Victron Orion - signal cable?

H

Hobojimumk

New Member
Hi Guys,

I installed my leisure battery today along with a Victron Orion B2B charger, looking at the manual it suggests I don’t need to run a signal cable to the fuse. I ran the cable anyway as I was not aware of this at the time.

Does anyone have experience of using the fuse cable vs not?

Thanks in advance for any help
 
Definitely if you can use the cable but link it to the bcm for an engine run signal, you’ll need it turned on with vcds
 
Pin 3 in the black bcm plug you’ll have to put a connector in I put a fused link in also, and then access long coding in the bcm coding it’s module 9 Byte 17 Bit 4 Battery Seperating Relay active.
Thanks @Deaky for telling me when I done mine
 
I'm just about to buy the Victron Orion B2B charger. The question is do I need to run a signal cable? if so can someone guide me where to run it from. I have read the manual many times and it looks like I don't need one, but would like the best way to do it, so advise, please.
 
The Orion has an automatic "engine detection" program that will run with out the IGN feed.

or you can connect and IGN feed or even better the Engine RUN feed as above . . .

more here:

www.t6forum.com

[Guide] DC-DC Charger (for leisure battery) -- How I Done It --

DC-DC Charger (for Leisure battery) -- How I Done It -- ************************************************** Dellmassive`s -- "how I Done It" -- Thread ************************************************** Kit List And Stuff -- How I Done It & What I Use --...
www.t6forum.com www.t6forum.com

.

and here:




.

and here:


.

and here:

www.t6forum.com

[Guide] DC-DC Charger (for leisure battery) -- How I Done It --

Question @Dellmassive may be able to answer. Currently sat in van testing my install of Victron eqpt and noticed as I use the eberspacher, it obviously drains the Lithium leisure battery. Currently showing 13.2v. However, I have just had the ignition on ( not started the engine ) and the battery...
www.t6forum.com www.t6forum.com

.

*************************************************************

The T6 "Engine Run" feed from the BCM is shown here:

T6-Logo.og.png


T6 - Second battery wiring diagram
Second battery for transporter ( not California)
www.t6forum.com

www.t6forum.com

+12v switched on when RPM engine run is detected.

used by the OEM setup to switch a 80A relay that connects the second battery (old skool SCR)

1590166222043.png



conection : J519 BCM - T73a/3

*************************************************************
 
Thanks, Guy's. IGN feed I understand and can take a feed from the fusebox that I have used for the Camera auto on/off. Engine RUN feed I do not have a clue where to look. Will have a long read from the links above as it does not arrive until Wednesday.
 
I just used a piggy back fuse adapter from the dash fuse box and added an inline switch.

It’s not an engine run signal, - it’s an ‘ignition on’ but in reality it works the same due to the fact the Orion ‘knows’ when your engine is running and will start charging when the pre-set voltage threshold is met i.e you’ve started the engine.

The inline switch is handy when I just want to charge via solar or use it to disable the Orion when charging the starter battery.
 
So, what is the advantage of using the bcm switch on rather than letting the Victron use its inbuilt engine running detection?
 
Deaky said:
As @Dellmassive has posted above. You can use the output from Pin 3 in the black plug on the BCM. It will need coding to turn it on. This will give you +12v when the engine is running.
Click to expand...
Deaky, that would be well over my head, so will stick to using a piggyback fuse adapter or may try just using the inbuilt engine running detection. Still reading everything I can find. So far no one has said what benefit it would make using a 12volt feed. Thank you none the less.
 
Qnapper said:
Deaky, that would be well over my head, so will stick to using a piggyback fuse adapter or may try just using the inbuilt engine running detection. Still reading everything I can find. So far no one has said what benefit it would make using a 12volt feed. Thank you none the less.
Click to expand...

The advantage of using an explicit signal is that the engine run detection is an imperfect heuristic, it will probably work fine most of the time but, given the range of voltages the alternator/starter can produce, it'll never be perfect. In particular, if the starter is charged >80% and you're cruising along, the alternator will turn off and the voltage will drop to the extent that the inbuilt engine run detection might not pick it up.

The advantage of using the engine run bcm feed over the ignition live as your signal is that it's only live when the engine is actually running. If you use the ignition live, it will happily draw charge from your starter when the ignition is on but the engine is not running. This is probably fine as long as you don't have reason for having the ignition on without the engine running for any length of time.
 
t0mb0 said:
The advantage of using an explicit signal is that the engine run detection is an imperfect heuristic, it will probably work fine most of the time but, given the range of voltages the alternator/starter can produce, it'll never be perfect. In particular, if the starter is charged >80% and you're cruising along, the alternator will turn off and the voltage will drop to the extent that the inbuilt engine run detection might not pick it up.

The advantage of using the engine run bcm feed over the ignition live as your signal is that it's only live when the engine is actually running. If you use the ignition live, it will happily draw charge from your starter when the ignition is on but the engine is not running. This is probably fine as long as you don't have reason for having the ignition on without the engine running for any length of time.
Click to expand...
And the fact you can change the charge thresholds so much can get battery equalisation, seeing how prone the vehicle batteries are to going down, when using stop start it will stop charging in these situations to allow all vehicle battery to deal with this
 
t0mb0 said:
If you use the ignition live, it will happily draw charge from your starter when the ignition is on but the engine is not running.
Click to expand...
That’s not strictly true. If your voltage thresholds are correct then it won’t draw any charge until the engine is running.
 
But the beauty of having the engine run is you can set the thresholds lower and not have to rely on and increased voltage figure and therefore maximise your charge

The function is there my opinion would be if your not going to want to maximise the potential buy a different charger a more plug and play one
 
Niknak said:
But the beauty of having the engine run is you can set the thresholds lower and not have to rely on and increased voltage figure and therefore maximise your charge
Click to expand...
That is also true mate. I guess there’s pluses and minus to both methods. For me, the effort involved in removing the dash/BCM/coding put me off the engine run approach.
 
Confused.............com......... Firstly I have start/stop thing fitted, so that will not be a problem. As I don't have a clue how to do a bcm feed and also do not have access to software to sort it I guess it's a live feed for now.
Removed offending Cyrix Battery Combiner today ready and install cables ready to connect to AGM (115amp/hr) leisure battery.

Fingers crossed. Thanks all.
 
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