Noco Genius 10 not working correctly

[SamD]

I have posted this on another thread but its the charger discussion one so i thought id do a separate one to see if anyone else has had this with Noco’s or any other charger. I've been camping this weekend. Running a Dometic CRX50 and a Noco Genius 10. The Noco charges when you turn it on/initially plug into hook up and it works through its stages and gets to the top so all lights are light and top green is flashing, once it swaps into optimisation mode and the rest of the lights go off and the top green flashes the charge just tails off and although the fridge is continuing to use power the noco charger doesn't change back into maintenance mode and start the cycle again. Id been keeping an eye on it but it still managed to drop to 12.2/12.3 which isnt great!
Below are a series of pics from the weekend, im pretty sure on if not all of the occasions before it starts climbing I've had to turn the unit on and off:


Am i worrying over nothing and give it another go or can i check anything? Van is currently sat outside doing nothing, had a short journey up the street about an hour ago and is running a stirling B2B 120A set up as the below and the and battery monitor shows at 13.02V

 

[Pete C]

It looks like this charger is not designed to work as a power supply. We use a Victron charger which explicitly says it will work as a power supply, and we don't get this issue. Once the leisure battery is charged, the Victron just provides the power the fridge or anything else needs, and keeps the battery topped up.

Pete

 

[SamD]

It looks like this charger is not designed to work as a power supply. We use a Victron charger which explicitly says it will work as a power supply, and we don't get this issue. Once the leisure battery is charged, the Victron just provides the power the fridge or anything else needs, and keeps the battery topped up.

Pete

It does say in the instructions that it should change between maintenance and optimisation mode though, it has power supply mode as well but wouldnt this just over charge the battery if left unchecked? The noco’s are recommended by others as a smart charger so it should be able to cope with this, i would have thought

 

[Dellmassive]

weve had a mention about this before with the 5A NOCO charger.

i have both the NOCO and Victron chargers . .

ill setup a test and see what happens . . . . . .

ill connect the NOCO charger to the battery bank and run a load . . . see if & when the charger kicks back in.





starting now. . . .

.

 

[Howzat]

I've just sent my Noco10 back but from what I remember the 12v supply needs to be selected with the mode button and I would not use this if still connected to the battery. The fact it doesn't jump back to charging mode when the voltage drops is a poor show tho.
I guess it's just designed for charging batteries to a full state?

 

[Dellmassive]

12v SLA mode selected



and running on only battery . .




when fully charged ill run this load . . its a motor running off an inverter so a constant load. . .




well use the BM2 to log the voltage.

battery currently taking 1.3A charge . . . . so almost full.




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https://www.batterystuff.com/files/1223-genius10na_user_guide.pdf

 

[Dellmassive]

I've also sent an email to NOCO, lets see what they come back with.

 

[SamD]

@Dellmassive wow thanks for all of the above i really appreciate the assistance!

 

[Dellmassive]

batterys full . .

green LED pulsing . .



load now conected and discharging battery . . .





.

discharging battery at 53w . . . .




lets see what the charger does and when . . . . . . .

battery monitor show 4A draw . . . . and 12hrs to go ( the battery shunt thinks its a 200ah battery bank, but I've disconnected one battery to accelerate the test results)

TBC

 

[Dellmassive]

its the following morning . . and the charger looks like its restarted the cycle . . . (on the cctv i set up)



lets see the BM2 readout. . .

looks like in this test the charger restarted at 12.2vish (just bellow you point)

charger has moved back into full charge mode . .




bm2 showing 13.5v . .



and the logging shows. . .a drop over night from the load . .




till about 12:10am . . . at which point the charger re-started again...

ill leave it running today to log more...


so it looks like it was right on the threshold and about to restart. . . ?



ill update later - off to work now.

 

[SamD]

I honestly cant put into words the effort you have gone into here to help me out, i really appreciate it!
12.2 seems quite low though, is ot going to be ok continually dropping into that before kicking in again?

 

[t0mb0]

I honestly cant put into words the effort you have gone into here to help me out, i really appreciate it!
12.2 seems quite low though, is ot going to be ok continually dropping into that before kicking in again?

I don’t think you want it down to 12.2v before kicking in ideally. Sounds like the Noco isn’t very suitable for use as a combined charger and power supply.

Sounds like @Dellmassive has contacted them though, let’s see what they say.

 

[Howzat]

Great effort @Dellmassive proving the OP's original concern.

.... the Victron just provides the power the fridge or anything else needs, and keeps the battery topped up.

For supply and trickle on hookup we seem to have a clear winner here.

 

[Dellmassive]

Update . . . just back from work, so around 12hrs later.

the charger was showing in charging stage . . .



but the BMV712 was showing the battery was draining . . . -1.7A running the pump.



the BM2 plot confirmed that and shows that the battery reached full charge at 7am this morning . . . then dropped its volts as the load drew power from the battery. . .



....



Then in a total fluke moment i noticed the charger lights change out the corner of my eyes. . . while i had the BM2 running.

i was looking at the screen, it was showing 12.25v and slowly dropping . . then it started charging again and jumped up to 13.45v. !!!!! (perfect timing)





so once again the charger has automatically restarted the charge cycle when the battery voltage dropped to about 12.25v.

ill leave it all running for another 24hrs to make sure the results are repeatable.

.

12.2v is fine for a SLA battery - bellow 12.0v is not so good.

AGM SLA batteries have a slightly higher resting/charging voltage so results will be slightly higher.

TBC . . .




edit. .

bit later (couple of hours), its still charging... the meter showing 8A going into battery.








ill get an update in the morning . . .

TBC . . .

 

[SamD]

Update . . . just back from work, so around 12hrs later.

the charger was showing in charging stage . . .

