diy solar

diy solar

My stationary RV project

ericfx1984

Solar Enthusiast
Joined
Oct 10, 2021
Messages
715
So the wife and I purchased an RV, we sold our house and decided to buy a small piece of property we've been living there for a little while now and the RV actually came with solar power when we bought it but it was pretty inadequate for our goals it's still not where we need it to be but it will easily get us through this winter

Aims Power 3000 ETL 12 volt inverter charger

3x Hi-Tech 200 watt panels for a total of 600 w

Victron 100-50 charge controller

4x Duracell gc2 FLA batteries wired in 12v


First problem I ran into is that if you tried to run the microwave that the 300 amp breaker would pop on the inverter well I ended up replacing the 300 amp breaker but it still had problems

Well it certainly didn't pop the breaker as easy as it did before it would eventually pop or the inverter would go into protection mode anytime you were running something that Drew more than maybe 800 to 1,000 Watts this was especially evident if I tried to use my electric tea kettle

So I started doing a little bit of detective work and one of the things I noticed was that the 1/0 gauge wire was slightly warm and that there was a major increase in temperature at the connection points themselves as I got to looking a little closer I realized the previous owner had used terminal connectors that were far too large for the tiny lugs on the chinese-made breaker.. in order to get more surface area he had used a washer unfortunately the washer was galvanized steel and if you know anything about galvanized steel you know that the mineral that's used to protect it is actually an insulator additionally I noticed that the power at the battery went under a heavy load would still be in the lower to mid 12 volt range but that at the inverter we were dipping as low as high 10s on peak this is bordering the shut-off voltage that the inverter set to



So then I decided that cheap breakers really weren't going to work for big things they're okay for things that are under 100 amps but once you get above 100 amps it's just not going to work

So what I decided to do since this is a 3000 watt 12 volt inverter I decided it would make more sense to double up the wiring so we went from a single 1/0 gauge wire to a double 1/0 gauge wire... That is the equivalent of a single 4/0 gauge wire

Which really is still a little under sized for what could easily become a 350 amp load

In addition I went to anl fuses and installed two of them, one on each line from the battery to the inverter


Now we don't see heavy drops when under heavy current we see nearly the same voltage if you're reading it at the battery Bank as you would at the inverter

From there I added a second charge controller and Silfab sil-330hl panels I decided to get cheap Chinese breakers and the first full sun day that we had I noticed that the breaker coming off of the charge controller was hot and so was the wiring so I had to take it out of place went ahead and replaced it with a mini ANL fuse and all the problems have went away

Now it's pretty fantastic.. I fire up the inverter in the morning when I wake up and it goes from somewhere between 12.4 and 12.6 and within about an hour and a half everything is charged up and sitting on float and I can run my work from home office on float as well as my gaming laptop mining the entire time as long as the sun is out

If we run the microwave for about 5 minutes or so it might take another minute or two for everything to go back to float again providing the Sun is with us

The wife and I went out for a drink after work yesterday came home about 7:30 8:00 and we watched a movie together for about 2 hours sipping on some apple pie moonshine.. long story short first thing in the morning we were still sitting at about 12.55 volts I'd like a little more battery capacity but there's something to be said for being able to go to a full charge in such a small amount of time
 
apple pie moonshine recipe plz.

Good sleuthing, and it looks like you did things right.

If you're batteries are still at 12.4-12.6 and still discharging, you don't need any more capacity.
 
apple pie moonshine recipe plz.

Good sleuthing, and it looks like you did things right.

If you're batteries are still at 12.4-12.6 and still discharging, you don't need any more capacity.
I agree in general I don't need more.. but it's times that I go days without having Sun where I really need a little more capacity
 
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