Upgrading from 3-way fridge..

Oh, but I forgot to tell you. This wasn't for free. You get to show me around when I come to Colorado.
We need to compare rigs.
Enjoy my friend.
Jeff


Pa-lenty of great places to camp out here, come on out! At this rate, it is going to be awhile before the high passes open, there is a snowman on my porch that greeted my Mother-in-law today if that tells you anything... :p
 
Ahh, we have a winner, I like it, thanks!

As for paper towels and such, I have put small D-rings on the ceiling that I secure all kinds of nifty light weight stuff off of including a shower curtain with a basin attached for Winter bathing. I usually put the bungees for the top up there not stretched very much and hang paper towels, dry washcloths and such from them.


I'd love to see some pictures of your shower set up and your clothes hanging set up if you get a chance.
 
I bought a gear hammock that I suspend over the dinette from the lift boards. When I am sitting down at the dinette, the gear is not in my way, but it might be a problem for tall people.

http://www.westmarine.com/1/1/31120-gear-hammock.html
 
His question kicked up a vague memory of mine but I can't find anything to back it up off hand. I though I recalled somewhere doing it like the picture as opposed to both off one battery might have a benefit of ensuring the charge drives through all the cells where as having them both on one could slowly wear out the other battery because the first battery would top off a bit sooner and then increase resistance or something like that. Not sure if I'm recalling that correctly or not??? Probably little risk in a 2 battery setup either way, I think it had more issue in big marine battery banks with many batteries strung together.


For the relatively low currents and constant solar charging, it won't really matter in the camper. In a large system such as a boat, or submarine with many cells, really heavy wire, or buss bars, and heavy current draws, the voltage drop between each cell becomes a factor to minimize, and also pulling the wire off different ends may just cost less if arranged physically just right. Often the cells are oriented to permit the load wiring to be as short as possible. More applicable for series connected cells. Our campers are drawing peanuts for current though.
 
There was a thread about mounting a solar panel underneath the cabover on a sliding system that I recall some time ago, I have done a good search but have not found it, anyone know the link? I saw the one in the Solar category but it did not have much in the way of photos.
 
There was a thread about mounting a solar panel underneath the cabover on a sliding system that I recall some time ago, I have done a good search but have not found it, anyone know the link? I saw the one in the Solar category but it did not have much in the way of photos.



Maybe this one...

http://www.wanderthe...hp?/topic/4552/

And, in the above thread, in message #7, there reference to another thread on "How Eldough did it".
 
That is the only one I have found, there was another one, maybe by LQHikers but not sure the photos are still around. In this thread, the guys are talking about a frame...we don't have frames under the cabover in the ATC, do we?
 
It looks to be just a solid piece of plywood with that white plastic surface covering, maybe melmaline?

Did you find this thread...

http://www.wanderthe...hp?/topic/3987/

Message #5 by Stan at FWC has a photo #3 of what looks likes a slide out solar panel from under the overhead bed. Don't know the owner of the rig.

I sent lqhikers a PM, we'll see if he's around and can point us to that thread you're talking about.
 
It looks to be just a solid piece of plywood with that white plastic surface covering, maybe melmaline?


Yeah its just plywood with a plastic layer.
 
There is not a 'frame' in the overhead, just wood except around the edge. (Look at the photos of the camper frame at ATC or FWC.) It is strong enough to support a frame for a PV panel. If you use aluminum angle 1/8" thick and carriage bolts through the wood you can make a frame that a panel will slide in to. I made the panel removable so I didn't have to deal with cantilevering the panel so it could stay on the truck when deployed. With your rig, you could make the panel tracks run side to side so your fairing over the cab wouldn't be disturbed.
 
Thought I should post some photos to illustrate. My apologies in advance to Kodachrome for the quality of the photos. I used square stock to space the frame down as I wanted to use drawer sliders to mount the panel and there is a certain amount of room needed to manipulate the panel to remove it from the frame. I also bolt the front of the panel to the frame while traveling so it is a rigid mount.
Side ViewSm.jpgFront ViewSm.jpg

This is a 40 watt panel so it is smaller than what you envision.
 
Thought I should post some photos to illustrate. My apologies in advance to Kodachrome for the quality of the photos. I used square stock to space the frame down as I wanted to use drawer sliders to mount the panel and there is a certain amount of room needed to manipulate the panel to remove it from the frame. I also bolt the front of the panel to the frame while traveling so it is a rigid mount.
View attachment 11949View attachment 11948

This is a 40 watt panel so it is smaller than what you envision.


I pretty much planned on sliding it out sideways. How did you run your wire? Did you splice into an existing line from the roof or did you go straight from the panel to a charge controller? Where did you run your line in?
 
