Journey with Confidence RV GPS App RV Trip Planner RV LIFE Campground Reviews RV Maintenance Take a Speed Test Free 7 Day Trial ×
RV Trip Planning Discussions

Go Back   iRV2 Forums > THE OWNER'S CORNER FORUMS > Outdoors RV Owner's Forum
Click Here to Login
Join iRV2 Today

Mission Statement: Supporting thoughtful exchange of knowledge, values and experience among RV enthusiasts.
Reply
  This discussion is proudly sponsored by:
Please support our sponsors and let them know you heard about their products on iRV2
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread Display Modes
 
Old 09-19-2019, 07:12 AM   #29
Senior Member
 
brulaz's Avatar
 
Outdoors RV Owners Club
Join Date: Dec 2014
Location: Ontario Canada
Posts: 1,940
Quote:
Originally Posted by ALLOY View Post
We have 2.6kw of Panasonic household solar panels. Half is fixed and half is portable.
...
Wow. 1.3kw portable? That's a lot of panels to lug around and set up.

But do love your solar setup. More is always better with Solar.
__________________
2014 Timber Ridge 240RKS, 70K miles
690W Rooftop + 340W Portable Solar, 215Ah GC2s@24V
2016 Ram 2500 CTD 4x4 RegCab SLT, 10-11 mpgUS tow
brulaz is offline   Reply With Quote
Join the #1 RV Forum Today - It's Totally Free!

iRV2.com RV Community - Are you about to start a new improvement on your RV or need some help with some maintenance? Do you need advice on what products to buy? Or maybe you can give others some advice? No matter where you fit in you'll find that iRV2 is a great community to join. Best of all it's totally FREE!

You are currently viewing our boards as a guest so you have limited access to our community. Please take the time to register and you will gain a lot of great new features including; the ability to participate in discussions, network with other RV owners, see fewer ads, upload photographs, create an RV blog, send private messages and so much, much more!

Old 09-19-2019, 09:49 AM   #30
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2017
Location: Elk Grove CA
Posts: 1,618
When we're away from shore power, we "think camping", not RVing. It makes a big difference. I'm also thinking of having a 100w portable panel to supplement my soon to be installed roof top panels when they're shaded
__________________
BobC
2002 Itasca Suncruiser 35U
Workhorse Chassis
BCam is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-19-2019, 10:11 AM   #31
Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2017
Posts: 86
Quote:
Originally Posted by ALLOY View Post
We have 2.6kw of Panasonic household solar panels. Half is fixed and half is portable.

We did a trip with full cloud cover and some light rain. The fist day we had 23Ah from our fixed solar.
The second day we tilted the fixed panels and set up portable solar in a better spot and had a total of 97A.

When we left the morning of the 7 day the batteries we were down by 71Ah.
The Olympic rain forest does not have just ordinary clouds. These are soul crushing wet blankets of doom that deflect any and all attempt to extract solar radiation.

The "Solar - Generator" debate went like this:

Susie Solar (the moody one) "No way are you putting me out in this gloom! Put Generator George out there, he's stinky and loud and deserves this weather; he is so stupid that he will even work the night shift! I hope he gags on a spark plug..."

Generator George (the stoic) "What a sissy - I don't give a hoot about the driving rain and darkness. I'm ready to go. Top of my tank, grab my starter cable and let her rip."
__________________
2016 Blackstone 280RLSB
2012 F250 Lariat 6.2L
Pacific NW
John Pattee is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-19-2019, 05:19 PM   #32
Senior Member
 
TyCreek's Avatar
 
Thor Owners Club
Ford Super Duty Owner
Outdoors RV Owners Club
Jayco Owners Club
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Treasure Valley Idaho
Posts: 240
Thanks for the chuckle John...

While I've used both solar and wind to power things, our various RVs and their uses, rarely see sunny places. Our power use is around 100Ahr for a week and we don't make a conserving effort, so we don't use a generator to specifically charge batteries, though we've always had a generator for making Coffee.

Usually we camp with nobody nearby, so generator noise only bothers us (me really). Picked up a quiet generator earlier this year: https://egopowerplus.com/nexus-portable-power-station Was a display or demo, so the price was right. Have made about 5 pots of coffee (12cup/10min) between home charging and works well for our short or long weekends. Its power meter has indicated enough time remaining for a pot or 2 more, the couple times I noticed.
__________________
20FQ yanked along by a F-250
TyCreek is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-19-2019, 11:57 PM   #33
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2017
Posts: 558
Quote:
Originally Posted by brulaz View Post
Wow. 1.3kw portable? That's a lot of panels to lug around and set up.

