Should I Change My WFCO Converter?
Opinions have often been expressed, both on this and other RV forums, that most stock RV converters are inadequate to properly charge and maintain batteries and are often of poor quality. It is frequ...
Forum Discussion
Hi,
It comes down to how many hours you can run a generator for the difference in price. $145 is going to run an inverter generator at 1/4 load for a lot of hours.
How many hours of genny time are going to be saved? In the past year I've only run 4 tanks of fuel through my generator, and those were about cooling and heating, not charging a battery bank. In October I did do one hour per day because my RV was in one place, so not much alternator charging was going on. I was running an electric heater to make the bedroom comfortable. Battery recharging was a side benefit.
Assuming conservation (i.e. led lighting) has been done, you may save 1 hour of run time every three days by going to a better fit for a converter. Payback is going to be several years at that rate.
You could save the same by using the 40 amp charger you already own.
I've set up my RV for solar. I run out of fresh water before I run out of power.
I've optimized the electrical system to allow shore power charging on a single 15 amp circuit, which I can do at 125 amps @ 15.5 volts. Payback for doing so is nearly forever at $1700. (the interest lost on investing the money is more than the savings). Or if I look at it another way, I wanted a pure sine wave inverter in the 3000 watt class. It happened to include the 125 amp recharge feature. So perhaps it cost me nothing extra?
I never ran my generator for battery recharging when I was part time. In the last year of full time I have only run it once specifically for battery charging--and then only for one hour.
I'd save the money for a new converter and put it towards Solar. With a 300 watt system, with no inverter use, the generator may not ever need to be run for simple battery charging.
It comes down to how many hours you can run a generator for the difference in price. $145 is going to run an inverter generator at 1/4 load for a lot of hours.
How many hours of genny time are going to be saved? In the past year I've only run 4 tanks of fuel through my generator, and those were about cooling and heating, not charging a battery bank. In October I did do one hour per day because my RV was in one place, so not much alternator charging was going on. I was running an electric heater to make the bedroom comfortable. Battery recharging was a side benefit.
Assuming conservation (i.e. led lighting) has been done, you may save 1 hour of run time every three days by going to a better fit for a converter. Payback is going to be several years at that rate.
You could save the same by using the 40 amp charger you already own.
I've set up my RV for solar. I run out of fresh water before I run out of power.
I've optimized the electrical system to allow shore power charging on a single 15 amp circuit, which I can do at 125 amps @ 15.5 volts. Payback for doing so is nearly forever at $1700. (the interest lost on investing the money is more than the savings). Or if I look at it another way, I wanted a pure sine wave inverter in the 3000 watt class. It happened to include the 125 amp recharge feature. So perhaps it cost me nothing extra?
I never ran my generator for battery recharging when I was part time. In the last year of full time I have only run it once specifically for battery charging--and then only for one hour.
I'd save the money for a new converter and put it towards Solar. With a 300 watt system, with no inverter use, the generator may not ever need to be run for simple battery charging.
