Community Forums

Foodmanim · 10-06-2018, 07:20 PM

2018 Fleetwood Southwind 36p Was cleaning the filters on my rear AC inside the coach and saw a wire hanging so pulled it down and it is the wire from the small solar panel that sits on top of the rear AC and it is not hooked to anything. Ooopps, guess the factory forgot to connect it to where ever it goes but pretty sure it's not charging the batteries this way.

**TonyDi** · 10-06-2018, 07:26 PM

I had one of those on my MH. They are usually 5-8 watts and are only good to counter parasitic drain. Almost worthless. If yours is not hooked up, you can be sure it's doing nothing for your battery.

Frank Miller · 10-07-2018, 08:07 PM

If the solar panel wire has a plug on it, look for a matching socket in the A/C. If you find one, plug it in. If you don't, ignore it. The power put out by the A/C solar panel is too small to be of any real value.

zorro2kita · 10-09-2018, 07:01 PM

When I bought my coach in 2012, the solar panel did not work so removed - one less thing to go flying off --

bolhuijo · 10-09-2018, 07:06 PM

I live in a sunny area and the tiny panel is OK for keeping the coach battery topped up (when functional of course). As wired however, I found it could not help the chassis battery. That made me upgrade to a real solar panel...

Marteen · 10-10-2018, 05:45 AM

I am considering getting solar for my bounder.
What type/brand did you go with?

bolhuijo · 10-10-2018, 10:19 PM

I got a 100W Renogy kit - flexible panel and duo charge controller for independent charging of both batteries. The panel is only 4 pounds and I stuck it down with Dicor. No problems so far.

vsheetz · 10-11-2018, 12:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frank Miller

If the solar panel wire has a plug on it, look for a matching socket in the A/C. If you find one, plug it in. If you don't, ignore it. The power put out by the A/C solar panel is too small to be of any real value.

Agree.