4000 Watt Holiday Rambler Class A Build

[Off Gridin' It]

Here in the north east US it is frequently cloudy and camping is often in full shade. I have never heard anyone complain about having to much solar. I have 3240 watts on my travel trailer and on cloudy days it is just right. On heavy overcast days it is enough if we are conservative. On hot sunny days we can run our mini split all day.

You have to post your RV! Love to see it!

 

[Off Gridin' It]

Very interesting. I've seen 12 volts do some impressive stuff , but I believe higher voltage is necessary. Hard to eliminate propane.

If a 12 volt system is built right with the right gauge wiring it will be fine but all that heavy cable gets pretty pricey!

 

[ArtDeco]

If a 12 volt system is built right with the right gauge wiring it will be fine but all that heavy cable gets pretty pricey!

for a good reason ... low voltage but high amperage

 

[chrisski]

i would bet in three months you will be adding that in.

If the lady seriously uses the both ACs throughout the day and into the night, I can see portable panels added along with the 2 batteries.

IME my single 15K BTU unit consumes 1800 watts from the batteries including inverter efficiency losses. Takes 2650 watts of panels to run that with another 200 watt load for 2000 watts total during the equinox in AZ. I have not run this off battery only when it gets dark, only the solar panels; my battery is only 13 kWh So would not last long.

I had a 15 degree differential between indoor and outdoor and the AC never shut off.

 

[ArtDeco]

If the lady seriously uses the both ACs throughout the day and into the night, I can see portable panels added along with the 2 batteries.

IME my single 15K BTU unit consumes 1800 watts from the batteries including inverter efficiency losses. Takes 2650 watts of panels to run that with another 200 watt load for 2000 watts total during the equinox in AZ. I have not run this off battery only when it gets dark, only the solar panels; my battery is only 13 kWh So would not last long.

I had a 15 degree differential between indoor and outdoor and the AC never shut off.

But it's a dry heat right?

I wonder about using one of those portable 100v AC units on a 3K system overnight, over here where it's not so hot, but humid .

 

[Bobert]

3200 watts on a bumper pull? That is worth a post here as well.

My trailer is a 38’ (35’ box) year 2000 keystone Springdale. A very similar layout is still made today. I originally mounted 10 240 watt panels on my roof. I used brackets that I made using extruded aluminum channel that was recycled from bleachers that were thrown away from our local school. I used a chop saw (with some difficulty) to cut the Essentially long aluminum “angle iron” into short brackets and By bolting two of these brackets together I was able to raise the panels 8” above the roof so all of the vent fans can open. Initially I left a space for the rooftop ac intending to eventually install 2 more panels and remove the rooftop ac and install a mini split. Several months later a storm came through where we were camping and sent a good sized poplar tree tumbling down on the camper roof. Since buying 12. 270 watt panels locally was cheaper than replacing the 3 broken 240s I decided to bite the bullet and put in a mini split and covered the roof with 12 panels giving me a nominal total of 3240 watts. I still have a 14” path on the left side of the roof where I can clean the slides and the solar panels. I had to create an airfoil as the front panels would have been susceptible to lifting from the wind. I also put on “skirting “ on the driver’s side to hide the brackets. My battery is a 5k lifepo4 made from four 100ah 12volt batteries in series they are connected to a 3500w Powmr AIO. I use a separate lifepo4 100ah battery for my 12volt system and that gives me some redundancy.

You have to post your RV! Love to see it!

 

[MrThisIsME]

My trailer is a 38’ (35’ box) year 2000 keystone Springdale. A very similar layout is still made today. I originally mounted 10 240 watt panels on my roof. I used brackets that I made using extruded aluminum channel that was recycled from bleachers that were thrown away from our local school. I used a chop saw (with some difficulty) to cut the Essentially long aluminum “angle iron” into short brackets and By bolting two of these brackets together I was able to raise the panels 8” above the roof so all of the vent fans can open. Initially I left a space for the rooftop ac intending to eventually install 2 more panels and remove the rooftop ac and install a mini split. Several months later a storm came through where we were camping and sent a good sized poplar tree tumbling down on the camper roof. Since buying 12. 270 watt panels locally was cheaper than replacing the 3 broken 240s I decided to bite the bullet and put in a mini split and covered the roof with 12 panels giving me a nominal total of 3240 watts. I still have a 14” path on the left side of the roof where I can clean the slides and the solar panels. I had to create an airfoil as the front panels would have been susceptible to lifting from the wind. I also put on “skirting “ on the driver’s side to hide the brackets. My battery is a 5k lifepo4 made from four 100ah 12volt batteries in series they are connected to a 3500w Powmr AIO. I use a separate lifepo4 100ah battery for my 12volt system and that gives me some redundancy.

Very nice! I never thought there was as such thing as a 38' bumper pull.

Are you charging the 12volt battery from the AIO and in essence the solar? I ask as I thought of doing something similar for the same reasons.

