Our RV came with residential appliances, an 1800W inverter, and 4 golf cart (GC2) 6V batteries. The engine has it's own dedicated battery and is isolated with the key off.
I have solar power at home, and I've been using a Xantrex Prowatt SW2000 Inverter 24/7/365 for almost 8 years to power a portion of my home. The power is cleaner than grid power. Screen shot of my inverter's output:
Keep in mind this inverter needs to be fairly close to the battery bank, and fed with 4/0 cables. Power in, equals power out (minus losses). A 1000W load at 120V is 1000/120 = 8.3A But to do the same work with an inverter, using 1/10th the supplied voltage, takes 10 times the current.. 1000W load at 12V is 1000/12 = 83.3A This is why the cables need to be so large.
Here's what I'm feeding each of my inverters:
Here's the recommended cable size per Xantrex:
Refrigerators have a small compressor. That's not the issue. It's the defrost cycle that puts a large demand on the inverter and batteries. Worse yet, many fridges immediately go into the defrost cycle when power is first supplied.
Here's the data from the two house fridges at had at the time of testing:
Refrigerator in garage: Not running but on: 0 Watts. Compressor running: 114-140 Watts. Total per day: 1.15 KW, 47.92 Watts per hour average.
Refrigerator in house: Compressor running: 146 Watts. Defrost: 572 Watts. Total per day 2.15 KW, 89.58 Watts per hour average.It just so happens that the RV came with the exact inverter I have at home. Consequently, it works flawlessly, just as the other one I'm using.
It's always good to have more inverter than you currently need. If you decide to put anything else on it, overloading will be less of an issue. Prices have also come down on these, so not a huge difference in price between power ratings.
You can see all the specs on Amazon:
Xantrex PROWatt 2000 Inverter
