05 Pleasureway Excel - Solar Panels?
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 an...
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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.
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.
