I recently purchased a Powermax PM4 75 watt converter charger and currntly have a Xantrex 10 amp true charge providing 12 volts and charging two RV batteries.
I'm thinking of installing the Powermax PM4 into a Class-B I'm working on or just keeping it as a backup in case the C ever needs to travel I can plug it in and install 1 - 3+ house batteries. I also have a 115 watt solar panel and a Mormingstar Tri-Star solar controller that can be used either with the C or B.
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When I remove the two RV batteries I don't see any reason to have a battery charger and only require a AC/DC converter.
I guess it's sort of an experiment and to save money on new batteries which I never really used in the last 10 years the RV been sitting connected to shore power. (other than a few times pud power went out for a few hours one or twice a year after a wind and rain storm.)
If needed I can run the Genny if the PUD power goes out.
I lived in a 44 foot RV without any sort of 12 volts and there isn't really any difference between full time living in a RV with 12 volts, other than your flipping on and off 12 volt lights instead of 120 VAC. The RV als had a 120 VAC compressor frig which are more efficient. Absorption frigs require 12 volts to operate are great for traveling but really not good for full timing. Their smaller and less efficient than electric compressor frigs.
For traveling in a RV yes it's neccsary to have 12 volts, converter / battery charger, house batteries and an absorption frig, plus all your other RV gas appliances.
Connected to PUD 24/7 not really necessary and think it's a waste of money as the batteries are never really used other than to filter and clean up 12 volts.
Power supplies, converters and inverters have seen alot improvements over the years and put out much cleaner 12 volts where batteries aren't really neccsary to produce cleaner power for more sensitive electronics.
So the questions remains how many amps and how many volts?
I'm thinking 13.5 vdc psu will be better than a 12 volts as there is a voltage drop with the long runs of DC wiring.
The two psus I'm currently looking at is a 25 amp 12 volt and a 22.4 amp 13.5 volt psu, which I'm thinking of getting instead of the 12 volts.
I'm uncertain how many amps will be a good amount to supply 12 volts to the RV which will be basically used for lighting and the frig.
10, 15, 20, 25 amps? I've come across a few new 8.5 to 12.5 amp 12 volt converters.
I have approx. 8 12 volts light @ ~2 amps each which if ever on at same time would draw approx. 16 amps, plus amps required for the frig.
So a 13.5 volt 22.5 amp psu should work ok.
I've lived in a RV for more than 25 years and it's really no different than full time than living in a mobile home. You tend to forget about the batteries and charger as if they don't exist as their rarely if ever used when connected to PUD 24/7.
Now a solar system (renewable energy) is much different as batteries are required to maintain the power system. A good solar system connected to PUD would want a good converter / charger to maintain the batteries when there is little or no sunlight.
If you have a wind generator the same thing. I've looked into water generators as that's another method to create energy to maintain batteries.
