head forward of the engines.

I fired up the engines today and the ACR was working and both the starboard starting battery and the inverter load bank were charging.:thumbsup:

The next steps are to install the inverter under the captain’s chair and the A/C power runs and reposition the bait tank and sink console.
 

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I got back on the inverter job today. Ended up removing the captains chair and seat base picture 1 to get to the hull so I could cut some holes picture 2.

The A/C and the DC cables are shown in picture 3.
 

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After the cables were run I made some brackets for the inverter to hang from the slide bolts for the seat see Picture 1. In picture one you are looking at the bottom of the seat base at the inverter. After fitting the inverter to the brackets I removed it and wired it up to the cables. See picture in previous post. Here are the A/C hook ups. Picture 2. My wife and I slid the seat base over the inverter. We jacked the inverter around with a crow bar till the cable flexed into place and the bolts lined up and all was good. See picture 3. Picture 4 shows the captain's twin seat with the access to the inverter shown open. If you look close you can see the inverter through the access panel.:thumbsup:
 

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I have the same inverter on two Trojan L16Hs. You will love it. The remote panel and charging capability really make this inverter exceptional.
 
Mike, looks good, no, looks great; nice job! Where are you putting your remote panel? By the way thanks for taking pics all the way through.
 
Looks good Mike
I'm having a hard time visualizing where you installed it though. Is it under the PAX seat?
 
Thanks Guys,:grin:

Todd,

Yeah the installed inverter picture is hard to visualize. See new picture in post eleven.The unit is under the Captains duel seat on the back wall of the seat base. It poured last weekend with just the bimini up and it stayed nice and dry.

I am going to mount the remote near the main AC panel in the berth area. I will be using the inverter mostly when I am in there and hopefully using the A/C. As BC-SC post showed only a test will tell if the AC will run. I have a mermaid duel heat cool system that says it pulls 4.4 Amps cooling and 5.50 Amps heating 115volts AC.

I looked into the Trojans and decided to try the install out on some cheaper batteries first.

All I have left to do is hook up the shore power feed and main CB. I will be ready to run some tests after that. I am planning to measure the amp’s pulled while using the actual equipment and get what info I can from the remote display. Next weekend hopefully trying it out on the hook.
 
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I hooked up the main feed thru hull receptacle after repairing the socket there was a stripped screw. I connected the line and load cables to the intermediary circuit breaker and checked everything out. Powered up the inverter and I had the display cable plugged into the sync plug. :smt021 Fixed that and the display was kind of screwy. ‘M’’s where changing to ‘O’’s :smt101 so I plugged into the other jack on the display and all was good.

Powered up the inverter and ran through the display options and got the status screens all SAT. I went on to verify all the AC devices while on shore power. The microwave the A/C the fridge and the battery charger all still working. With every thing except the micro wave on and the inverter charging the battery bank I was pulling 17 amps off the shore power. :wow: I did not get to check out the inverter my help had to go to the relay for life rally.

Will charge the batteries overnight and get some Inverter values tomorrow.:thumbsup:

I pulled out my digital camera and the selector knob broke off so no pictures right now.
 
I checked out the inverter a little bit today. Ran the microwave and it pulled 108 Amps at 12 volts. The fridge was 35 or 40 Amps at 12 volts. The A/C to my surprise only pulled 30 Amps at 12 volts with the batteries at full charge. I did not have any water hooked up so I did not run it very long and it was pretty cool today so expect this number to go up.

I also ran into a condition that is not to my liking. As you can see from the wiring diagram I chose to power the entire Main AC panel from the inverter. I originally though as long as I made sure the AC Converter/Battery charger was switched off when running on inverter every thing would be okay. I realized today that if I put the inverter into auto mode and I lose shore power while charging the boat main batteries I would end up charging the boat batteries with the inverter. I have two choices one is to rewire the AC converter to only run off shore power or take the inverter out of auto mode. I will have to think about it. Most likely I will be rewiring the charger so it does not mater if I accidentally leave the charger on while I am running on the inverter.
 
Mike, What is the advantage in your case to leaving the inverter in auto mode?
 
The only thing I can think of is incase I am using the fridge for food stuffs that might spoil. If I am on shore power and it shuts down or has a brown out the inverter will take over the power duties.
 
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