Generator vs Battery/Inverter/Solar

If you need air conditioning without utility power you will need a large generator and plenty of fuel. Or if you want to camp well below freezing you may also need a generator. Although a small 1000w should be fine.

Otherwise solar/battery/inverter/propane can easily do the rest. Worst case you will need to find a place to plug in.
I recommend trying to avoid a generator.

chobe2 wrote:
Use it all! It has TV, AC (I think we'd have to be plugged into power to use??), I want to install a microwave, etc etc

Then I suggest add the generator first and add solar later if you want. If you have room add another deep cycle battery.

A 2KW-3KW generator only needs fuel to operate.

The Large 2KW-3KW Power Inverters will require many many big batteries to operate it under load even for a short period of time and then you will need a way to recharge the batteries... The generator is the easiest solution to do this in a short time frame.

A typical 120WATT solar panel will only produce 5-6AMPS DC Current when in high Sun. You will need many many solar panels to come anywhere close to what a 2KW-3KW Generator will do. You will also need many many batteries to store the solar panel generated power in to able to use this power when you need it.

Most public camp grounds around all have generator run time restrictions and we have very few DISPERSED camping around here on the East side of the US. OFF-ROAD Camping out West is a totally different story...

To be able to camp OFF-GRID here on the East side of the US We beefed up our batteries and use a minimum wattage power inverter to run just the must have things we want to use when camping off the power grid. This does not include Air Conditioning or high wattage Microwave use. I can run 12VDC@20AMP capacity from 6PM to 11PM each night off my batteries and then can recharge them the next morning in an three hour generator run time when allowed using smart mode charging techniques. Adding solar panels will reduce my generator run time by two hours with my setup. Sometimes however you will not have high sun and then the only recourse is a generator. We deemed the generator the highest priority to have right away when we started out in 2008 and are just now thinking about adding solar panels. My roof top on my OFF-ROAD POPUP trailer which is much the same size as you TC Camper will only support a couple of solar panels.

It all depends on what you want to do...

Roy Ken

Use it all! It has TV, AC (I think we'd have to be plugged into power to use??), I want to install a microwave, etc etc

Is your use more like "tent on wheels" or do you want to use TV, DVD, laptop, CPAP, AC, microwave, etc etc?

Thanks for your reply. We tend to drive daily and stay overnight in campgrounds without power or boondock. We'll be doing a lot of 3-4 day trips and some longer trips (2 or three weeks). I don't see us sitting in one spot for more than a day. The camper has only 1 battery currently and has 2 propane tanks.

Welcome to the forum. Tell us about your intended usage? Weekends; long stays; in a CG with power or boondocking in the forest...