Hi, just an update that is overdue
I learned a lot but ultimately, my goal to setup the 48v failed. But all is well let me explain
On this property, there is a seasonal creek. On the other side of the creek there is flat land, perfect for solar. I have been working throwing everything to get a culvert installed. Because of some drama that I can't get into, I couldn't get it installed. I'll have to post pone installing the culvert this until late spring. Until then, I can and have been hauling cinder blocks, solar panels, cement bags over the creek but it isn't ideal.
If I had installed the culvert, I would have my 48v LV5048 setup with 18 400w panels and have my starlink setup.
But I'll have to settle with what I have setup.
I setup a 24v system with 4 230w panels. The 24v system is actually two by two 3s7p lithium ion batteries. The batteries in total are maybe a measly 300w. The panels are the cheapest Santan panels they sell, that they had accidentally sent me when I ordered the 400w ones.
I learned some amazing things!
First off, the SanTan panels each make about 10-15w each in the shade. This doesn't sound amazing, but together this is 40-60w for most of the day. Again, this doesn't sound like much... BUT I am only using 35 watts in my RV. Wuh you say?
In my 30ft RV I replaced all of the lights with LED. This took me down from 120w to 30w -- the 30w is basically the 120v to 12v transformer minimum. I also bought and use a Raspberry Pi 400 (RPI4 with the keyboard) that consumes 4 watts. I also have a 27" Acer monitor that takes 11 watts. All of that -- lights, computer, and a 3w LTE booster, keeps me about 30-40w so the 24v system works great. The RV has a cigarette lighter for plugging in devices. I found I could back feed it 12v and skip the transformer and run the lights directly from batteries.
In late September I started getting power cut offs. I tried moving the panels a bit, that gave me a few weeks.
So for backup, I have these crappy amazon battery packs. I have two small ones -- one 66wh, another 250wh. Both have AC 120v. The 250wh has pure sine wave. I charge them with my generator when it is cloudy or rainy. The part that sucks is that the 250wh takes 7 hours to charge and the 66wh 3 hours.
So I discovered another amazing thing. A long time ago I bought a Dewalt heated jacked. I had no idea these existed. Don't get one, they suck. But they comes with this amazing device -- its a dewalt batter pack to USB plus 12V regulated. I think 12v 1amp. I use it to charge my phone when everything fails. Well I bought the chines counterfeit version of the Dewalt USB adapter, and amazingly it comes with a 60w 12v regulated output. I then bought ten 150w car cigarette lighter inverters for $5, $50 total on ebay. I have about 10 dewalt batteries, mostly new. I also have about 3-4 chargers, two of them four bay. So I can charge all of my dewalt batteries in one go - about 90 minutes on the generator.
So when my solar goes down (its up today), I run off the amazon battery packs. When those go down, I run off my Dewalt packs. When I run out (about 2-3 days), I fire up the propane generator and charge everything for 90 minutes. The dewalt packs charge super fast and I only need to run the generator for about 90 minutes every two days during these storms. The solar turns on every other day when it is cloudy.
So I will make it until Spring where I can give it another shot to install the culvert and get over to the flat area for solar.
I tried hooking up the generator to the LV5048 but it does not like to charge the ebike batteries because there's a voltage spike when the generator goes from 0w to 480w. I posted in another forum about this.
I also bought the no-name chinese 300w hydro power. The stream is running a lot and I might hook it up. It requires a 30ft drop at 3" pipe to produce 300w 110v. If I get it working, I'll look to set it up. Probably to a 4-5 amp golf cart or ebike charger, I'll plug that in to charge the battery packs 24/7 and try to charge the LV5048 from that .. or just run off the hydro.
Unfortunately the LV5048 uses 60w in standby. So its a huge waste of energy given I am using only 30w in my RV.
I am waiting for a few days without rain to get everything up and running.
Anyway I learned a lot thanks for all the input. I'll post some pictures and probably create a new thread when I get some kind of victory, but for now I am happy. Dewalt battery packs with chinese USB adapters and 120v 150w small inverters saved the day!