Propane furnace battery usage

AndyW wrote:
...
Nice to know I can make it through a long weekend without hookups without any inconvenience now. Honestly unless we need to run the AC, I'm not even sure I'll bother paying extra for an electrical site anymore.

That's kinda where wife and I are right now. Kids rarely camp with us anymore, so we go to all the parks and woods that don't have hookups. Usually enjoy larger campsites and less commotion!

We use something like this. Also got ours from Harbor Freight. If we think we might run low we put it on the roof or in the window to top off the batteries.
15W 12V solar panel

To make sure we don't drive off with it on the roof we tie a brightly colored sign to our steering wheel whenever it gets deployed. At $70 it doesn't break the bank.

Hi,

Solar panels are not really on the toy list especially if camping "off the grid". Mine have paid for themselves in saved campground fees, and battery replacement fees. Cost for 256 watts was $1700.00 plus $600.00 for installation.

One set of four batteries is now ten years old, the others are five years old. They still meet my needs.

smkettner wrote:

AndyW wrote:
Just a quick update - everything was fine. Running on battery power was a complete non-issue, they were still showing > 50% charge when we left on Sunday. I wasn't even all that careful about power after making it through the first night without the indicator lights even changing.

Nice to know I can make it through a long weekend without hookups without any inconvenience now. Honestly unless we need to run the AC, I'm not even sure I'll bother paying extra for an electrical site anymore.

Some RVs perform better than others. Sounds like your systems are working well and probably some conservation mixed in.

I still recommend 100 to 200 watts of solar and LED lights if you are thinking more often to be off grid.

I agree, and they're on the list, but the toy budget for this year has been spent (and then some...).

AndyW wrote:
Just a quick update - everything was fine. Running on battery power was a complete non-issue, they were still showing > 50% charge when we left on Sunday. I wasn't even all that careful about power after making it through the first night without the indicator lights even changing.

Nice to know I can make it through a long weekend without hookups without any inconvenience now. Honestly unless we need to run the AC, I'm not even sure I'll bother paying extra for an electrical site anymore.

Some RVs perform better than others. Sounds like your systems are working well and probably some conservation mixed in.

I still recommend 100 to 200 watts of solar and LED lights if you are thinking more often to be off grid.

Interesting. We also find our batteries are okay for four days in summer and two when freezing overnight. We pushed our luck one trip and ruined the batteries in a week with only engine charging while traveling. Some calculations suggest our usage is about 10 amp hrs a day. It takes a few hours of engine charging to recover that. But our new 100 watt solar panel may well provide more than enough, particularly in eliminating battery draw during the day.

Just wondering how much electricity it would take to charge up the batteries.
Say 100 amp-hours = 100x14Vx1hr = 1400 watt hours = 1.4 KWH
That would cost the campground less than 50 cents.

Andy, that is great and it makes a lot of dry campgrounds usable for you. The next step is boondocking and not even paying for the site. :)

Just a quick update - everything was fine. Running on battery power was a complete non-issue, they were still showing > 50% charge when we left on Sunday. I wasn't even all that careful about power after making it through the first night without the indicator lights even changing.

Nice to know I can make it through a long weekend without hookups without any inconvenience now. Honestly unless we need to run the AC, I'm not even sure I'll bother paying extra for an electrical site anymore.

Its hard to say because the furnaces are not all the same in their electrical consumption. 6 or 8 amps is often given as a number but mine is rated at about 3 amps. Also they cycle and are generally not running continuously.

Here's a few tips:

Blankets are great, use plenty and set the heat as far down from 70 degrees as you're comfortable with.

Always be sure you start with fully charged batteries. Don't start a parked RV and assume they're still charged from last time, or that the drive will charge them up.

Read through your furnace instructions/spec and try to determine how much power it uses. Learn you battery amp hour capacity and how to figure run time for various loads.

Convert to LED lighting if practical or necessary.

Oh and the question about plugging in at the pedestal in another site... Prearrange it in the office-request permission-pay for it. Don't do it without discussion with management.

I'm really surprised at the responses. We do this all the time with night time temps in the 40s and the thermostat set at 67 or 70. We also don't have any LED lights yet but they are on the list. The only time we had a problem was when our 7 and 8 yr old batteries were going bad. We replaced them with Walmart group 29 batteries and have been going good ever since. We do have hook ups for solar panels from Harbor Freight so we can throw a panel in the front window at the storage lot or on the roof in a camp ground but don't always do it. We easily go 3 nights of full furnace usage.

We also have the foil insulation that we have cut to cover all the windows, exterior roof vents, shower dome etc. We mount these with friction fit or velcro. They are great for keeping heat in at night or keeping heat out and the cool in when the weather is hot.

Our propane tank routinely lasts an entire summer and covers all our trips. Most require heat all night long because we go to the mountains alot. We have never run out with only needing to fill it once per year.

Here is my blog post covering when we replaced our batteries and the decisions we made vs. the common wisdom on the forums.
A battery replacing we will go.