View attachment 124273

but the BMV712 was showing the battery was draining . . . -1.7A running the pump.

View attachment 124276

the BM2 plot confirmed that and shows that the battery reached full charge at 7am this morning . . . then dropped its volts as the load drew power from the battery. . .

View attachment 124277

....



Then in a total fluke moment i noticed the charger lights change out the corner of my eyes. . . while i had the BM2 running.

i was looking at the screen, it was showing 12.25v and slowly dropping . . then it started charging again and jumped up to 13.45v. !!!!! (perfect timing)

View attachment 124279

View attachment 124280

so once again the charger has automatically restarted the charge cycle when the battery voltage dropped to about 12.25v.

ill leave it all running for another 24hrs to make sure the results are repeatable.

.

12.2v is fine for a SLA battery - bellow 12.0v is not so good.

AGM SLA batteries have a slightly higher resting/charging voltage so results will be slightly higher.

TBC . . .

View attachment 124281


edit. .

bit later (couple of hours), its still charging... the meter showing 8A going into battery.

View attachment 124324

View attachment 124325

View attachment 124326


ill get an update in the morning . . .

TBC . . .

Cheers for all of this, so it looks like i was worrying it was getting to low and jumping in before the charger had a chance. I may do my own test and put the fridge back in and plug it in, see what happens.

 

[Dellmassive]

Cheers for all of this, so it looks like i was worrying it was getting to low and jumping in before the charger had a chance. I may do my own test and put the fridge back in and plug it in, see what happens.

looks like it . . . . . this Noco 10A is restarting the charge cycle when the battery drops to around 12.2v in the SLA standard battery mode.


i have the Victron 15A Blue smart charger too . . . so after tomorrow ill do the same tests with the Victron to compare the results.



+++

what battery is in the van? (yours?)

what profile mode was the charger in? (yours?)

+++

 

[SamD]

looks like it . . . . . this Noco 10A is restarting the charge cycle when the battery drops to around 12.2v in the SLA standard battery mode.


i have the Victron 15A Blue smart charger too . . . so after tomorrow ill do the same tests with the Victron to compare the results.



+++

what battery is in the van? (yours?)

what profile mode was the charger in? (yours?)

+++

I've got a lowprofile 110Ah Xplorer premium leisure battery from Alpha Batteries
12 V
110 AH @ c100
100AH @ C20

The noco was in 12v charge mode,which was the first option when turning it on.

 

[Dellmassive]

I've got a lowprofile 110Ah Xplorer premium leisure battery from Alpha Batteries
12 V
110 AH @ c100
100AH @ C20

The noco was in 12v charge mode,which was the first option when turning it on.

isnt that an AGM battery? . . .

is so then the second "AGM" profile would be better suited ( slightly higher charge voltage )

edit:

just checked - no its a standard lead acid. ( SLA )

so that's the correct profile . .

12V 100AH Xplorer Low Height Leisure Battery - Alpha Batteries

12V 100ah Low height Xplorer dual-purpose flooded lead-acid battery for multipurpose starter & leisure hookup use Features • Low-height (suitable […]

www.alpha-batteries.co.uk

12V 110L Low height Xplorer dual-purpose flooded lead-acid battery for multipurpose leisure use

Features

• Low-height (suitable for installation in applications with limited battery box height, eg. campervans and motorhomes)

• Wet Flooded technology (tried & tested)

• Power demand level of intended application: Low – Medium (occasional, light, casual usage)

Flooded serviceable batteries are the traditional, wet-cell, lead-acid choice; the technology has been used in a wide variety of applications for decades.

 

[Dellmassive]

NOCO have replied:

John (NOCO) Jul 20, 2021, 17:09 MST If a large load gets put on the battery and its voltage drops, the charger will kick back in to top the battery back off. However, you should know the GENIUS10 wasn't meant to charge a battery that has a constant load on it because the charger expects it will be able to get the battery back to full at some point. So potentially if the draw on the charger lasts long enough for the charger to time out, it will display an error and stop applying a charge to the battery. We just do not recommend charging a battery under constant load as it will diminish battery health faster than using the battery, and then recharging it will. Kind regards, John

They are basically covering there backs. . .

Provided the charger has enough Amps to cover come the load draw and get the battery charged up it should be ok. (like my testing shows)

but the other thread with the 5A charger was causing the "bad Battery" error as the loads exceeded or equalled the load draw meaning the charger could NOT fully charge the battery in a a timely manor - so timed out with an error.

 

[Dellmassive]

Hold on - day 3 and its all gone wrong.. . . (NOCO 10A Charger )

Im just back from work and come out to check on things - its not good.

The inverter running the pump is bleeping the low battery voltage warning . .



The Bm2 readout shows 10v on the battery . .



looking at the plot we can see what has happened.





The pump has been drawing a 4A load constantly . . The 10A NOCO charger has done a good job keeping the battery recharged (in cycles restarting at 12.25v ish)
Until today that is . .

Its decided that enough is enough and now showing the battery error message and has stopped charging.




It has decided that the battery is faulty and has stopped charging. . . . this is correct as this would be trhe scenario of a faulty battery (ie will charge to full voltage but drop that voltage very quick)

Running the 4A load has similar symptoms of running the battery low very fast. . . . so the NOCO is working as designed.

BUT Not what we want . . . . . . . we want the NOCO to keep charging the battery an NOT time out. . .


Notes: we can switch the charger off/on to restart the cycle . . . this is the easiest way to use this charger for this purpose. . just restart once every 24hrs.



++++

Next test will be the Victron BSC 15A - lets see how that deals with the same situation . . .



.

edit:

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TBC