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Help making electric budget (newbie)-

mpkoontz

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Dec 16, 2021
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Trying to make a amp budget before looking for an all-in-one system. I'm having trouble getting figures and also... Should the 12v and 110v numbers be figured separately (or in the whole budget)? How does this look for realism: 1639686159295.png

Thanks,
Mark Koontz
 
Hi.

I am working out similar details, but have taken a more modular approach.

I used a free spreadsheet I downloaded off explorist.com. Mostly because it is constructed in the way that I think. So it seemed natural for me to use.

More importantly, I liked that it separated out loads into two categories 120 V, 12 V, and stuff that uses a power supply off 120V.

And then within each of those categories, a hierarchy of hi consumption devices, and low consumption devices.
I guess another way to say that would be big important stuff, nice to have stuff, and unimportant stuff.

And then each device has a column for an estimated number of minutes used per day.

That spreadsheet is big enough that I was able to play games with my consumption figures, to better optimize the size of my array, the watthours I would need to potentially generate, and then the size of the battery storage that I would need to meet my performance goals.

needless to say, modeling, and imagining behavior, before you spend a whole lot of money, can be eye-opening but also fun.
But I also recognize not everybody thinks the way that I do, nor enjoys the same kinds of things I do.

I hooked up a shunted meter and started turning things on and pulling out fuses. The numbers I generated were bang on from the manufacturers literature. So I have confidence in my figures.

In a nutshell, keeping a camper warm enough in low temperatures is a problem.

The only reason I mentioned using that other spreadsheet, was because it really helped me having things blocked out into groups.

I hope it’s not a sin on this site to mention some thing that works really good.
 
Trying to make a amp budget before looking for an all-in-one system.
You may have better results using the following:

 
Did anyone else notice the 100a draws?? I hope that's based on 12v. :eek:
I saw those
I couldn’t tell if there was a mix of 12 and 120 v draws in his list.
I‘m not familiar with all the different styles of devices.
My 1000w 120v convection microwave uses 8.4amps at 120 volts.
Which means (with inefficiencies) almost 100amps off the inverter.

It’s becoming clearer to me why if you want to run std kitchen appliances off of batteries, you need the high output battery models And heavy cables.
 
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