05 Pleasureway Excel - Solar Panels?

Just keep in mind small solar panels don't produce alot of DC CURRENT when in high sun. A typical 120WATT SOLAR PANEL will only produce 5-6 DC AMPS. High sun is only available for approx 5-6 hours a day for planning purposes... You will need to determine that this is enough DC CURRENT to re-charge your batteries to put back what you are using them for...

To bring a typical single battery from a 50% charge state to a 90% charge state will require around 14.4VDC with the capacity of 17-20AMPS DC current per battery if you want the battery to be re-charged to this level in a three hour time period. If you only have 5-6 hours of high sun in a day you can see how quick your may be getting into trouble keeping the battery bank charged up enough to use for long periods of time after the high sun goes away.

If you just top off a battery using a small solar panels you will eventually get depleted too low to use.

All of this takes planning on what you really want to be doing using your battery bank off the power grid...

For us we do alot of camping off the power grid and all is planned out to use our batteries (Total of 255AHs) for all of the things we want to use when off the power grid and have the battery bank depleted down to their 50% charge state (appx 12.0VDC) by 8AM each morning. This is when we fire up our 2KW generator and run our on-board smart mode converter/charger for around three hours to recharge our battery banks back up to their 90% charge state. We can only do about 12 of these 50% to 90% charge cycles before having to do a full 100% charge state which would take a good solid 12-14 hours time to complete. Thats too long to run the generator especially where generator run time restrictions are in place where you might be camping.

Having solar panels to use for us would only be used to cut back our generator run time to only have to run around one hour during the morning run. Then we could use the lower DC CURRENT from several solar panels (at least 20AMPS DC Current total) to hopefully finish the 90% required charge state so we can safely use the batteries again the next day/night run. My 255AH battery bank likes to draw around 52AMPS DC current for the first 15-20 minutes when first hit with 14.4VDC. This 52 AMPS then start tapering back as the battery bank starts taking on charge and eventually drops down to around 8AMPS or so. After the first initial high DC AMP charge has been completed then you can really benefit from the solar solar for the rest of the HIGH SUN day.

Just things to think about about setting up your solar setup for your needs...

In our case I will not want to start the next day/night run off my battery bank without them being at the 90% charge state otherwise they will be depleted early and it will get dark on me around 10PM at night haha... I want my batteries to not to get down to their 12.0VDC level until I am allowed to run my 2KW Generator then morning at 8AM to start my re-charging sequence.

Been doing this routine since 2009 and batteries are still in pretty good shape...

Roy Ken

Makin' Do thanks for asking your question. We are wanting to look into solar too. Hoping that someone has already done this on an Excel. The perfect setup would be tillable panels, for the winter lower angles of sun light.

We have recently added two 6v Deka batteries under the bed of our Excel. The original AGM battery is still installed. I have separated the new bank by installing a separate shut off switch.

RoyB wrote:
Just keep in mind small solar panels don't produce alot of DC CURRENT when in high sun. A typical 120WATT SOLAR PANEL will only produce 5-6 DC AMPS. High sun is only available for approx 5-6 hours a day for planning purposes... You will need to determine that this is enough DC CURRENT to re-charge your batteries to put back what you are using them for...

To bring a typical single battery from a 50% charge state to a 90% charge state will require around 14.4VDC with the capacity of 17-20AMPS DC current per battery if you want the battery to be re-charged to this level in a three hour time period. If you only have 5-6 hours of high sun in a day you can see how quick your may be getting into trouble keeping the battery bank charged up enough to use for long periods of time after the high sun goes away.

If you just top off a battery using a small solar panels you will eventually get depleted too low to use.

All of this takes planning on what you really want to be doing using your battery bank off the power grid...

For us we do alot of camping off the power grid and all is planned out to use our batteries (Total of 255AHs) for all of the things we want to use when off the power grid and have the battery bank depleted down to their 50% charge state (appx 12.0VDC) by 8AM each morning. This is when we fire up our 2KW generator and run our on-board smart mode converter/charger for around three hours to recharge our battery banks back up to their 90% charge state. We can only do about 12 of these 50% to 90% charge cycles before having to do a full 100% charge state which would take a good solid 12-14 hours time to complete. Thats too long to run the generator especially where generator run time restrictions are in place where you might be camping.

Having solar panels to use for us would only be used to cut back our generator run time to only have to run around one hour during the morning run. Then we could use the lower DC CURRENT from several solar panels (at least 20AMPS DC Current total) to hopefully finish the 90% required charge state so we can safely use the batteries again the next day/night run. My 255AH battery bank likes to draw around 52AMPS DC current for the first 15-20 minutes when first hit with 14.4VDC. This 52 AMPS then start tapering back as the battery bank starts taking on charge and eventually drops down to around 8AMPS or so. After the first initial high DC AMP charge has been completed then you can really benefit from the solar solar for the rest of the HIGH SUN day.

