T&T: TIG generated anomalies

[Larry N. Brown]

First I want to present a narrative of events and then ask a follow-up
question.

I was assisting my friend, Luis, as he made some repairs to my aluminum
hardtop frame. Gouge out the cracks and re-weld them. We were running on the
generator with air-conditioning on because of the heat. The TIG unit was
powered by a separate gas genset. We tensioned everything into place with
come-alongs and Luis finished the gouging. We attached the ground and Luis
started welding. After a while we went below for a Gatorade and a brief
respite from the heat to discover all the air-conditioners were off. What the
heck? I reset them and we went out to weld again. Went below and the AC's were
off again.

Figured it was related to the TIG frequency but didn't know the exact vehicle.
Finished the welding and turned the AC's back on again. I told Luis about the
AC's and he said that it's the frequency. . . it gets into computers too. My
desktop has a surge protector and I guess this kept the freqs out but my AC
thermostats are digital and it reset them all to default, calling for 80d.
This why they shut down.

Fast forward a couple weeks. I've been using my port main cranking battery as
a house bank since we moved aboard because I had a lot of things to work on
besides that. I wired the DC in with AWG 4 because I had it on hand and I
really didn't know where the bank would be eventually located, Also, we have
generally been on shore power or genset. Finally got the house bank in 4 x 6 v
GC batteries. Wired it all in with 00, big battery cutoff switch. Rechecked my
work and applied the voltage. Bingo. LED said bulk charge. Hoorah.

But not so fast. panel meter was taking a long time to rise what with a 120
amp charger on. Take the clamp on and check the current. 180 amps. Jumpin'
jehosaphat. Raced into the engine room and checked batt temps with my handy,
dandy IR thermometer. Normal. Same for the Link 10 shunt. Checked the current
in the engine room wiring - with my glasses on-- it was 18.5 amps. The decimal
is TINY.

Now, the problem is why the low charging current? Energized the system at 330
pm yesterday and it is only 30 minutes ago that it went absorption mode. 14.2
volts that you want.

I'm tying the AC computer failure mode to the computer in the Victron. Maybe
it's lost it's programming. You can set it to any percentage of the max, 120
a.

I'm going shut it down and reprogram it and I hope a wiser head will be able
to advise me of the charge parameters. C= 440 ah. Optimum charge current?
80-100 a? Absorption voltage rate for this bank. 14.2? 14.4? Maximum
absorption time? 4 hours? Float voltage? 13.8?

This will be of interest to anyone having TIG welding done. Shut off ALL
computers.

I would appreciate any help with the battery charging parameters. Thanks.

Regards,

Larry and Teri
M/V Cigano, 47' Prairie Sundeck Cruiser
Lying: Slidell, LA
N 30 13.28
W 89 48.63