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hi  jeff cote here with pacific yacht  systems we've got a question from a  fellow boater named james  james asked i'm about to install a solar  panel system on my boat i've got three  ways of charging my batteries  an engine with an alternator shore power  charger  and solar panels pretty common do you  have  some way of disconnecting the solar  panels when i'm running the engine  should i install a disconnect switch  that's a actually  this is a little this is a good question  because james is thinking about what  happens when my alternator  is recharging my batteries and my solar  controller powered by solar panels is  also recharging my batteries  some alternators will sense a voltage  coming from the solar controller and  will say you know what  i don't need to help here and will  actually turn the alternator off so it  is not generating power  and in some instances that doesn't  matter but in other ones where the  alternator is also  outputting rpm to actually feed the  tachometer  on your engine instrument panel what  that means is that your rpms are not  going to work  and so a way to stop that is either to  disconnect the solar panels when you're  running the engine  or simply add more loads so that it  actually  exceeds the power that the solar panels  can provide  and when the alternator sees a voltage  that is low  enough for it to trigger to turn on the  alternator will actually start  outputting  for instance on my boat i have 450 watts  of solar array  and there are certain circumstances  where i'm leaving in anchorage where my  batteries are full  and my the sun is shining and the  batteries are getting a charge  i've in the past had to trigger some  loads to bring the voltage a little bit  down to force the alternator to kick in  so that my rpm  on my tachometer is going to actually be  showing  yes you could do what's called the  service disconnect and put a device that  would disconnect the solar panels from  the  from the batteries but in doing so you  have to make sure that you never  disconnect solar panels  from your batteries when you're actually  getting a charge voltage  right so that means that you probably  want to cover the solar panel so there's  no current output coming from the panels  to the controller  and from the controller to the batteries  so it's not an easy thing to do but if  you're getting an external regulator  these devices now have a sort of a i  guess an option where they're  forcing the alternator to output just a  little bit just so that your tachometer  can get an  rpm and that's how we do it with the  ball mark we actually force the  alternator  to do a little bit of output so that  even if it senses  solar charging or voltage charging on  the batteries it's still going to  create an output to make sure that your  rpm or your tachometer  is working at your pension panel so that  was a really good question from chips  thanks for watching this video if you've  got further questions that we didn't  answer please ask them below or go on  our website  and fill up one of the forms and lastly if you  haven't subscribed to  our channel please do so that way you'll  get the regular contents  and in closing thanks for watching