Life after RoadTrek: Ecotrek, rebuild Ecotrek module, or DIY?

[avanti]

ARV used these Tyco relays which I have purchased on eBay for good prices before (less than $100) for their lithium battery system. Something to consider...

https://www.te.com/usa-en/plp/X289x.html

In this day and age, I would think that any new design should be strongly biased toward solid-state relays.

 

[chris_g19]

ARV used these Tyco relays which I have purchased on eBay for good prices before (less than $100) for their lithium battery system. Something to consider...

https://www.te.com/usa-en/plp/X289x.html

Whoaa that's expensive and also the old way of doing things. Go with the Victron battery protect which uses a FETs for the same price! They're parasitics are 1.5mA, where a relay will eat up ~100mA.

That's one reason Roadtrek always said turn off your batteries when you aren't using them. I see 6 relays in their design just in the battery box! WTF, that's like 10 watts of continuous power drain 24/7, what a waste!

Modernize, get a programmable FET with a surge current up to 600A and all sorts of other safety feature and programmability.

 

[gregmchugh]

In this day and age, I would think that any new design should be strongly biased toward solid-state relays.

Very true but those Tyco relays are very reliable and proven in the long term and have low power to close the relay, just mentioned them as an option.

I had bought two to use in the electrical system in a motor glider I was building. Needed to avoid any unneeded battery drain while gliding with the engine off. I could have a dual battery setup (one for engine start and one for avionics/lights) but stopped building it before I got to that point. Don’t want to have a dead battery when it’s time to restart the engine...

 

[gregmchugh]

Whoaa that's expensive and also the old way of doing things. Go with the Victron battery protect which uses a FETs for the same price! They're parasitics are 1.5mA, where a relay will eat up ~100mA.

That's one reason Roadtrek always said turn off your batteries when you aren't using them. I see 6 relays in their design just in the battery box! WTF, that's like 10 watts of continuous power drain 24/7, what a waste!

Modernize, get a programmable FET with a surge current up to 600A and all sorts of other safety feature and programmability.

Won’t there be continuous charge currents greater than 100 amps from the GU when you only have on battery connected. With both online you could still get higher current when one gets full.

 

[gregmchugh]

Whoaa that's expensive and also the old way of doing things. Go with the Victron battery protect which uses a FETs for the same price! They're parasitics are 1.5mA, where a relay will eat up ~100mA.

That's one reason Roadtrek always said turn off your batteries when you aren't using them. I see 6 relays in their design just in the battery box! WTF, that's like 10 watts of continuous power drain 24/7, what a waste!

Modernize, get a programmable FET with a surge current up to 600A and all sorts of other safety feature and programmability.

Why 6 relays? That is a question in itself...

 

[ContinuousImprovement]

It will be $7,000 dollars to replace both my modules. They can't replace one because module Rev H isn't compatible with Rev G.

I enjoy reading these exchange of engineering ideas. Have fun but the dealer has the $7000 price and technical facts all wrong.

All ecotreks revisions are compatible. The L and H have a different serial interface for dealer debug. Therefore you only need to have one repaired.

The dealer pays KS2 less than $500 for a L2R replacement if your battery is less than three years old. Other wise they pay less than $1000. That's a fair price so what is your dealer's markup?

My Aktiv has one L and one H installed. The L is beautiful inside and I will upgrade my H.

 

[gregmchugh]

I enjoy reading these exchange of engineering ideas. Have fun but the dealer has the $7000 price and technical facts all wrong.

All ecotreks revisions are compatible. The L and H have a different serial interface for dealer debug. Therefore you only need to have one repaired.

The dealer pays KS2 less than $500 for a L2R replacement if your battery is less than three years old. Other wise they pay less than $1000. That's a fair price so what is your dealer's markup?

My Aktiv has one L and one H installed. The L is beautiful inside and I will upgrade my H.

My understanding is that the price you quoted is for batteries coming directly from KS2 not original batteries from EHGNA or am I wrong.

 

[ContinuousImprovement]

My understanding is that the price you quoted is for batteries coming directly from KS2 not original batteries from EHGNA or am I wrong.

.

All Ecotrek batteries are KS2 batteries so they are "original batteries". EHGNA did nothing except install them wrong and mis-program the balmar and solar controllers.

Those are KS2 price to dealers so the dealer will add shipping and a FAIR markup. BTW: KS2 was shipping directly to dealers before EHGNA went under since EHGNA shipped batteries poorly.

 

[gregmchugh]

.

All Ecotrek batteries are KS2 batteries so they are "original batteries". EHGNA did nothing except install them wrong and mis-program the balmar and solar controllers.

Those are KS2 price to dealers so the dealer will add shipping and a FAIR markup. BTW: KS2 was shipping directly to dealers before EHGNA went under since EHGNA shipped batteries poorly.

My understanding is that KS2 provides no warranty whatsoever for batteries installed by EHGNA and only provides warranty of some type for ones that they supplied directly. Are you saying that there is no difference in how these two types of batteries are treated by KS2?

 

[gregmchugh]

Whoaa that's expensive and also the old way of doing things. Go with the Victron battery protect which uses a FETs for the same price! They're parasitics are 1.5mA, where a relay will eat up ~100mA.

That's one reason Roadtrek always said turn off your batteries when you aren't using them. I see 6 relays in their design just in the battery box! WTF, that's like 10 watts of continuous power drain 24/7, what a waste!

Modernize, get a programmable FET with a surge current up to 600A and all sorts of other safety feature and programmability.

In the ARV system there are only 2 of these Tyco relays so the parasitic drain is not very significant for the typical 800-1200 AH lithium systems they were installing. Reliability may have been the focus on using the Tyco.