But do love your solar setup. More is always better with Solar.
Yes, more is better in so many ways

A panel is 43lbs....less than our Honda 2000 or 5gal of gas. It takes 20min to set up the 4 panels close to the trailer. Longer if all 50' of 8ga cord is unrolled.

The portable side of things doesn't come out often. Once since Feb. That was to check if everything was running. It will get used more this winter.

We've started to carry a spare controller so the portable panels can be used to charger another trailer.
ALLOY is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-20-2019, 06:41 AM   #34
Senior Member
 
brulaz's Avatar
 
Outdoors RV Owners Club
Join Date: Dec 2014
Location: Ontario Canada
Posts: 1,940
Yes, we only need to use our 2 portable solar panels when long term boondocking, especially in the shade.

And we too have a separate charger for them that we run in parallel with the rooftop solar's charger. This charger can also serve as a 120VAC charger (with a 120VAC -> 33VDC power supply as input) when the solar panels are not being used.

It was the cumbersome size as well as the weight of the large >300W panels that forced me to look for smaller ones for portable. I wanted to store them in the back of our pickup, under the roof of the cap/topper and wanted to be able to handle them by myself. Ended up with two 36 cell units totaling 340W in series. About 24# each I think.
__________________
2014 Timber Ridge 240RKS, 70K miles
690W Rooftop + 340W Portable Solar, 215Ah GC2s@24V
2016 Ram 2500 CTD 4x4 RegCab SLT, 10-11 mpgUS tow
brulaz is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-22-2019, 04:23 PM   #35
Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2015
Posts: 33
Sun turned into volts

I strongly urge you do seriously study what it takes to charge your house batteries and run on solar.

Refer to

https://handybobsolar.wordpress.com
and

www.batterystuff.com

then
www.batteryuniversity.com



Using the charger/inverter/DC power distribution (hereinafter "thingy" 'cause it's shorter) that came with your RV will NOT, I repeat, NOT adequately charge your batteries.


Last year I replaced a 20yr old thingy with a new Progressive Dynamics unit only to discover it will take DAYS to charge my batts when I'm connected to shore power or my inverter generator. The problem lies in the charging algorithm of the thingy and the variances between battery manufacturers for the voltages required for bulk, absorption, and float-maintenance charge voltages.


When the sun don't shine, I'll use my Schumacher smart charger plugged into the AC of my generator/inverter.



With sun, I am easily able to charge my 230Ah of batts with 200W of panels and a Morningstar solar charge controller.


Properly maintained (if flooded cell deep cycle golf cart batts, NOT "deep cycle marine batts (these are hybrid starting / deep cycle cells nor auto starting batts.



"HandyBob" cited above is an electrical engineer with beau coup experience living off the grid both in an RV and now on a homestead in Montana. What he describes he learned from hard experience.


-- Good luck!



Quote:
Originally Posted by camper8251 View Post
Ok so need some advice here.
Just got a 23DBS and am trying to decide if I want to add solar or a Generator to it.

Currently I have two SRM-31 DeepCycle Batteries with 210 Reserve Capacity each.

We dont use the AC or Microwave at least not yet. So we can live on 12Volt power alone. May use the TV on rainy days....

If I added two 160 watt solar panels would that be enough to charge my batteries on a regular basis if I am camping in the woods without direct sunlight?

I found a 2200 watt Dual Fuel Generator for under 600.00 Its a Duromax and the price is right, not sure if they are reliable or not....But it has a 3 year warranty so I figure it cant be a total lost

I have never had solar before so kind of lost as to what the capabilities are for the solar in shaded locations.

Thanks!
n6medjim is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-22-2019, 05:11 PM   #36
Junior Member
 
FiddleMusic's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2011
Location: Southern Oregon
Posts: 17
Quote:
Originally Posted by camper8251 View Post
Ok so need some advice here.
Just got a 23DBS and am trying to decide if I want to add solar or a Generator to it.

Currently I have two SRM-31 DeepCycle Batteries with 210 Reserve Capacity each.

We dont use the AC or Microwave at least not yet. So we can live on 12Volt power alone. May use the TV on rainy days....

If I added two 160 watt solar panels would that be enough to charge my batteries on a regular basis if I am camping in the woods without direct sunlight?

I found a 2200 watt Dual Fuel Generator for under 600.00 Its a Duromax and the price is right, not sure if they are reliable or not....But it has a 3 year warranty so I figure it cant be a total lost

I have never had solar before so kind of lost as to what the capabilities are for the solar in shaded locations.

