Renogy Rover 30A 12V/24V Auto DC Input MPPT Solar Charge Controller Parameter Adjustable LCD Display Solar Panel Regulator fit for Gel Sealed Flooded and Lithium Battery, Rover 30A,Black

Great replacement for the PWM controller that came with our Renogy Solar kit. Initially we had the Renogy PWM 30 AMP controller and it was an entry level controller in all respects. The previous controller was limited to a 12 volt battery source had 2 lead pairs, one for solar panel connection and the other for the battery side connection. Any load connected to the battery array had to be connected directly to the batteries and was not governed by the controller. Also you had to rely on LED indicator lights To determine when the controller was in charge mode versus float mode. Adequate for an entry level controller but not great. Now lets talk about this controller. First, this controller is capable of 12 or 24 volt wiring installations. 24 volt DC is superior to 12 volt DC because it cuts the Amperage draw in half on the DC end. A 1.2 Amp TV running on AC/120 volts will require 12 Amps on the 12v-DC end to meet the same 140 Watt requirement. A 24 volt DC setup will reduce the amperage requirement down to 6 amps on DC, which means your DC wiring gauge doesn’t have to be as robust when supporting a 24 volt application. Secondly, the LCD display is great and is a must for a solar charge controller. It’s not enough to know that the solar cells are charging the battery, you may also want to know how “fast” they are charging the battery and whether or not the panels should be angled to reach optimized charge rate. The LCD screen also provides a percentage estimate of battery remaining in addition to the amps that are being supplied by the panels, along with a running amp-hour accumulation of charge provided the panels over a period of time and current battery voltage. Third, it has a pair of positive/negative load leads that permit connecting appliance loads up to 20 Amps DC. It’s not necessary to use the load leads for connecting the devices that run off the battery, but the added advantage of using them is that your battery array is protected from over-consumption, as the leads shut off usage on the battery once it reaches a certain level of discharge in order to protect the battery array. I’ve only used the new controller once, but the instructions were easy to follow and I made a laminated copy of the LED and Menu options as a quick reference guide that will go along with the kit on camping trips. Currently the array powers my 400 Watt (4x100W) kit and 2 VMAX 125ah batteries wired in parallel, but I am seriously thinking of doubling the panel array and adding 2 more batteries in a series/parallel configuration to take advantage of the 24 volt capabilities of this controller. Quick Note on the 100 Watt Renogy panels: When I measured the charge current of the 4 x 100 watt panels connected in Parallel I noted an 18.5 amp charge rate on the new controller or ~4.6 amps per panel. That seemed low to me given that 400 watts/12v is around 33.3 amps, or 8.33 amps per panel. In discussions with Renogy support I found out that the 100 Watts is calculated at 17.9 volts * 5.7 amps, where they use the maximum charge voltage by each of the panels as basis for the calculation. Just something to be aware of when you are reading sub-5 amps per panel charge rate on your controller. This new controller works as advertised, was relatively inexpensive for what it does, and I may update the review again in 12 months after running it a few more times for a consistency check.

Plug and play, easy set up and working perfectly

I replaced an old direct from China PWM converter with a Renogy Rover 20 amp for my camping solar rig. The improvement has been pretty remarkable. I'm really happy with the configuration, efficiency, and safety of this design. The efficiency gain going from PWM to MPPT is noticeable. More importantly for me, the ability to program the charging parameters from a laptop allowed me to use a custom lithium battery pack and get the target voltages exactly where I want them. I camp with a 70 Ah lithium pack built into a "suitcase" with the the Renogy Rover, fuse box, switches, inverter, etc. A big selector switch in the box lets me swap between my internal lithium and an external sealed lead acid batter for those times when the weather doesn't cooperate, and I need a little more juice. The Rover easily switches between "SLA" battery mode and my "USER" mode for the lithium. Best for me, the protection circuitry in the Rover shuts everything down long before voltages get anywhere near damaging my lithium if I forget to switch modes. The only knock I'd give on this controller is that the software to configure it is pretty rough around the edges. I had to reconnect and reboot frequently as it lost sync with the Rover, and the initial setup of the software isn't intuitive. Read the Fine Manual... The software is Windows only as well which is inconvenient for a Linux/Mac user. Still, after a bit of fiddling & testing (with a bench power supply standing in for solar panels over this LONG winter), it configured the Rover to the exact charging parameters I wanted for my lithium. All the settings are remembered when the controller is powered down. I'm ready to camp this summer!

--- Why I ordered this item: My old PWM controller was trashing my battery out at the shed, plain and simple. I wanted something with real MPPT tracking so I could get more juice out of my panels, especially on cloudy days. Likes: * This thing pulls power even when it's overcast out. I watched the display during a partly cloudy afternoon and it kept adjusting instead of just tanking to nothing. * The LCD screen shows all your stats right there, voltage, amps, battery percentage. No app needed to see whats going on. * It has settings for gel, sealed, flooded and lithium batteries. I run lithium, and switching to that profile was just holding one button for a couple seconds, then it ramps the charge amps up steady and settles into a float once the bank tops off. * The case is metal, not some flimsy plastic shell, and it has a little heat sink on the back that gets warm when it's working hard. * Wiring it up took about five minutes. Terminals are labeled clear and it clamped down on my wire gauge without stripping out. No likes: * The fan kicks on under load and it's loud enough you can hear it clear through the shed wall. * You need the separate bluetooth module to get the app alerts and history. That's an extra buy they don't make obvious. * The manual is rough. A lot of the button functions took some trial and error to figure out. Would I pay full price for this product: Yes Final thoughts: On the charging side it pulls whatever my panels can give it, and swapping battery profiles between projects is just one button press. Buy the bluetooth module too if you want real monitoring, because the on unit display only gets you so far.

