solar power for dry camping & cpap machine
***Link Removed******Link Removed***Hello, I recently purchased a 2006 Thor Wanderer 30' travel trailer. I was disappointed that I could only run my cpap machine when the trailer is plugged in. I al...
Forum Discussion
One problem you're overlooking is that draining some batteries to nothing will kill the battery and that draining any battery below 50% will shorten the cycle life. A target SOC of 80% is certainly a sweet spot and if you can keep a bank above that level, you'll get a long life out of them.
Most quality inverters have a low voltage cutoff of somewhere around 11V. If the inverter cuts out at that voltage, you'll still have some charge left in the battery. Without powering the inverter it will rebound back to it's low SOC. It won't be a death sentence but it will impact cycle life. This is where correct design and application comes in.
The first thing you want to do is accurately assess your power usage. Add up all the devices used and convert that into AH drained from a battery bank. In this thread that revolves around Cpap use so that would be the starting point. The easiest way to accomplish this is to use a Kill-A-Watt meter. You can plug the KAW into your house receptacle and use the Cpap as you ordinarily would. It will do the measuring.
Most quality inverters have a low voltage cutoff of somewhere around 11V. If the inverter cuts out at that voltage, you'll still have some charge left in the battery. Without powering the inverter it will rebound back to it's low SOC. It won't be a death sentence but it will impact cycle life. This is where correct design and application comes in.
The first thing you want to do is accurately assess your power usage. Add up all the devices used and convert that into AH drained from a battery bank. In this thread that revolves around Cpap use so that would be the starting point. The easiest way to accomplish this is to use a Kill-A-Watt meter. You can plug the KAW into your house receptacle and use the Cpap as you ordinarily would. It will do the measuring.
