Solar panels
TAMMY
anyone out there have it on theirs, does it work well?
Tammy
00 Niagara
99 F150
3 kids 1 husband
mac davis
I looked into them last year... figuring that as hot as it gets in
Cent. Calif., they'd work well..
I found that a decent quality "slow trickle" panel to keep the
batteries charged while in storage was $75 to $150 ... and a panel
that would supplement the batteries and help run things during the day
would be at least $500...
I decided that I could buy a LOT of batteries for $500...
Mac
John
> We are considering putting some kind of solar charging system on our
> p/u, anyone out there have it on theirs, does it work well?
Two problems; weight, and where to locate the panels/batteries.
Weight wise, a #27 trolling battery and a Honda eu1000 genny would be is a
good combo. The Honda charges at about 8 AMPS. You could add a 20A
charger to run off the Honda AC outlet if faster charging is needed.
Personnaly, I like to put my popup in the shade.
Z.Z.
> ...
> Personnaly, I like to put my popup in the shade.
>
Me too. I have a 64W panel that I use at home to charge the batteries
that run my ham gear. I also take it with us when we camp. It's kinda
large (about 2x4 ft) but it lays on one of the bunks for transport. It's
about 3" thick and weighs five or six lb. so it's fairly portable. It
feeds the controller via a 50 or 60 ft cable so I can have the trailer in
the shade and then place the panel where it will get the most
sun...usually have to move it a few times during the day. If I'm diligent
about keeping it in the sun it will keep the battery charged pretty well.
It supplies about 4 amp to the battery in full sun. We mostly use the
battery for lights at night but also run a boombox and/or laptop on
occasion. The panel cost about $300 IIRC, and the controller was about
$15 from a surplus electronics outfit. It works pretty well, you just
gotta be a bit careful with the panel. OTOH, I also have a little Honda
generator, just in case... :-)
Mark
William Vojak
68.6.19.6:
> We mostly use the
> battery for lights at night
Anybody ever look into converting their lighting
to all LEDs to save power?
Bill Vojak
lfm
two inner lights for fluorescents, which should pull half the power and give
us more light.
We are also getting a 2nd battery.
They are also replacing the outside light, which my husband some how sheared
off while driving it. This shorted out the electrical system, giving us no
AC power at all, so after all this we will have considerably more AC power
than before :-) Infinitely more, or just a while lot more, depending on how
you look at it.
Laura
"William Vojak" <wvo...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:Xns94F5DF8FEF6D...@216.168.3.50...
mac davis
wrote:
I'm converting a lot of my interior lights to LED... it's expensive,
especially if you buy the lights and fixtures pre-made...
Amazing though, how much light you get with so little current draw...
I read an article a few months ago that claimed that since the
invention of clear and white LED's, they will eventually replace
incandescent light bulbs.. hmmm...
Mac
Oren Beck
wrote:
Solar power demands watt miserly lifestyles and campers are often more
energy aware than non campers- boondockers even more so .
LED lighting will someday render other lamps obsolete .
But not quite yet . Experiments and cost no object niches yes .
Just needs some R&D to become a mundane consumer item .
Personal experience beats gee whiz articles in deciding which lighting
systems work for you . Try before investing a lot is my comment .
Premade diode bulbs are still either "not quite that " or way
overpriced for what they should cost . Economy of scale I guess .
Like any disruptive technology market economics fight changes .
Now the Dollar stores are having white LED flashlights in quantity so
homerolling diode lamps may get practical after all . Getting a white
diode lamp already packaged on a footlong flex shaft with a switch for
a buck changes the rules a bit . From the same dollar store the Nokia
cell phone charge cord outputting Nominal 5Vdc from 12 v in gets
grafted to where the batteries had been in and Fiat Lux ...
$ 2 and some tape - we butchers often don't waste solder on tests....
Snipping the rhetorical technoflood arguing about obscure conversion
efficiency factors the Compact Fluorescent standard base lamp is a
contender here . By my experience a truly livable contender even .
After real world testing both LED lamps and Compact Fluorescent lamps
the CF wins for usable light per amp/hr draw . Several companies make
12-volt CF lamps but the pricing is hardly attractive . Several of the
membership club stores are selling 14-watt spiral lamps about $ 2 each
in multipacks . These screw into a standard lamp socket and run on 120
vac . Now to be honest- ratings comparing a 14 w CF with a 60 W
incandescent are not fair- call it closer to a 40 w and the 26 W as
being equal to a 75 and most will agree . Now here come the debatable
parts . Total life cycle costs . Subjective acceptance by spouses .
My wife * LOATHES * both CF and Diode lights. The flicker/delay in CF
drives her nuts and Diode lights somehow look " Wrong" to her .
Sadly limiting our use of them . Even though she saw the battery life.
Back to the drawing board . Found some 26 Watt Warm White spirals at
Target for about $2.25 each. These passed her approval . Powering one
of them from a 50 w inverter runs 2 nights before the inverter's
battery protection beeps " low volts" May have to hook some
instruments up to this ? Since this install is in a temporary camper-
homemade motorcycle tent pop-up elaboration is not a virtue :>
But being serious. DO check out the combination of a cheapie < 200 w
inverter and the small spiral CF lights - you may be pleasingly
surprised . One of my test rigups is a " Rally " brand 100 w inverter
bungee corded to a 12v 10Ah gelcell. Lampholder is a " Y" socket
adaptor bearing 2 of the Warm White Spirals screwed into a
plug-to-lamp socket adaptor . Whole assembly bungee cords to roof
brace . Runs all night and gelcell gets partly recharged by my
Volkswagen Beetle solar panel . Call it the K.I.S.S lighting system .
Oren Beck
" Grandpa - did light bulbs really used to get HOT ? "