Here is a follow up post to Max's about installing the battery box and the inRESERVE Active Battery Management System.
We preach a lot about proper battery maintenance but we do stupid things just like everyone else sometimes. We've been installing our ISIS Intelligent Multiplex System in our 1955 Ford F100 Panel Truck. All of this activity is going on while we're building product, answering the phone and calling on customers. Last Friday, an intern who shall remain nameless, left the ignition key in the on position before he buttoned down things for the weekend. Guess what... the battery was stone dead when we came in yesterday morning.
This leads to a timely video about our ISIS inRESERVE Active Battery Management System. The inRESERVE kit is an add-on to the basic 2 or 3-Cell Kit an it includes a latching solenoid, a primary fuse holder and some ancillary wires and terminals. It works hand-in-hand with the MASTERCELL and POWERCELL to eliminate the possibility of the battery getting drawn down by the electrical loads in the car. It watches for 3 things: the ignition must be off for it to operate, the battery voltage must have fallen below 12.2 volts (which is clinically dead for most batteries) and it has to stay at this voltage level for more than 15 minutes. If the 3 of these things happen, the POWERCELL sends a pulse to the inRESERVE solenoid and it opens up, completely isolating the battery from the electrical demand in the car. This effectively kills all draw off of the battery.
It protects you against two scenarios. The first one is that you put your car in your garage and leave your headlights on with the ignition off. The headlights drain the battery and you wake up the next morning and can't start the car.
In the second scenario, you have your car sitting idle for a few weeks without a trickle charger on the battery. If you're like me, you travel a lot and forget to connect your battery tender. All of the electrical accessories in your car draw small amounts of current. That includes ISIS, your audio system, EFI and anything else that you have connected. Over time, the battery voltage drops to a point where you can't start the car.
In either scenario, the MASTERCELL would see the battery voltage drop below the set threshold. It would check to see that the ignition was off and it would wait 15 minutes before it did anything. It would then send a command to the POWERCELL to pulse an output to trigger the latching solenoid to open and cut all the current draw from the battery.
There is an important note here. Since inRESERVE kills all of the current draw from the battery, you need a reset button to re-engage the solenoid. Most guys hide this under a fender. Pressing this button turns the power back on to ISIS and the rest of the car. We include a button and a fuse holder to protect this wire in the inRESERVE kit. This feature also acts as a nice added security feature for your car.
There are two goals for inRESERVE. First, never let the battery voltage drop to a point where you can't crank the engine to get it started and charge up the battery. Second, never let the battery voltage drop low, deep cycle. Batteries don't like to have their voltage drawn down. This will damage the battery and effect its lifetime.
This is an example of the wiring diagram for inRESERVE.
You can download this at our website at this link.
You can check out the inRESERVE Video talking about installing it in our F100 here.
Stay tuned for more videos.
Jay
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