Solar power? Anyone have use it? Your opinion here...

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foneguy9

Member
Joined
Oct 9, 2006
Posts
11
Hi all,
I was looking at solar power to charge up a bank of batteries for an RV.  I don't have one yet and am looking for a TT but I was wondering if this would be useful to cut down on electrical usage from a plug.  I found this site:
http://www.practicalmotorhome.com/product/jul04.html
and a few other sites that I googled under Solar Power for motorhome and wanted to ask your opinion...

Since I am a newbie, this may be a 'usual' question since no questions are dumb.  :D

I wouldn't mind speding the money on this if it will free me from the electrical cord!

 
We have 2 solar panels, 4 batteries (6-volt), and an interter. Are we saving money over the long run? Probably not once you amortize the cost of those goodies. But we don't have to listen to the generator run, we can pull over pretty much anywhere and have quiet power. And that makes me happy and if I'm happy, the rest of the household is happy.
 
;D  That's great!  To keep you happy that is, you need quiet! I love it!:)

I hadn't thought of that, but looking at a Honda generators EU series with 59 db, although quiet, a solar panel will be much more quiet!

Would I be able to use more batteries and more panels to supply the power of a a 15K A/C, Micro, lights and laptop power?  I know this is very general but I just am kicking around ideas for my setup.  Once I have more details on the electrical required I can dive more deeply into this question.  But any other life experience and application of Solar would be appreciated.
 
A/C No. But we just spent 4 days without hooking up to shore powerl. We ran TV, 2 laptops, printer, internet satellite, lights, water pump every night. And it was cloudy and rainy most of the time. And we never even came close to running out of juice.
 
Excellent!  That works out great!  I could hook up to shore power where I am going but want the ability to cut the cord and not rely on it.  You are just confirming that it can be done.  Nice!  Good for you, not contributing to the oil cartels!  ;D ;D  Or to pollution for that matter or more importantly I should say!


 
Saw a Holiday Rambler MH at Quartsite last Jan that had 8 Powered solar panels on top of the unit.  Now thats solar power.  Let's see probably 16 to 24 batteries to go with it, Gosh maybe 5000K in price and need a 500HP moter to move the darn thing witht he tow trailer he had with a car and a couple of 4 wheelers in it.  Might be able to stay somewhere for couple of weeks like that.
 
Shayne said:
Might be able to stay somewhere for couple of weeks like that.

:) We stay for MUCH longer than that. We are Full-Time Boondockers. We bought 2 x 125 watt Solar panels and a Solar Boost 2000E controller when we visited Quartzite last January. We still need to add some batteries. But we are usually self sufficient in power for MOST of the time.  ;)
 
foneguy9 said:
Hi all,
I was looking at solar power to charge up a bank of batteries for an RV.  I don't have one yet and am looking for a TT but I was wondering if this would be useful to cut down on electrical usage from a plug.  I found this site:
http://www.practicalmotorhome.com/product/jul04.html
and a few other sites that I googled under Solar Power for motorhome and wanted to ask your opinion...

Since I am a newbie, this may be a 'usual' question since no questions are dumb.  :D

I wouldn't mind speding the money on this if it will free me from the electrical cord!

I know that site that provide solar power to charge your batteries in RV. I also read this
  Solar Power Generator . I think you will be free from your electrical cord. XD
 
In case someone else stumbles on to this long lost thread...

We have 270 watts of solar and 440 amp hours of battery capacity (four 6v GC2 batteries) on our 19' travel trailer. We never have to plug in unless we want to run the A/C or the microwave; we really don't care to use either of them anyway. All of our interior lights have been replaced with LEDs and we have a 300 watt Pure Sine Wave inverter to watch a little TV, charge our cell phones, camera and other rechargeable batteries (AAA, AA, etc). We don't really conserve electricity but we do turn things off when they aren't being used.
 

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