Ran roof air all day on only solar, batteries still full

[Boatycall]

It's been a long journey, but I'm finally there.

So--the back-story, I have a 2-slide Eagle Cap 1160, when I got it 6mos used, the previous owner ordered it stripped - no AC, gen, not even tvs. I put a 13,5kbtu AC in because my previous Arctic Fox had a 11k and I had days where it didn't cut the mustard.
I put in (6) 145ah AGM batteries and a Magnum Technologies 3KW Hybrid Inverter, and a Honda 2000.
First attempts to run the roof air on the Honda were hit n miss, mostly miss, even using the hybrid function of the inverter.
Then I put 600w of solar on my trailer(The Shotwagon) with (6) of it's own 145ah batteries and ran 4ga to the hitch an Anderson disconnects to the TC.
That worked 'ok'. But at the end of a hot day, I killed about a half of my battery capacity, voltage would be down to 12.1-ish from 13.7 float.
Then I put 800w solar on my TC and tied the two systems via the same 4ga Anderson connectors and just last week installed a Micro-Air soft start.
Yesterday we had a record hot day for May, I hit 87 here. Ran the roof air all day, I ended the day with the batteries still @100% charge. The solar was putting in roughly 80amps charge even though the roof air drew 110amps@12v from the inverter. In between roof air cycles, the solar of course kept charging and kept the batts at 100% I ended up with both solar controllers in Float mode, 13.7v.

Attached a pic of my system design.

[time2roll]

Would be interesting how long the battery lasts into the darkness.
The real battle will be the next day to both charge and run the air.

Plenty of hookups in Las Vegas. Run a generator 24/7? No thanks.

[NRALIFR]

“Practical” is the mother of...........

Practically nothing.

:):)

[bighatnohorse]

It's a good proof of concept. Solar panel efficiency will continue to improve.
As it does, battery powered AC will become more practical.
I like it.

[jimh406]

valhalla360 wrote:
Yes, you can run air/con off a solar/battery system...just not practical.

Leading edge technology and larger newer TCs aren’t ever practical. That doesn’t stop us though!

[jplante4]

Great info. I get the question at the store every once in a while "How much solar do I need to run the AC?". Now I can say 1400 watts of solar, 1740 aH of battery and 4000 watts of inverter.

Too bad I don't work on commission. 🙂

[valhalla360]

So if I'm reading this correctly, you have 1200w of solar along with 12-146amp-hr batteries...so
- probably $4-5k tied up if you did the install yourself.
- around 1000lb off your payload.

Could have picked up a small generator and a 5gal can and fueled it for a couple decades.

Yes, you can run air/con off a solar/battery system...just not practical.

[Kayteg1]

10 PM in Vegas and still 81F.
Don't think solar will cut a mustard here.
Even when I'd have 2 RVs of solar to power single AC.

[time2roll]

Very nice even if it takes a trailer of panels to make it work.

[jimh406]

That’s cool!

[Supercharged111]

Damned impressive. That solar isn't cheap though, is it? Not really the point either.

[Lwiddis]

Very interesting.

[Boatycall]

dwrat wrote:
With an outside high of only 87 degrees, I would guess you mostly only ran the fan and very little compressor usage.
Still pretty amazing use of solar.

Ha!
You're in Phoenix, I'm near Seattle.... 'Only 87' is warm for us... I lived in Phoenix for a couple of years straight--though summers, didn't 'snow-bird' it, I get it when you say 'only 87'...
.
I'm hoping I can maintain battery voltage past 90. The roof air is oversized for a TC, I had the stat set to 70, so it was only at about a 50/50 duty cycle during the hottest part of the day.

[dwrat]

With an outside high of only 87 degrees, I would guess you mostly only ran the fan and very little compressor usage.
Still pretty amazing use of solar.