Dickinson Marine heater
Anybody using a Dickinson (or other) type propane or solid fuel heater? I am thinking of putting one in, but would like to here some real world numbers of how they work.
Forum Discussion
reed cundiff wrote:
Weight and cube are not of considerable concern to motor coach owners. However, Liberty Coaches ($1.8 M and up) have gone completely to lithium iron phosphate (LFP) with a claimed weight savings of about 1100#
A 180 amp-hour (2.4 kW-hr) 12 V nominal battery (4 LFP cells) weighs about 60 to 80 pounds and provides 80% DOD for several thousand cycles. This would provide the equivalent of more than 150# of lead acid. The price of LFP is going down drastically just as the price of solar panels has gone by a tremendous amount in the last several years. Balqon sells one of these for about $2.5 K. This is scarcely a game changing cost for most people.
We full-time (and almost entirely dispersed camp/bush camp) and have 9.6 kW-hrs of LFP and 1.4 kW of solar on our 5th wheel. Our battery bank consists of four Manzanita Micro 180 amp-hr 12 V batteries (each is four 180 amp-hr CALB cells). These four batteries are in series to provide a battery bank at 48 V nominal. Each 12 V nominal battery weighs 64# and is 12" x 13" x 8" (29 kilos and 30.5 x 33 x 20 cm).
We have only tied into line power for 3 days in the last 18 months and have not used generator except to trial. A friend of ours has (will have shortly) 1.2 kW of solar on his truck camper/motorcycle hauler trailer combination.
We have a friend who will shortly have 1200 W of panels on his truck camper/ motorcycle trailer combo. He is looking into LFP
Reed and Elaine
Thanks for that input. Very interesting. One question about your setup, do you use your solar to run an electric heating system or the A/C since your sig shows NM? Or does it just power the propane fired heating system?
One issue for me is roof real estate and coach room for batteries.... But I am very interested in more info!
