RDMueller wrote:
Don't really plan on doing much gen charging by the way. The only long trips we take are during the summer and then we need A/C. Spring and fall work for dry camping but because of school, we are usually limited to 3 nights.
We did one 2-night trip this fall, watched a couple of hours of TV both nights, ran the furnace a fair amount in the mornings and evenings, LED lights and the normal phantom loads, never did any charging and before we left the SGs were all about 1.200 or roughly 50%SOC. During more moderate temperatures with little to no furnace time, I think we could easily pull off 3 nights without going below 50%.
So due to the short nature of our dry camping trips, I'm trying to basically be set up to "bring all of our electricity" with us, then charge when we get home.
Your description above is about how we camp ... I call it hit-and-run camping. We charge our 230 amp hour AGM deep cycle battery bank on trips with the engine alternator between camp spots, and at drycamp spots with a little 650W quiet Honda generator. Our AGMs charge enough faster than liquid acid batts such that a few hours on the alternator does it, or 5 hours via the Honda (one full 0.5 gal tank's worth of gasoline) feeding our single stage 7345 converter does it good enough to easily get us another day or two of 12V power. At home we charge the battery bank fully low and slow with a power cord feeding the 7345.
The above worked for about 8 years on our first set of AGMs and we're using the same approach on their replacements. However, we chose AGM batteries that are spec'd to be floated on the same voltage as the 7345 puts out. Many AGM batteries and most liquid acid batteries will be damaged from being exposed to the output voltage of a 7345 converter for long periods.