 

[avanti]

My understanding is that KS2 provides no warranty whatsoever for batteries installed by EHGNA and only provides warranty of some type for ones that they supplied directly. Are you saying that there is no difference in how these two types of batteries are treated by KS2?

My guess is that EHGNA negotiated a price that assumes that they would cover the warranty rather than KS2.

 

[gregmchugh]

My guess is that EHGNA negotiated a price that assumes that they would cover the warranty rather than KS2.

I assume so too, a 6 year warranty was a major marketing tool to convince owners to take a chance on Ecotreks. KS2 is not giving anything close to that on the ones they are now supplying and the warranty they are providing doesn’t seem to be well understood yet, I have seen several different versions stated...

 

[Davydd]

I love it when you talk electrical technical. I admit I don't know what you are talking about other than you probably have discovered why the parasitic battery drain on lithium Ecotrek Roadtreks.

I left it on good faith what Advanced RV was doing mainly because they had good intentions to deliver the best they could get and would make it right if there were problems. I did visit early on Elite Power Solutions in Arizona as a courtesy request and they examined what ARV was doing with their batteries and gave the A-OK, tuned the connections and probably gave ARV some feedback. It was the first time they saw ARV's installation.

I'm not going to be such a pioneer for their next lithium system. There are few builds out there on the road and I haven't heard any negatives. I will go with the Lithiumwerks Valence batteries inside the van under the bed. They had been developing and testing them for over a year that I know of before their first build. Hope to know more in a month at Advanced Fest.

 

[ContinuousImprovement]

My understanding is that KS2 provides no warranty whatsoever for batteries installed by EHGNA and only provides warranty of some type for ones that they supplied directly. Are you saying that there is no difference in how these two types of batteries are treated by KS2?

EHGNA, not KS2, was responsible for the fictional 6-year warranty. EHGNA screwed everyone including KS2.

KS2 is providing a fair deal by upgrading ehgna-sold ecotrek Rev G/H to Rev L2R for $450 if the ecotrek is less than three years old. $950 if older. $450 is a good price for to upgrade your fryed BMS, a good set of cells and having the rest refurbished.

 

[cruising7388]

KS2 is providing a fair deal by upgrading ehgna-sold ecotrek Rev G/H to Rev L2R for $450 if the ecotrek is less than three years old. $950 if older. $450 is a good price for to upgrade your fryed BMS, a good set of cells and having the rest refurbished.

You would recommend doing this even if your Rev H batteries are presently functioning OK?

By the time you pay for shipping the battery(s) both ways and for the labor involved in removing and reinstalling them, aren't you close to doubling the $450 figure cited?


Since the RT inverters installed do not have a capability to program to the parameters currently recommended by KS2, aren't you going to have to replace the inverter for their 3 year battery warranty?

 

[gregmchugh]

EHGNA, not KS2, was responsible for the fictional 6-year warranty. EHGNA screwed everyone including KS2.

KS2 is providing a fair deal by upgrading ehgna-sold ecotrek Rev G/H to Rev L2R for $450 if the ecotrek is less than three years old. $950 if older. $450 is a good price for to upgrade your fryed BMS, a good set of cells and having the rest refurbished.

So, the $7000 price quoted to the OP to replace the two modules with new ones from KS2 was completely bogus when they should have suggested getting the upgrade from KS2 which, of course, is not surprising given that the majority of RV dealers are shady at best? Is it possible that, at the time, the KS2 upgrade option did not yet exist?

In any case, while I am aware that you justifiably have major issues with EHGNA and Jim Hammill, how was the 6 year warranty fictional prior to the point where EHGNA went kaput?

 

[gregmchugh]

KS2 has distributed a wiring diagram showing the recommended connection of all chargers (including the inverter) and the auxiliary AGM to the charge terminals on the ecotrek batteries. Until recently, EHGNA had used various wiring designs with the inverter typically connected to the discharge side of the ecotreks. With the latest info from KS2 only the 12v load distrubution is connected to the discharge side of the ecotreks.

 

[booster]

KS2 has distributed a wiring diagram showing the recommended connection of all chargers (including the inverter) and the auxiliary AGM to the charge terminals on the ecotrek batteries. Until recently, EHGNA had used various wiring designs with the inverter typically connected to the discharge side of the ecotreks. With the latest info from KS2 only the 12v load distrubution is connected to the discharge side of the ecotreks.

That would be fairly consistent with other lithium systems that charge and shut off everything on the charge side when full. You run off the batteries until the SOC or voltage drops low enough to initiate another charge cycle. Has pluses and minuses in doing it that way.

 

[gregmchugh]

That would be fairly consistent with other lithium systems that charge and shut off everything on the charge side when full. You run off the batteries until the SOC or voltage drops low enough to initiate another charge cycle. Has pluses and minuses in doing it that way.

Yes, the minus is not having inverted 120v power when the solar and GU chargers are providing more charge current than you are currently using and they get the batteries full. I guess you would get cycling as the batteries drain and the chargers get reconnected over and over. If you are boondocking probably not as big issue since the solar alone may not provide enough current to overcome the inverter loads. Another good reason to have a disconnect switch for solar charging in case you get full charge and the inverter gets disconnected.

 

[booster]

Yes, the minus is not having inverted 120v power when the solar and GU chargers are providing more charge current than you are currently using and they get the batteries full. I guess you would get cycling as the batteries drain and the chargers get reconnected over and over. If you are boondocking probably not as big issue since the solar alone may not provide enough current to overcome the inverter loads. Another good reason to have a disconnect switch for solar charging in case you get full charge and the inverter gets disconnected.

Yep, that would be the biggest one, I think. Not a big deal if you have 800+ah of battery but if you only have 200ah certainly could be.


Another downside, that Roadtrek would mostly avoid because of the AGM battery in the system, would be the prevention of spikes or non starts of the charging equipment because of lack of a battery in the system at all times.