First Time Boondocking Plan - Tech Question
I am trying to learn & prepare to Boondock for 12 days in Oct. I have a standard 5er setup (two 6 volt batteries) and a 2000w Honda generator. For convenience I purchased a battery level indicator at ...
Forum Discussion
Well... if you're going to be THAT way about it... then I'll, once again espouse my old mantra...
CAPACITY IS KING!!!
Though the actual effects may not be as pronounced as the theory suggests... Peukert says that... (paraphrasing)... per a given draw... the greater the capacity, the slower the draw per cell and the actual capacity is increased exponentially.
Put another way...
If you take 100A off of a bank over 100 hours, the capacity left will be greater than if you take the same 100A off in 20 hours.
Cram as many amp hours in your battery box as it will take. 4-GC2s would be great! Try and be sure to keep pairs of the same age in parallel together.
I don't have the height for golf cart batteries and have room for a max of 3. So I have 3-Group 27s for a total of about 300 Ah.
With a few hours a day on an old 13" tube TV/DVD player, a few hours a day of boombox, some furnace at night and a few hours on the LED bulbs, I can go 5 days before my bank gets down to 50%. As a broke business owner, I have never taken a longer camping trip than that, so solar is a non-issue for me... thus far.
However, my rig is old and built at a time where parasitic draws were virtually non-existent. My CO and smoke alarms run on their own batteries and I have no fancy monitors and such. About the only draw I have are a few gas valves. Not everyone is so luck to have such an ancient rig. :)
CAPACITY IS KING!!!
Though the actual effects may not be as pronounced as the theory suggests... Peukert says that... (paraphrasing)... per a given draw... the greater the capacity, the slower the draw per cell and the actual capacity is increased exponentially.
Put another way...
If you take 100A off of a bank over 100 hours, the capacity left will be greater than if you take the same 100A off in 20 hours.
Cram as many amp hours in your battery box as it will take. 4-GC2s would be great! Try and be sure to keep pairs of the same age in parallel together.
I don't have the height for golf cart batteries and have room for a max of 3. So I have 3-Group 27s for a total of about 300 Ah.
With a few hours a day on an old 13" tube TV/DVD player, a few hours a day of boombox, some furnace at night and a few hours on the LED bulbs, I can go 5 days before my bank gets down to 50%. As a broke business owner, I have never taken a longer camping trip than that, so solar is a non-issue for me... thus far.
However, my rig is old and built at a time where parasitic draws were virtually non-existent. My CO and smoke alarms run on their own batteries and I have no fancy monitors and such. About the only draw I have are a few gas valves. Not everyone is so luck to have such an ancient rig. :)
