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tuna_fisher's avatar
tuna_fisher
Explorer
Jan 24, 2017

Solar install question

Finally installing solar on my TC. Read somewhere that you can hook up power to your electrical panel instead of your battery. Would be great for me and was wondering if you would loose anything doing that. I gather there talking of hooking into the main lug. My panels will be laying flat so I don't want to loose anymore charging.
  • You could hook up the output from the solar charge controller to the DC side of the converter or DC power distribution buss. But all the factory wiring I've seen is pretty light, you'll get a lot of voltage drop to the batteries. Best bet is to go directly to the batteries with heavy gauge cable. And if you want to run an inverter you'll need to go directly to the batteries.
  • I think I didn't word this correct, what I'm saying is do everything but instead of going from the controller to the battery go to the main lug on the control panel, would that charge the batteries?
  • There are tons of threads on this subject and even more info on the Internet. But in summary you need 4 things:
    - panels to collect energy from the sun
    - battery(ies) to store said energy and provide power to the
    - inverter that you will need to convert 12V DC from the battery to 120V AC
    - charge controller to regulate the energy that the panels provide and recharge your battery(ies)

    You would plug your TC into the inverter. There are lots of resources on the Internet to help you size how much storage you need (batteries) and how many panels you need to recharge based on your anticipated usage.
  • You can't hook 12v solar panels to your electrical panel. Even playing loose slot machines you're going to lose.

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