Just things to think about about setting up your solar setup for your needs...

In our case I will not want to start the next day/night run off my battery bank without them being at the 90% charge state otherwise they will be depleted early and it will get dark on me around 10PM at night haha... I want my batteries to not to get down to their 12.0VDC level until I am allowed to run my 2KW Generator then morning at 8AM to start my re-charging sequence.

Been doing this routine since 2009 and batteries are still in pretty good shape...

Roy Ken

+1
A pair of 24X48 panels may not be enough to properly charge a pair of AGM's. Also making them tiltable will get more out of them

what little I know about solar panels, makes me think best results are when they are aimed directly at the sun- even a slight 15º angle can reduce charging by 40% or more. Heat makes the panels less efficient.

(I had a solar survey done here at my home)

I see drawbacks to panels on the roof- 1 is effect on MPG, but also they are "stuck" pointing straight up- and in many places, many times of year the sun will be at some angle....plus at many campsites we want to keep the van shaded for temp control in the van and the ambient temp of the fridge

i am considering getting one of the small units w/ panels and controller that sets up on the ground- you pick a clear area with good sun exposure and move the panels to follow the sun after a few hours.

mike

HERE is a very good spreadsheet for figuring your energy use, battery needs, and solar system sizing.

First you figure out what you use, then size your battery bank at about 2X that nominal amp hours, to avoid running the batteries below 50%.

Then you figure out the amount of solar you need to get the batteries up to 100% every day---because the second worst thing you can do to a battery is to never fully charge it.

With solar, you need to allow a generous margin in sizing, due to inefficiencies from shade/cloud cover, panel angle, and latitude.

What many people do is size the solar so that MOST days it is enough to get you back to full charge, and for the days it is not, run the generator for a couple of hours.

Thanks for all your input. Was really hoping someone had already set up a system on a Pleasure Way Excel wide body. That doesn't seem to be the case so far. However, a roof is a roof and you only have so much area that you can attach panels to. In my case two would be the max.
Now, which panels and which controller questions would be best posted in the Tech forum.
What I'm setting up is a second and separate battery system. The current factory system has room for one 12v group 34 battery in the outside compartment for all house needs. It's an almost new battery, so I don't want to replace it. My second system will have two Lifeline 6v batteries at 220 AH that will provide for only an Engel DC front opening fridge and when needed, power for a PlatCat catalytic heater. Both batteries will fit under the sink. I do not have nor do I want an inverter.

Makin' Do wrote:
Just wondering if any of you that have an Excel wide body have placed solar panels on your roof. If so, can you (or maybe already have) share your installation? I'm putting in two new AGM batteries and think solar would be the way to go to keep them charged up since I don't spend much time camping with hook-ups.
Checking out the roof, looks like I would have room for two 24x48 panels between the roof vent and air conditioner shroud.

Hi, I have a 2012 PW Excel and you can't really put solar on the roof easily but I did purchase a Renogy 100 watt suitcase and absolutely love it. I can easily stay for a few days somewhere no problem. You can also hook up another 100W to suitcase unit. I asked at Renogy.

Easy to set up and take down. I am very happy with my purchase.

I too recommend Renogy but I went with a fixed 100 watt monocrystaline panel with controlerxcables and mounts for just under $200. I don't tilt them but they do help keep batteries charged and running my auxiliary compressor fridge. I attached mine to my fiberglass roof using Eternabond. Solar is great and you don't need to spend huge amounts on it. Renogy also has flat panels that mount flush to the roof but will be less efficient because of not ventilation underneath as well as inability to setup for tilting.

I don't have a Pleasure Way, but as stated "a roof is a roof". I installed two Renogy 100 watt panels from Amazon and a Renogy controller and I have two 12v conventional deep cycle batteries. Last summer, we spent two weeks in a NF campground. No hookups, of course. All I can tell you is they worked very well for us. Perfect? No. Help a lot? Yes. I ran our genset about an hour each day when it was cloudy. We were in a forested area and had, normally, about six hours of good sun on the roof. I am very pleased with the performance.

Knowing how to live away from hookups and be conservative on power usage is a must. I built in a digital voltmeter for the system and I monitored it carefully, never letting the batteries get below 12v. We have been boondockers for a lot of years and this is the best solution we have ever had on a rig.

Paul

We too have the 100w Renology suitcase connected to a single 12v wet cell. We have managed to go four days without starting the generator on a couple of occasions. We are pretty conservative with our power but we do use the fan and a bit of radio during the day and a few led lights at night plus at least 6 hours on the cpap machine. We do not have a compressor refrigerator and only use a 150 watt inverter occasionally. I would like to install permanent solar but there is limited available real estate on my Sprinter AI roof.