I put a pigtail on the solar panel and put a heavy duty SAE connector on the end. I drilled a hole in the 'step' in the floor pack of the Bobcat just behind the opening for adjusting the turnbuckle and put an 'RV roof connector' with wires coming into the camper and connected to the charge controller. I put plenty of sealant around the roof connector so it is weather tight when its cap is in place.

I made a 30 foot extension (14 gauge) with a roof connector on one end and a heavy duty SAE connector on the other. I carry the extension inside the truck bed in front of the camper. When I want to use the panel, I take it out of the mount, hook it up to the extension (which is already plugged in) and carry it to some sunny spot. The camper can remain in the shade while good old Sol does his thing with the panel.

Connectors came from: http://www.solarseller.com/low_voltage_dc_pumps__lvm__teel__accessories__plugs_and_extensions.htm

This is admittedly somewhat crude, but it works. The extension can be plugged into the camper and unplugged from the camper while the camper is on the truck.

The only problem I can see with sliding the panel out to the side is possibly the width of the panel. It might be possible to use square stock to extend past the front of the camper should that be necessary. You also have to be careful with the part of the bed that extends out for sleeping. Countersinking the carriage bolt heads may be necessary.
 
I just remembered that I did take a photo of the front wall and overhead "joining" area on my Bobcat shell. I asked Marty & Jeff to make all the interior side panes to be held in place with screws and NOT use staples anywhere, I think the staples are usually at the bottom of each wall panel. I knew I wanted to get behind those wall panels.

FrontandOverhead.jpg


To get this photo I've got the bed slide out removed and the driver's side interior wall panel removed (which means I had the bed slide out support also removed).

You can see the plywood with the plastic coating.
You can see how ATC countersunk the screws holding the plywood to the frame.

And, perhaps most importantly... that there is a 1" square tube right under the plywood on the front wall frame, so if you are going to insert the solar panel wire on the front wall of the camper, go "just below" that part of the frame.

I don't think I have a photo showing the entire front frame area, as I didn't take that front panel off completely, but, you could see about finding that bare frame photo mentioned above at FWC or one of the other, non-main ATC web sites.
 
Ok, MPPT-15, remote meter and new larger battery installed. Not sure how much I can get done tomorrow since are to a fair amount of snow over the next day or so. So I am ready to install the panel, just triple checking the wiring needs.

Right now I have an 85 watt panel on the roof. The three wires, green ( hot ), black ( neg ) and white ( ground ?) are accessible at the front of the camper, behind the bilked and down the left side under the carpet piece. Marty at ATC said I can use 14 gauge wire and just splice the wires from the 100 watt panel on to the existing lines.

Since the controller only has one solar input, this makes sense to me.

Any comments on this?
 
My only comment would be to overdoit on the wire gauge. Don't loose any power to voltage drop in that department b/c it's your main feeder.

I'd think 12 at least, or why not just run 8 and be happy.

Pull that fridge yet? Crap for weather here too. 2" of graupel and thunder tonight. Makes it a bit of a PITA to work on the camper outside.
 
Makes sense to me. While stiffness is a virtue in some situations, the stiffness of 8 or 12 gauge wire is a PITA if you are moving the panel around. Size does matter and 14 gauge is available and adequate for what you are doing. If you were going to run 50+ feet panel to camper, then 12 gauge.
 
So the question of the hour is should I just run a new set of 14 gauge straight from the new 100 watt panel directly to the charge controller, having two sets of panel leads on the single solar input?

Or should I wire the panels in parallel and run the wire from roof panel to new cabover panel, then from that panel to the controller, adding a fair bit more length needing to basically run two sets of wires to and from the 100 watt panel splicing into the existing 14 gauge. If I go this route, I am going to be adding about 8 to 10 feet of new wire, this changes the voltage equation a bit...so I am confused as to what gauge to use, or if this is even the correct route to take based on this calculator:

http://www.freesunpower.com/wire_calc.php

In looking at this calculation, I currently have about 25 feet ( ? ) of wire going from my 85 watt roof panel to the controller then the battery, at 4.9 amps and 12 volts that is about 12 gauge wire according to the link above, 14 gauge is what is installed.

If I do the 100 watt panel at it's rated max of 5.7 amps and figure about 12 feet from the panel / controller / battery, I get right at 14 gauge.

But if I add in about 8-10 feet for splicing at the total output of roughly 11 amps, I get 9 gauge wire, and that is for the whole thing, so it is really kind of tough for me to figure out what gauge wire I would use if I splice it in.

I am headed out to the camper now to pull the left panels by the bed to see what kind of space I have to run separate wires for the new 100 watt.....
 
Pull that fridge yet? Crap for weather here too. 2" of graupel and thunder tonight. Makes it a bit of a PITA to work on the camper outside.


Pulled the fridge for exact measuring purposes, the vendor has not sent me the shipping notice yet on the new one so I put it back in for now. It took me about 30 minutes to remove it so no biggie.

Couple of inches of fresh snow outside, LOL!
 
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