Food Truck build DIY

Ok, so new to solar/battery power systems…designing a food truck that I want to be free from a noisy generator to run it (even a Honda is more noise than I’d like).

My goal?

1. To have a traditional 50A shore power system (when available and/or for charging system when parked at home.)

2. Have battery bank Solar charging/shore line charging when needed.

3. Ability to switch from shore to battery-powered system (auto? Too pricey?)

Food truck has:

- refrigerator (rated at 3A)
- freezer (4.7A)
- prep table (3.5A)
- hood system (5A)

- Misc charging of iPads/pos system
- 65” flatscreen
- led lighting

I have:

4000W and a 5000W inverter—good deal from an auction

50A breaker box

Oh, and ONE solar panel so far, lol! Looking for deals on marketplace.

…and wondering what other components needed.

BMS?
Transfer switch?
Inline fuse?
24v system?
Battery type/quantities?

All help appreciated AND will post a YT video of the process for others considering doing this as well!

All 120v? Looks like about 2000w, the fridge/freezer will cycle so maybe 1500w is a better adjustment. How many hours would you want it to run? 10 hours is 15kwh. So I'd say you'd want at least 20kwh batteries.

If you were able to fill the entire roof with solar you're looking at 3000-4000w, and with the hood that's huge and will cause shading, you're looking at 2000w. Depending on where you are you can hope on sunny days to get 10kw from the sun.

If I were you I'd focus on a large battery bank, say 30kwh or 6 SOK 48v rack batteries and charge before you leave. Add some solar to keep the system topped off when parked and give a bit of boost throughout the day.

Which inverters do you have? Are they pure sinewave? I'd ditch them and get a Victron Multiplus 5000w. It has transfer switch built in and is far better. Keep a small Honda 2000w genny as a backup. You then can run the genny if needed and the victron inverter will take the 2kw and add its 5kw since it has power assist. Just plug the genny into the shore plug. Maybe you could get away with 3000w multiplus.

Build list would be
Victron multiplus 5000
Victron cerbogx (controls everything from phone)
4-6 SOK 48v rack batteries
Misc cables and such.

If you go with sok batteries or others with Victron compatible bms you can skip a smartshunt.

Need a good kWh requirement to do anything. I picture a roof filled with solar panels, a 13 kWh battery pack, but most days will still need to top this off overnight to get the batteries full. Also, still need a generator for cloudy days.

Each 1 amp @ 120 volts can cost you 2.5 kWh per day. All depends on how much this equipment is used. A kilowatt meter will help measure consumption, even if its one item each day until its done.

The battery pack I mention is the size of a tesla Powerwall. An estimate for a very large food truck would be 1 kw of panels with the ability to produce 1 kWh - 5 kWh per day in ideal conditions depending on location and time of year.

The inverter DC input voltage will determine what battery pack voltage is needed. Might be 12, 24 or 48 volt.

To answer the question of time, 4-5 hours max (business model is during the week at companies).

Both inverters are pure sine/rated 22/24/36/48v, if that helps.

On the subject is solar get as much as you can on the roof then 2-4 panels on hinges on the food service side of the truck. When propped up they will make a nice awning for your customers