Solar. What Can It Do?

cm11599ps wrote:
We've got dual batteries on our camper and 90% of our trips are with electric sites. The other 10% of our trips are dry camping and we take along our Honda 2000. I've also got a 300W PSW inverter hooked directly to the batteries which the trailer plugs in to when not running the genny.

What would a solar panel do for us? For arguments sake, let's say a 100W panel.

While solar pundits who regularly dry camp would scoff at such a meagre solar setup probably the majority of us are like you - mostly camp on electric sites, occasionally dry camp because we get the "urge" or can't get an electric site, or because power to our electric site has failed for one reason or another. For us it seems to me a couple of portable panels that can be moved around to follow the sun and an inexpensive PWM controller is "good enough". For system sizing the best guide I've seen is to think in terms of 1 watt of solar for 1 amp of battery AH rating ... so for a pair of 6 volt GC-2 batteries a solar setup in the 230 to 250 watt range would be a reasonably appropriate solution. This may not totally eliminate dependence on your genset but would go a long way to reducing it. :)