Solar Kart, Cart Whatever Emergency Thing on Wheels

[Ivelostmytailagain]

This is my solar kart, hurriedly pressed into use when the contractor boring for a cable company tore up my direct bury electrical service. Posting on Beginners forum because technically this is still my first system. Was living in my RV last year and these components were chosen, purchased and were in the process of being installed for that application, and a much smaller budget. Living in a nice home now, but also very wary of recent Texas electrical history. The red cart is Harbor Freight special. If starting from scratch today would definitely chose 24 or 48 volts. Kart was quickly finished to the point where I could plug in my refrigerator, and it ran for 52 hours before power to the house was restored.
That test of the system was timely, but also brought up some issues that need to be addressed for the future: 1) Finish wiring up the solar charge controller, 2) Add a power strip or PDU, 3) Finish the 12v connections for 12v LED lights and recharging things, and 4) Decide on a way to actually cook the food in the refrigerator. No gas stove here, it’s got an electric oven and stove. Weber grill? Oh, and add a shunt thing for displaying battery life.
Questions: Do I need a 20amp breaker before the outlet box? Now that I have more of something that I’ll no longer take for granted, money, can I add another manufacturers 12v battery to the cart for more capacity, like an Epoch? Any else I haven’t thought of?
Yes, yes I now know that building a solar system on a Harbor Freight tool cart isn’t an original idea and others are cooler, better and can probably cut and light your cigar.

 

[JBoffgrid2022]

Cool rig, I dig it!

 

[Philip53]

You did good, especially for a beginner. I am thinking of building two 'generators', one for each of my kids (40 years old). If you are looking to cook with your generator, take a look at the portable one 'burner' induction cook tops. I have a home size one for the house, and a small one for the van RV I built, which has 2 - 200Ah Victron 12 volt batteries. Those batteries have powered a microwave, the induction cook top and a roof top air conditioner, but not all at the same time. It's amazing how relatively little power that cooktop takes. I love both of my induction cooktops and would never go back to anything else, even have converted some gas & traditional electric cooktop users to induction.

 

[Ivelostmytailagain]

Cool rig, I dig it!

Thanks!

 

[BerndL]

If starting from scratch today would definitely chose 24 or 48 volts.

This is great! I think that giandel you got is the only one of theirs that has a terminal block below the 3000w range, and they don't do a 23V version of it iirc. That's their listed one, right?

 

[Ivelostmytailagain]

This is great! I think that giandel you got is the only one of theirs that has a terminal block below the 3000w range, and they don't do a 25V version iirc. That's their listed one, right?

It’s “ETL listed with UL458 standard” I truly don’t know what that means. It ran my side by side refrigerator in the kitchen for 52 hours. Didn’t get warm and only whined a little when the fans kicked in upon the compressor starting.