Thanks!
I have a 140 watt, 2-way tiltable solar panel on the roof of my 24-foot TT. The 2 batteries are 6-volt AGM golf cart with about 220AH total capacity. I also have a 1200 watt fairly quiet Westinghouse inverter genny. The solar usually keeps the batteries charged, except on cloudy days or when camping in the woods. DW and I travel south from Oregon to Arizona for 2 months in the winter, and we just got back from a 9 week trip to Alaska. I only used genny twice.
We do a mix of boondocking and RV parks, sometimes with power and sometimes not. I got solar first, then after 5 years of always trying to find a campsite with good sunshine and frustrating DW, I got the generator. Now we can sometimes choose the prettiest campsite instead of the sunniest one. :-) We rarely use the air conditioner, and never without having electrical hookups.
__________________
2005 GMC Duramax
2001 Komfort 22FS Sofa Slide 24-foot 5th Wheel TT
Old-time & Irish music fan
FiddleMusic is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-22-2019, 05:39 PM   #37
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2018
Posts: 634
Both is best. Especially with Li batteries...BUT..........get ready to drop some big $'s
Ret.LEO is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-22-2019, 06:58 PM   #38
Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2015
Location: Variable with temperature
Posts: 50
Gen 1st

I have both and the solar is of course limited to sun, direct sun to do much good. 330 Watts I have.

GO with an iGen to keep the noise down is my suggestion and I would go bigger than I think I need so you have the starting current capability for the AC unit.
mcdade54 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-22-2019, 07:13 PM   #39
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: midAtlantic
Posts: 6
Quote:
Originally Posted by camper8251 View Post
Ok so need some advice here.
Just got a 23DBS and am trying to decide if I want to add solar or a Generator to it.

Currently I have two SRM-31 DeepCycle Batteries with 210 Reserve Capacity each.

We dont use the AC or Microwave at least not yet. So we can live on 12Volt power alone. May use the TV on rainy days....

If I added two 160 watt solar panels would that be enough to charge my batteries on a regular basis if I am camping in the woods without direct sunlight?

I found a 2200 watt Dual Fuel Generator for under 600.00 Its a Duromax and the price is right, not sure if they are reliable or not....But it has a 3 year warranty so I figure it cant be a total lost

I have never had solar before so kind of lost as to what the capabilities are for the solar in shaded locations.

Thanks!
I have both solar panels and a generator.
Both are expensive additions to an RV.
Consider that solar panels don't work after dark or while there is a heavy rain. Solar panels need to be in direct sun to be efficient but the solar gain from parking in the full sun reduces the net result.
Batteries can be efficiently charged by using an under hood generator, essentially a high amp alternator to charge while driving or idling parked in the shade.

I prefer the under hood generator to charge my battery bank to operate frig/freezer, lights and ceiling fan.
Time to charge is greatly reduced and doesn't draw attenton to a loud generator.
south is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-22-2019, 07:14 PM   #40
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2012
Posts: 3
1440 watts of roof mount solar + lithium battries+ 400 watts of portable solar

Even with the solar options, I have, if I have 2 days of clouds I still have to use my genny. If we have sunny days with the full sun no problems. to help my 1to 2 day of clouds I have to add another 300 watt panel bringing my total roof mounted solar to 1740 also have to add 2 lithium batteries for a total of 800 amp hrs maybe make the portable unit bigger. The portable unit is used to put out in the sun if we happen to be in a shaded area it has a 50 ft cable on it. We are big users (hogs) of 110 ac, Electric stove,frig. air cond, ice maker, coffee maker.washer, dryer, TV, Sat system which runs 24/7, computers, wifi unit, hair dryer ect all the comforts of home.Everything runs off the batteries when the sun shines and even when it don't We very seldom plug in to electric expect for the occasional driveway surfing and then its usually a 110 v 15 amp plug for electric.Is solar worth it? YES! Keep your panels clean. I use all Victron equipment, all panels are wired in parallel
dave111959 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-22-2019, 07:33 PM   #41
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: midAtlantic
Posts: 6
This is the underhood generator that Roadtrek RV uses.

Nation Starter & Alternator,Tractor Auto,Marine,Truck,Small Engine
south is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-22-2019, 07:57 PM   #42
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2012
Posts: 3
Nice Try

I have a 12.5 kw Onan diesel gen for them cloudy days. Like I send in my post we are AC hogs. Its the wife she needs her Air cond, blower dryer, ice maker oven to bake in Ect. Would I have such a setup even not for her-------NO WAY!
dave111959 is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Tags
solar, generator



Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests)
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are Off
Pingbacks are Off
Refbacks are Off


Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Solar power of the future. Thought this might be of interest to the Solar power puris IMDSailor MH-General Discussions & Problems 1 04-17-2014 04:31 AM
Chassis Battery Solar Solar Panel camperkids Newmar Owner's Forum 8 07-12-2013 02:14 PM
solar electric specialties solar panels soybeans Monaco Owner's Forum 1 10-25-2012 07:09 PM

» Featured Campgrounds

Reviews provided by


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 06:17 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.8 Beta 1
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.