Battery Question

kenkorona wrote:
OP here. Thank you all for some great insights. I read all your posts and did other research and now I understand the pros and cons of the battery types. Now with that information other questions are raised and again I look forward to any insights you can offer.

I am planning on buying a new TC and it will not come with a generator nor with a generator hookup. I am also planning a pretty long trip for next year. Right now it looks like it will be a total of 4 months with at least 2 of them in Alaska. We enjoy boondocking; usually no shore power, so having adequate battery power is important.

To that end, I'm sold on the benefit of the lithium batteries and plan to put at least 2 in the TC. The reasons I'm sold on them are 1) lighter weight, 2) OK to discharge further without degrading its capacity, 3) accepts a charge faster.

So my next question is... is there anything special I need to know or do if I decide to put Lithium batteries in a TC when the manufacturer was planning on it using FLA batteries? The camper will be equipped with solar panels, either 2 or 3 100w panels. But my question is not about whether those panels would be enough to recharge that much battery capacity, rather the question is about the equipment's compatibility.

Thanks

A modern truck camper has three power sources for charging:

1. truck
2. power converter
3. solar controller

If we forget about the truck, the most popular power converter is made by Progressive Dynamics and a popular model they have is the 45A one. They make converter/chargers that ether has a switch that can switch the charge voltage over to a LI compatible voltage OR the entire guts can be swapped out with LI compatible guts for ~$200.

The solar controller is a similar story, many modern solar charge controllers simply have a LI compatible setting or if worse comes to worse its a matter of 4-6 wires and <$200 for a controller that is LI compatible.


- Mark0.