 

[Bobert]

Very nice! I never thought there was as such thing as a 38' bumper pull.

Are you charging the 12volt battery from the AIO and in essence the solar? I ask as I thought of doing something similar for the same reasons.

Yes our particular unit was not designed to be a “park model” but in following years this model was promoted as a “hybrid” fully self contained but yet large enough to be comfortable for long term living like a park model. This is about as long as a travel trailer gets.

I installed the AIO to act as a onboard solar generator so the shore power goes directly to the AIO and the output of the AIO feeds the breaker that used to be directly connected to shore power. The ac electrical on this unit is 30amps so When the inverter is on we operate just like we were connected to a 30 amp campground pedestal. The converter charger ( upgraded for lifepo4) Charges our 12 volt “house” battery. We lose some efficiency with the double conversion that makes this work but the redundancy is worth it. If I add any more solar it will be a few panels and controller wired directly to the 12 volt “house” battery. This would nearly eliminate my conversion losses by keeping that battery nearly full most of the time being that our 12v continuous loads are generally quite small.

 

[ArtDeco]

My trailer is a 38’ (35’ box) year 2000 keystone Springdale. A very similar layout is still made today. I originally mounted 10 240 watt panels on my roof. I used brackets that I made using extruded aluminum channel that was recycled from bleachers that were thrown away from our local school. I used a chop saw (with some difficulty) to cut the Essentially long aluminum “angle iron” into short brackets and By bolting two of these brackets together I was able to raise the panels 8” above the roof so all of the vent fans can open. Initially I left a space for the rooftop ac intending to eventually install 2 more panels and remove the rooftop ac and install a mini split. Several months later a storm came through where we were camping and sent a good sized poplar tree tumbling down on the camper roof. Since buying 12. 270 watt panels locally was cheaper than replacing the 3 broken 240s I decided to bite the bullet and put in a mini split and covered the roof with 12 panels giving me a nominal total of 3240 watts. I still have a 14” path on the left side of the roof where I can clean the slides and the solar panels. I had to create an airfoil as the front panels would have been susceptible to lifting from the wind. I also put on “skirting “ on the driver’s side to hide the brackets. My battery is a 5k lifepo4 made from four 100ah 12volt batteries in series they are connected to a 3500w Powmr AIO. I use a separate lifepo4 100ah battery for my 12volt system and that gives me some redundancy.

Awesome pics. Especially the new panels after the tree crashed on the old ones.

 

[ArtDeco]

Are you running any high draw appliances besides the mini split?

 

[Bobert]

Are you running any high draw appliances besides the mini split?

Yes we have a converter charger that charges the 12 V battery and that uses in the neighborhood of 1000 to 1500 W when it is in full charge mode. We also use a microwave and a coffee pot. We cannot use the coffee pot the microwave have it charging the batteries at full force and have the mini split going at full blast at the same time but if I remove one of those items the remainder can operate all at once. I also use a fairly large 120 Volt air compressor on outside projects and occasionally an 120v arc welder. Our biggest limitation is that we only have 5K of battery so we cannot run things for an extended period of time once the sun goes down but during the day we pretty much can use anything we want and not go backwards unless it’s extremely cloudy or we’re parked in the shade events which occur with some regularity where we live.

 

[ArtDeco]

Thanks. Very helpful to know what you can run while charging from the array.

 

[djnorth]

@Off Gridin' It How did you wire the panels? I’m guessing some series-parallel combination

 

[Bobert]

@Off Gridin' It How did you wire the panels? I’m guessing some series-parallel combination

3s4p is the only combination that has high enough voltage to charge 48 volts in the morning and heavy overcast days but low enough to not kill the charge controller when we have 30 below mornings in the winter.

 

[Bobert]

Very nice! I never thought there was as such thing as a 38' bumper pull

FYI I looked it up and forest river makes a destination travel trailer that is 42’ 9” long.

 

[MrThisIsME]

FYI I looked it up and forest river makes a destination travel trailer that is 42’ 9” long.

Ya but those are not meant to be moved around a lot? Not sure. From a turning perspective, that would compare to a 50' 5th wheel.
Heck yours would be a larger turn than my 42' 5th wheel, I would think.

No thanks!

 

[djnorth]

3s4p is the only combination that has high enough voltage to charge 48 volts in the morning and heavy overcast days but low enough to not kill the charge controller when we have 30 below mornings in the winter.

There’s 20 panels in the photos so how does that work?

 

[MrThisIsME]

There’s 20 panels in the photos so how does that work?

I only see 12

 

[djnorth]

I only see 12

I’m referring to the OP of the RV. Upon closer inspection there appears to be 10 panels with each panel appears to have 2 PV cell arrays, so 10 400W panels?

 

[MrThisIsME]

I’m referring to the OP of the RV. Upon closer inspection there appears to be 10 panels with each panel appears to have 2 PV cell arrays

Boberts RV is the second set of RV pictures starting at post #46. That is who you are asking.