Occasional charging with an external battery charger

[bigern77]

I just set up a pretty basic mobile solar setup in my SUV. It's simply a 150W solar panel & Renogy 20A charge controller feeding a bank of two 12V 100ah LifePo batteries wired in parallel. Say I occasionally want to charge my batteries with an external battery charger (the ones that plug into the wall socket). If I clamp the charging cables to the negative and positive terminal of one of the two batteries, will the other battery in the bank also simultaneously get charged? Or do I need to actually charge them separately?

 

[Dave911]

Separately, no, charge them together.

 

[seneysolar]

I just set up a pretty basic mobile solar setup in my SUV. It's simply a 150W solar panel & Renogy 20A charge controller feeding a bank of two 12V 100ah LifePo batteries wired in parallel. Say I occasionally want to charge my batteries with an external battery charger (the ones that plug into the wall socket). If I clamp the charging cables to the negative and positive terminal of one of the two batteries, will the other battery in the bank also simultaneously get charged? Or do I need to actually charge them separately?

Yes, paralleled batteries will charge as they all use the same + and -

 

[bigern77]

Yes, paralleled batteries will charge as they all use the same + and -

I have a switch between the battery bank and the charge controller. Should I switch it off during charging, or does it not matter?

(My external battery charger can charge at 20A, and the Renogy Rover is the 20A version.)

 

[time2roll]

Multiple charging sources will work fine together. May as well connect the alternator also.