Battery Monitors

[jpcor...@embarqmail.com]

I'm looking at battery monitors.  The "Cristec" unit availlab le via Marine Beams has my interest.  Can anyone shed some light on them?  There are no reviews.

Thanks

[Bill Jones]

Blue Sea, Victron and the Zantrex  Link Lite and Link Pro are pretty good
choices from what I have heard over the years.  The Victron is the most
cost effective and comes with all the necessary cables/connectors for a
plug and play result.
The Zantrex requires either purchasing their installation kit which in my
opinion is too expensive or purchase off the shelf parts and spend a little
more time performing the installation.  The actual unit is a little more
expensive than the Victron.  The Zantrex Link Lite is my choice mainly
because my battery charger and new inverter are both Zantrex.  The Link Pro
appears to have a higher current rating with everything else being the
same.  The Link Lite amp capacity is fine for my 800 amp system.  However I
probably should go with the Pro in the event I wish to increase my battery
bank to something over 1,000 amps.  Most of my other electrical is Blue Sea
and you cannot go wrong with that one either.

Bill
Cameot

[Alex Tarlecky]

Sorry, don't have any insight into that monitor buy I can relate to you our experience with our monitors living aboard full time for 4 years now. 

The balmar SmartGauge is by far the most accurate battery monitor - if you have not yet read the pages by MaineSail he does an excellent write-up on few monitors. It does not have Ah counting but it does an excellent job at showing capacity consumed which is really what you are after. Our SmartGauge works well in tandem with our Mastervolt controller but if we would do it again we would go with a Victron / Balmar combo.

https://marinehowto.com/smart-gauge-battery-monitoring-unit/

- alex

[jpcor...@embarqmail.com]

Thanks Alex. I will follow your lead.

[jpcor...@embarqmail.com]

Thanks Bill