I would like to get a monitor for my campervan leisure battery as I only have the original analogue volt meter. I would like to see how well my solar panel is working and how much it is charging the battery as I have the compressor fridge on when out and about and dont want to flatten the battery. I have seen a victron monitor but that is so expensive. there does seem to be a cheap copy fron Aili and Camway (needs a shunt), so are these any good. Also there is a BM2 monitor that doesn't need a shunt and is only about £25-30 , so would that do the job.
The battery is difficult to get at so I need to be able to monitor it via phone or dedicated display. Any advice would be very helpful.
I fitted a NASA BM1.
90 quid but very good. Lots of info about the battery...
Time to charged (if charging)
Time to discharged (if discharging)
Charging amperage
Voltage
Bar graph
Percentage charge
Amp hour 'trip' meter
Engine battery voltage
After seeing the Aili battery monitor on Will Prowse YouTube channel I ordered one of eBay, and it arrived in 10 days from China all for £28 that was April last year.
I went for the 100amp model, which goes to 150amp, although my maximum load is never likely to be more than 60amp.
Superb piece of kit, and does the same job as the £150 Victron but without Bluetooth, which I did not need.
Our has a simple led traffic light display on the control panel for lights & tap & shows the health of both the leisure & vehicle battery. With the 12v compressor fridge & 150w solar panel it rarely drops into amber, except in winter & never been in the red. Got plenty confidence in the system & rarely monitor it nowadays.
It is a Sargant unit, same as the distribution/fusebox.
Most campervans should be charging the leisure battery when on the move so should be impossible to flatten it with the fridge when driving.
I think that it's easy to over complicate things prefer to keep them as simple as possible. I replaced the analogue meter with a DVM module of the same physical size. It cost less than £5.
------------- Two drifters off to see the world.
I'm tired of reality, so I'm off to look for a good fantasy.
YouTuber, Urban Explorer is a Liverpudlian, just search Battery Monitor, he has done quite a good video on installing the Aili battery monitor in a VW camper, nothing over complicated at all, in fact it is a very simple job to install one, just some basic DIY skills required.
Only thing I would have done different is shorten the 2.1m meter sensor cable to fit, very easy to to do being only three core screened cable and maybe fit a 65mm (OD) rubber washer behind the meter face to neaten the job of.
Although I would not use his Amazon affiliate link as the unit is £48 unless you want quick delivery, but if you can wait £28 of eBay is a better buy for the exact same item.
I’ve got the BM2 on the starter battery in my van, we use the 12v sockets for running a compressor fridge and charging stuff when camping. Once fitted on the battery you never need to touch the monitor again, there is a great app to use with it which shows graphs of charge state over the last couple of weeks so it’s very easy to spot how much the fridge it taking out of the battery. It’s a great little battery monitor.
Here’s a sample screenshot from the app, this is the van being driven normally and then the compressor fridge was plugged in just after 5pm, the graph shows it cycling in and out during the evening.
Yep Broadside that shows some interesting data, although I would still rather use the Aili battery monitor for a leisure battery as it uses a Shunt, as that lets me know at a glance how much Ah or % is left in the battery after using my inverter etc, the BM2 looks great as a general car battery monitor though.