3.3 - Cabling
All wire must be the appropriate gauge and construction to handle the loads that will be
placed upon it. Heavy gauge, fine stranded copper wire is the industry standard. A
minimum of 2/0 or 4/0 AWG copper cable is recommended for battery interconnect cables.
The cables connecting batteries in series into rows must be the same length. The cables
connecting the rows in parallel must be the same length. The home run cables to the
inverter must be the same length. Cables of different lengths will cause voltage differences
in your battery bank. The rows in your battery bank must be kept within 0.2 V of each
other to ensure that they work correctly and that large currents between rows aren’t
generated.
If your battery bank suddenly shuts down as one or more rows approaches fully charged or
fully discharged, it is likely either the batteries are not all at the same state of charge or, if
they are measured with a multimeter to be all the same voltage, the voltage drop across
the cables connecting the rows is not equal. Also use the voltmeter to make sure that the
voltage drops across each battery interconnect is very close.
Torque all bolts and battery terminals to 88.51 to 97.36 in lb (10 - 11 Nm). Terminals left
insufficiently tightened will lead to overheating, melting the battery and potentially causing
a fire. Be careful when using thin washers. You may think you're applying sufficient torque,
but if the washers are too thin, the cable lugs can still move. Add additional washers until
you can tighten and the cable lugs cannot move.
3.4 - Configurations
The KiloVault® HLX series of batteries can be used 12 V, 24 V, 36 V, and 48 V
configurations where one, two, three or four batteries are connected in series, plus to
minus, in a row. The maximum number of batteries in a bank is limited to sixteen (4 in
parallel and 4 in series). Each row of batteries must be kept within 0.2 V of each other
or the battery bank may prematurely shut down during charging and discharging.
Exception:
CHLX can only be wired up to 4 batteries in parallel
OR
up to 4 batteries in
series, but not both. They cannot be wired in a combination series & parallel
configuration.
KiloVault
®
LLC • 330 Codman Hill Road, Boxborough, MA 01719 • +1 (888) 218-5924 •
•
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