Hardwiring inverter to converter and redundant charging

I'm not sure how to answer this, but your first sentence also says you'll have solar charging as well. If so, you probably need to add that to your drawing.

Jim

can it be done.. yes..
but for the diagram you have drawn, you Need a whole house inverter, something that will carry 30amps (not supply..just pass thru) or more of 120vac

and you will need a switch/Circuit breaker to turn off the converter (remembering to do so is the big problem)

actually much better to parallel the converter and charger 120v input, so that the converter is automatically off when there is NO shore power

people usually use a "break out sub panel" to power the needed circuit from the inverter
everything has power when connected to shore
with out shore power, only the inverter circuit has 120v power

Excuse me but why is it so importent to turn of the converter? I am thinking to do pretty much the same thing but I am totally new to this thought.

Thanks

hgpezi wrote:
Excuse me but why is it so importent to turn of the converter? I am thinking to do pretty much the same thing but I am totally new to this thought.

Thanks

Because the converter will be attempting to charge the batteries with the power from the inverter which comes from the batteries. In summary, the batteries would be attempting to charge themselves.

Need more information to be able to give good advice.

What converter do you have? Some are "smart". Most are "stupid".

Suspect any inverter large enough to handle your RV (all but heavy loads such as roof A/C, water heater and any other heavy loads) it will have a smart built in charger that is likely vastly superior to your converter.

If true, there are two good choices: Disconnect or remove the converter. Leave converter in place, but install a switch on the 120 VAC hot to it. This would give you the redundancy if the charger section of the inverter/charger failed, but allow you (AS YOU HAVE TO) to make sure it is disabled when not on shore power. If left connected, as posted above, you would quickly deplete the batteries-- inverter powering converter powering inverter...

Hi,

Don't muddy the waters.

Solar charge controller connects to the battery bank.

Inverter powers the shore connection.

If you want it automated then a transfer switch and a sub panel work well.

If not, just provide an outlet that is supplied by the inverter and plug in the shore power cord. The converter needs disconnection. The fridge, and water heater should be set to propane.

Maybe this 30AMP Wiring configuration will help...



I installed my high wattage INVERTER as close to the battery terminals as possible...

This is my layout around the WF8900 series Power Distribution Panel... The WF8945 Original CONNVERTER was just left in place as a turned OFF spare unit and I use the PD9260C Converter as primary.


In your case a 3000WATT INVERTER will require alot of DC CURRENT coming from your battery bank if loaded down full. This will draw over 250AMPS DC CURRENT from your battery bank so you will have to have many batteries in the bank if you want to run in this mode for even just a few hours. You already know how fast a single 12VDC Deep Cycle battery lasts when just pulling 5-6AMPS DC load over night. I can only get maybe one hour using my 255AH Capacity Battery Bank to operate my 1500WATT PSW INVERTER running pretty much full load. I actually have a 600WATT PSW INVERTER being used as my workhorse Inverter and only use my 1500WATT PSW Inverter to just power up the 120VAC 15AMP Receptacles are the trailer. I switch OFF all of the 120VAC circuit breakers in power panel and just have my Converter and 120VAC receptacles connected.

INVERTERS need alot of DC CURRENT from the batteries to operate. Check with the guys on here that live 24/7 in their motorhomes and see how much Battery Capacity and Solar Panels they have on their trailers...

Roy Ken

pianotuna wrote:
Hi,

Don't muddy the waters.

Solar charge controller connects to the battery bank.

Inverter powers the shore connection.

If you want it automated then a transfer switch and a sub panel work well.

If not, just provide an outlet that is supplied by the inverter and plug in the shore power cord. The converter needs disconnection. The fridge, and water heater should be set to propane.

This^^^ We just plug our shore power cable directly into the 120V outlet on the inverter and it powers the whole house. It it's a manual fool proof transfer switch! The converter must be switched off so it isn't trying to use the batteries to charge the batteries.
You can use any size inverter you want to power the whole camper, you're just limited on what you can run by the capacity of the inverter. We power our TT this way all the time with a 300 watt one. We usually just use the AC power to run the television.

Run the whole RV? Air conditioner? Electric water heater? Microwave? 120v fridge?

And you will need to turn the converter off. The battery will supply the 12v power direct.

hyfyve wrote:
I want to wire my inverter with switch to my converter so I can run my whole trailer on the batteries if I do not have shore power.

My converter also has a charger and all the 12 volt is distributed through it, so when the converter is getting 120 VAC it is also charging the batteries.

Therefore when I am connected to shore power my inverter will be charging the batteries and the converter will also be charging.

Edit: just a thought but when I am not plugged into shore power the inverter will be feeding power to my converter therefore would I have power to my 12 volt distribution and if so could I disconnect the cables from my battery to the converter?

I don't get why the converter has to be powered to run the trailer on batteries. Any coach I know of can run off batteries sans converter being on.

You don't need to mess around with both the IC and the converter with just 2 batteries. Just use the IC to charge.

Again, why does the converter have to be on?