Driving with the generator on

darsben wrote:

JaxDad wrote:

darsben wrote:
All in all I feel the economic part is close to a wash but the convenience and comfort level is much greater.

A typical dash air system takes maybe (on average overall) 2hp, on an engine making 200hp, that is a 1% increase in load, therefore an increase in fuel consumption of 1%.

At 8.5mpg and 55mph that equates to 6.47 gal. / hour. A generator burning 0.5 gal. / hour would then be an increase of 7.7% in fuel consumption.

That's the equivalent of your mileage dropping from 8.5mpg to 7.9mpg.

I'd hardly call that "a wash".

Now factor in the savings from not using propane to cool fridge and it makes it CLOSE to a wash

Just how big is your fridge???????

Again, rather than 'gut feelings' lets actually look the FACTS.

There's roughly 91,500 btu's in a gallon of propane. Today that costs about $3.00 / gallon.

A typical 12 cubic foot Norcold RV fridge burns 2,400 BTU / hour.

So one gallon of propane will last about 38 hours of actively cooling time.

If you completely discount ANY rest time (not actively cooling) and not the 1/3rds running, 2/3rds resting time average that means the fridge would cost $3.00 divided by 38 hours or roughly 7.89 cents per hour.

A generator burning 0.5 gallons of $4.00 an hour gasoline would cost $2.00 / hour.

You really think $2.00 versus $0.0789 per hour is "CLOSE to a wash"?

That's more than 25 times the cost per hour. Hardly what I'd call "a wash".