I have it connected to 2 Renogy 200 Watt Shadowflex Panels on top of my Van. Never had a problem with it. Most of the time it is in float at about 13.7v. I would buy it again.

This seems to be doing its job, i have had it nearly a year now. I have had a heck of a time setting up the safe shut down though. So i am not sure what to do with that just yet but i might get around to it soo. If i do then i can update my review once I get that sorted out! We have two complete gaming computer setups on this one and it is flawless!

Unreliable with no warning. I have had this since March and it's just stopped working, at least 4 times, with no warning. You have to unplug everything to reset it and then it will work...for a while. I don't like the way the buttons work (not intuitive) so I have to dig out the manual every time...well not anymore, I got so used to it having to be checked and restarted. I say it just quit charging and let my battery run down 4 times but I'd really guess it's twice that because I caught it several other times and reset it before it just allowed the battery to go to a near unchargeable situation. I have it hooked to a Ghost Controls Gate with a 100Ah LiFePO4 battery and a Renogy 100W panel. I upgraded the panel twice thinking that might be the issue. It's not. It's this controller. DO NOT trust it. Ever. I've moved to a Victron SmartSolar 75/15 MPPT. Just hooking it up so we'll see how it does.

I've been using Renogy products for 3 years now. I boondock all winter in the Arizona desert powering an old RV with 4 100w Renogy panels. For two and half years I had been running my solar through a Rove 20a controller. The conditions were such that I was constantly exceeding the limits of the Rover 20a unit, often feeding it over 25a and it never complained. I finally smartened up and upgraded to the Rover 40a and it is doing its job perfectly. My only issue is with the bluetooth module. It was constantly needing to be unplugged and plugged back in to be reset. This appears to be a generic bluetooth issue that is not limited to Renogy controllers. My simple fix to keep from having to go outside to do the unplugging was to take an Ethernet cable that I had hanging around, plugged it into the controller and ran the cable into the RV. I bought a cheap connector to join it to the bluetooth module cable and now I can comfortably reset it as needed without going outside and crawling on the ground to reach the charge controller. The Rover controllers are quite rugged. I run fans in the bay where my controller, inverter and batteries are located, yet the temperature will often get to 125 degrees. That's in the desert in the winter! So far, so good.

Gran producto, lo recomiendo!

Awesome product! Works great, well made..happy camper!

This is the second unit I’ve bought. They are a great unit. And easy to run in parallel. They were handling 2500w easily. (With room for expansion)

Robusto ben fatto, completo di tutte le funzioni indispensabili per un mppt stand alone. Il dissipatore di calore è ben dimensionato e non necessita di ventole visti i rendimenti dichiarati dalla casa che credo siano corretti anche sulla base dei test che ho fatto. Inoltre il modello 20A gestisce potenze tutto sommato modeste ( 480w con batterie da 24v). Il display è a cristalli liquidi senza retroilluminazione con tutti i problemi dei cristalli liquidi. Di giorno e con vista frontale sono nitidi e chiari, con vista disallineato non si riescono a leggere. Non è che uno sta sempre lì a guardare il display, una volta impostato si controlla ogni tanto. Con l'app questi problemi non ci dovrebbero essere, però occorre comprare un ammennicolo wifi da aggiungere. La morsettiere fa il suo lavoro ma forse si poteva fare meglio. La programmazione è un po' macchinosa visto che si deve entrare nei vari menù, scorrerli fino al parametro di interesse, modificarlo e salvarlo. Vero che si fa una volta sola, ma è un po' noioso. Sul display di possono vedere tensioni e correnti gestire dall'apparecchio ma mancano statistiche più accurate, credo che sempre con app e ammennicolo il problema si risolva Cosi come la programmazione. Per me l'apparecchio va bene visto anche il costo di acquisto scontato ed è certamente completo per l'uso stand alone. Al prezzo di vendita pieno , senza sconti, si trovano apparecchi più completi con wifi app incluse.

I bought this unit as a somewhat temporary backup for my main charge controller. The CC was easy to set up, the connection terminals have nice long tunnels to help remove stress on the exposed wire ends. So far the unit seems to be working well, and I appreciate the information available on the built in screen - such as daily kWh charge to batteries, as well as daily average charge information. Two concerns/gripes: 1) I'm not sure if this was a mistake, but my charge controller arrived with ZERO paperwork. Nothing at all, note even a card pointing you to their website. As this product is likely being installed in some locations where reliable internet access isn't a given, and that it is a device that controls so much power (therefore danger), I am very surprised that there is no literature included. By contrast my products from other established solar energy manufacturers comes with ample written support. 2) the device comes with a password set to ON by default, and you cannot change any parameters (even as fundamental as battery type) without this password. What is that password? Who knows... internet searches brought up nothing --- the password is 000000. I finally figured this out... I hope this saves somebody the same hassle I went through.