How does the Dual Voltage Charging option work?

The dual voltage option offers owners the ability to charge their batteries when they are in countries that have different voltage than their primary voltage setup onboard. 

What does that mean?

• An example would be a US customer that has a 110v setup boat. The inverter/battery charger onboard must be installed as either a 110v or 230v unit as they are not multi-voltage. The inverter /charger combi unit does exactly that: It both inverts the house bank DC power to AC power and also acts as a battery charger when external shore power is connected to it.
  In this example, the boat is mostly to stay in the US, so the customer elects to go with a 110v setup onboard with the below options:
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  • • All the GPOs will be setup for 110V
    • Appliances will be 110V
    • When away from the dock, the 24v house bank power is supplied through inverter to the 110v system.
    • The shore power connection for the boat will be 110v and will include a shore power cable, ELCI unit and reverse polarity indicator 
    • This system is often paired with an isolation transformer, which offers the maximum protection for stray current and galvanic corrosion. In the above options setup, isolation transformer is an upgrade, in place of the galcanic blocker which comes with the shore power connection.
    • When plugged into the 110v shore power, the power delivered will run through the inverter selecter switch and will directly feed the GPOs/appliances onboard. 
    • If the power being delivered from the shore power connection is not enough to supply the draw from the GPOs/appliances, the inverter will top up that power by supplying additional power from the battery bank through the inverter to increase the available power onboard.

The customer then wants to do a season in a 230v country, such as The Mediterranean. The 110v voltage shore power is not compatible with the 230v connection. Why? The ELCI & reverse polarity unit on the deck fitting are 110v only, as is the charger inverter unit. 

This is where the "Dual Voltage Charger" comes in....

The dual voltage charger is a completely independent system, in the opposing voltage to the boats's primary 110 voltage setup.

In this example, it consists of:

• An independent 230v shore power connection,
• Circuit breaker and reverse polarity unit (RCBO for 230v vs. ELCI for 110v)
• Galvanic blocker
• 110amp 24v Battery charger. 

It does not supply any 230/110v power to any of the curcuits. It is purely a battery charger so that you can be on dock and have zero concern about keeping the charge up on your batteries. All the primary voltage loads (in this example 110v) will still run through the inverter as normal.

What is the galvanic blocker?

This is essentially a lesser version of the isolation transformer. It servers the same purpose in that it protects the boat from galvanic corrosion and stray current and whilst not as robust as the larger (and significantly more expensive) isolation transformers, they are sufficient for the task given the lower usage in alternative voltage country. 

What if your boat is setup as a 230v boat?

The concept is identical, simply in reverse. The shorepower, inverter charger and isolation transformer would be set to 230 voltage, and then the dual voltage charger would be setup in the opposing 110v configuration.