Solar Panel Layout?
Me again....have questions on the best layout and mounting for the panels I bought. Panels = 58.27" x 26.58" x 1.38" (26.4lbs) Roof dimensions are roughly 100" wide by 251" long. This was my ini...
Forum Discussion
alliemac9 wrote:
Another question for my plans....
If I may at some time want to also have a set of portable panels (likely only if I ever expand battery capacity and/or find I want options to augment shade issues), is there anything I could/should do during the initial install to facilitate that? I guess my vision would be the portable system would simply plug into a pigtail or connector on the RV. If you check out this video by the Wynn's at about 1:40 you'll see the connector they had on their RV for the portable system. Here's a photo of it for those of you not wanting to click through to the video:
I guess the more I see/learn about the wiring, it's probably reasonable to just do this add on later if/when I need to. It will likely just connect in to the current system pretty easily (especially if I buy a portable kit that has its own controller built in) and not require reworking any of the existing system. Would you agree? Anything I should take into account now?
I did this only kind of in reverse of what you are doing -- I put a solar system in our TT, including controller, inverter, & Trimetric meter. I started with a 120 watt folding panel. I built the system with provision to easily add roof panels. I have since sold that TT, but removed the solar system, all the components of which are mounted on a piece of 3/4" plywood that was in the pass thru storage, so was pretty easy to remove. The connection for our portable panel is an Anderson connector. The wires came out the bottom of the TT from the pass thru storage, and the Anderson connector dangled there. I enclosed it in a short piece of ABS sewer pipe, 3 or 4" diameter, forget which, with a threaded female connection that accepts a screw in ABS plug. This keeps the Anderson connector dry if driving in the rain. When I set up, I unscrew the cap and plug in the 8 gauge cables that go to my portable solar panel.
This off season, I will re-install the system in a longer TT we bought. And at that time, I plan to add 2 or 3 solar panels to the roof.
Good luck with your system!
