Graphics Panel and Whiz Bang Jr.

[Retep]

  Can the Classic Graphics Panel be remotely mounted with a telephone cable, and set to continuously display the State of charge of the battery bank via the Whiz Bang Jr., and thus replace the Trimetric battery Monitor?

[boB]

Yes, it sure can.

Depending on the phone cable wire size, it will be limited to somewhere between 100 and 200 feet.

boB

[Halfcrazy]

Standard purchased phone cables seem to only go about 20ft. Cables made out of quality cable like cat5 go about 150ft

[Retep]

Thank you.

  So then, with quality cable, can I set it to constantly show the SOC of the battery bank, or will it cycle off?

[Resthome]

Thank you.

  So then, with quality cable, can I set it to constantly show the SOC of the battery bank, or will it cycle off?

The Main Status page cycles Battery SOC % and Charging Stage. Alternating every couple of seconds. There is also a WBjr display that shows SOC % at the bottom of this screeen. There is no display that only show SOC %.

[boB]

Well, the idea was to have the MNGP showing voltage and/or  SOC % is LARGE CHARACTERS on
the LCD but we never got one of them round-tuits unfortunately !
The display is certainly capable.  Just a simple matter of programming.  SMOP as they say.

Maybe some day ?

boB

[Retep]

Thanks Y'all.  Now if only that "one day" will happen before I start the next install on my own RV.

[dgd]

Well, the idea was to have the MNGP showing voltage and/or  SOC % is LARGE CHARACTERS on
the LCD but we never got one of them round-tuits unfortunately !
The display is certainly capable.  Just a simple matter of programming.  SMOP as they say.

I thought from previous discussions that there may have been the possibility of a battery monitor based on the WBjr and the MNGP separate from the classic? The issues I suppose are powering the graphics panel and interfacing the WBjr to it. That would have needed an rs232
WBjr - no bad thing anyway as that would let Classic connected WBjr free up AUX2 for those pwm applications, eg water heating.
And doesn't the MNGP already use a decent resourced CPU (same one as classic?) so software expertise already exists for that CPU in MN.

An MN battery monitor would be perfect for all those misguided people using non- Midnite controllers 

Dgd

[vtmaps]

  Can the Classic Graphics Panel be remotely mounted with a telephone cable, and set to continuously display the State of charge of the battery bank via the Whiz Bang Jr., and thus replace the Trimetric battery Monitor?

If you already have a trimetric, why replace it?  I believe that both the whizbangjr and the trimetric can share the same shunt.

One thing I like about my trimetric is its independence from the rest of my system... it serves as an independent auditor of what's going on.  The whizbangjr can control your system, which means that it can screw up your system if it is not configured properly or if there are firmware/software bugs or corruption.  The trimetric cannot affect the function of your system.

--vtMaps

[boB]

I thought from previous discussions that there may have been the possibility of a battery monitor based on the WBjr and the MNGP separate from the classic? The issues I suppose are powering the graphics panel and interfacing the WBjr to it. That would have needed an rs232
WBjr - no bad thing anyway as that would let Classic connected WBjr free up AUX2 for those pwm applications, eg water heating.
And doesn't the MNGP already use a decent resourced CPU (same one as classic?) so software expertise already exists for that CPU in MN.

An MN battery monitor would be perfect for all those misguided people using non- Midnite controllers 

Dgd

I wish that the MNGP could do this very thing...  The MNGP is dependent on having 9 or 10 volts to operate from
as well as the open-emitter interface for communicating with and power the WB Jr.

BTW, the MNGP already has RS-232 implemented on it.  That is how it communicates with the
Classic control board.  It just happens to mainly use modbus over RS-232 for communications
but it does do RS-232 if the modbus code is not running.  The WB Jr. isn't RS-232 exactly...
close though.

boB