Another question about solar
So while shopping for a new trailer, I was speaking with the salesman about solar. Seems most new trailers are coming pre wired for solar. Which is cool. I don't really know exactly what that means, b...
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To give you an idea of what you're up against; this may help, I have both wind and solar on my home, both are considered "Wild Power".
In other words as the wind increases, so does the wattage output on the wind generator. Solar is essentially the same, a little to a lot of shading and wattage output drops...full sun and you're doing good.
However with wild power you need a way to store it and regulate it...which means in the case of a camper, batteries and lots of them to pull an AC unit. But it just doesnt stop there, you need enough batteries to be able to exercise them without overly discharging them...lead/acids will treat you as rough as you treat them. To give you a rough idea try starting out with about 22 golf cart batteries and go from there, so you will a need a LOT of panels to drive an AC unit, plus keep a charge on overall system, the inverter itself will need to be something a serious off-gridder would use, such as an Outback inverter at around 3600 watts... you need to compare it to the output of your AC unit, each Outback alone will cost about 2,500 bucks. However Outback inverters are capable of being tied together for to increase wattage output, so for every 3600 watts, its going to cost you another 2500 dollars.
I use Outback exclusivley, I plugged it on 5 years ago and it never has shut off I use that for our "Island system" within our home. I must have let teh magic smoke out of 4-5 700 dollar inverters before I "caught on"
Any inverter you plan on using to pull an AC unit better be far beyond the cheesy big box store stuff because when a good load hits it, it will only let the magic smoke out of it and you will be out of the 500-700 for that inverter.
Driving an AC unit is a daunting task with any RE system
My home has 22 panels at around 230 watts each, on a good day I can make about 7-11 kw....no batteries on this part of the system; the solar is grid tied so I dont need a huge battery bank.
The ONLY reason I have a battery bank and a wind generator Island system is because its backup power...the power drops around here faster than a war torn third world nation.
Try a block of ice and a fan behind it, or dont move around a lot during the hottest part of the day, the best way to do what you want to do is a get a generator. Leave the camper solar stuff to charging a battery for the water pump and led lights
In other words as the wind increases, so does the wattage output on the wind generator. Solar is essentially the same, a little to a lot of shading and wattage output drops...full sun and you're doing good.
However with wild power you need a way to store it and regulate it...which means in the case of a camper, batteries and lots of them to pull an AC unit. But it just doesnt stop there, you need enough batteries to be able to exercise them without overly discharging them...lead/acids will treat you as rough as you treat them. To give you a rough idea try starting out with about 22 golf cart batteries and go from there, so you will a need a LOT of panels to drive an AC unit, plus keep a charge on overall system, the inverter itself will need to be something a serious off-gridder would use, such as an Outback inverter at around 3600 watts... you need to compare it to the output of your AC unit, each Outback alone will cost about 2,500 bucks. However Outback inverters are capable of being tied together for to increase wattage output, so for every 3600 watts, its going to cost you another 2500 dollars.
I use Outback exclusivley, I plugged it on 5 years ago and it never has shut off I use that for our "Island system" within our home. I must have let teh magic smoke out of 4-5 700 dollar inverters before I "caught on"
Any inverter you plan on using to pull an AC unit better be far beyond the cheesy big box store stuff because when a good load hits it, it will only let the magic smoke out of it and you will be out of the 500-700 for that inverter.
Driving an AC unit is a daunting task with any RE system
My home has 22 panels at around 230 watts each, on a good day I can make about 7-11 kw....no batteries on this part of the system; the solar is grid tied so I dont need a huge battery bank.
The ONLY reason I have a battery bank and a wind generator Island system is because its backup power...the power drops around here faster than a war torn third world nation.
Try a block of ice and a fan behind it, or dont move around a lot during the hottest part of the day, the best way to do what you want to do is a get a generator. Leave the camper solar stuff to charging a battery for the water pump and led lights
