Roof solar is just a waste of money….

[dawsey]

Yes I can understand your situation and everyone at sometime needs a " dark nights hobby".
I know we could not be confined to such a small space for such a long time as a winter, even lockdown was enough for us, and that was in a fully functioning house.
We would have to get to be near some sort of civilisation if only to get out once or twice a week to some sort of activity just to break the routine.
Could not spend all that time watching TV or with music holed up in our van.
We'd end up killing each other!

One more post just for the Captain. Well, there’s increasingly been times when we aren’t far off that, it’s a strain, we have given up all and rolled the dice - who knows how it will turn out. Hopefully not divorce.

 

[Minxy]

Shhhh!

Dave, some folks heads might explode if they are made to accept that my sole purpose in life isn’t just to wind them up

If it wasn't for the photos of your MH I was beginning to think you didn't exist and instead it was Jim having a play with AI and trying to 'entice' funsters to do more posts and/or keep us entertained!

 

[Minxy]

I'm just about to upgrade the electrics in my van to lithium . I'll also have solar and b2b , I tend to move fairly frequently not usually in one place more than 3 or 4 days. Dont want to rely on ehu or running my engine so solar is essential for me.

Solar is fairly cheap these days I'm fitting 2 x200w panels ... around £300

That's only about 10 or 12 nights on a campsite

Tam - have you seen the battery in classifieds at Portsmouth?

TN Power Lithium (LiFePO4) Battery - 216Ah

Hi, We're currently out in the Van, but on our way back to Portsmouth (2nd week in Sept), and toying with changing our relatively little used (127 charge cycles) Lifepo4 battery for a 560a version. Thinking of doing this for no other reason than our...

www.motorhomefun.co.uk

 

[RedFrame]

One more post....

Let's hope so, at least that one wasn't too long....

Cheers
Red

 

[funflair]

So if you havnt got lithium, your solar on the roof will keep your AGM batteries charged.
If you havnt got every electric gizmo known to mankind , your solar charged AGM s will keep everything running fine.

It's the same with any battery really, if you are taking out more than you are putting back in it will eventually run down, with the same ah capacity lithium compared to lead acid you will get longer before it's flat because the lithium can be safely taken lower, if you have depleted say a 500ah battery bank it will take a long time to come back up with just solar, lithium is a bit more efficient at charging but will still take an age, as explained earlier a B2B will just make the alternator work harder and ours will put in a constant 90 amps, the other point about B2B as I understand it is that they are a basic requirement on modern vans with "smart alternators" as these just monitor the state of the starter battery and only put in charge when the vehicle requires engine braking, good for emissions figures but useless for charging 500ah so the B2B makes the alternator work all the time.

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[Al n Val]

If I may politely ask, but what sort of system were you thinking of?
Something akin to what you get at the Multiplex , with electric lounger seats and a hole in the arms for a pint and your tub of popcorn, with a sound system Motorhead would be proud of?
Think you would need a VERY big van for that.
Or were you referring to an " at home" system, in a purpose built cinema room?
Just curious.

I’m referring to Dawsey’s interpretation of an “High power Home Cinema”

In my honest opinion it’s no such thing apart from hyper bullish!t

For a start it’s not an home cinema unless you consider his motorhome his home which I suppose it is

It certainly isn’t high power unless you consider a few thousand watts as high power, the power supplies are certainly not high power so it physically cannot be consider as high power unless you interpreted distortion as high power.

A 200 watt “high power” sub woofer, well that made me laugh tbh, one of my “ home cinema subs” is 4.7kw alone, my bass layer 7 channel amplifier is 6.3kw then I have another at 4,8kw driving overheads.

I’ve never described these as “high power anything” as it’s all high power b@llocks and someone is making his system sound awesome with words along with his other attributes.

Being good with words is a bonus, it’s being able to see through the crap that counts imo.

No offence intended just replying to a question

 

[dawsey]

I’m referring to Dawsey’s interpretation of an “High power Home Cinema”

In my honest opinion it’s no such thing apart from hyper bullish!t

For a start it’s not an home cinema unless you consider his motorhome his home which I suppose it is

It certainly isn’t high power unless you consider a few thousand watts as high power, the power supplies are certainly not high power so it physically cannot be consider as high power unless you interpreted distortion as high power.

A 200 watt “high power” sub woofer, well that made me laugh tbh, one of my “ home cinema subs” is 4.7kw alone, my bass layer 7 channel amplifier is 6.3kw then I have another at 4,8kw driving overheads.

I’ve never described these as “high power anything” as it’s all high power b@llocks and someone is making his system sound awesome with words along with his other attributes.

Being good with words is a bonus, it’s being able to see through the crap that counts imo.

No offence intended just replying to a question

Bully for you. Top Man. I bet you live in a mansion too.

I humbly, humbly apologise for not making it more clear I meant ‘high power home cinema - for a camper van’. I’m sure everyone will be suitably impressed by your stats. Thanks for letting us all know.

Pray tell us, what exactly would you consider high power for a camper van?

 

[Al n Val]

Bully for you. Top Man. I bet you live in a mansion too.

I humbly, humbly apologise for not making it more clear I meant ‘high power home cinema - for a camper van’. I’m sure everyone will be suitably impressed by your stats. Thanks for letting us all know.

Pray tell us, what exactly would you consider high power for a camper van?

nothing as a motorhome does not have the physical distance to allow speakers separation and steering of object audio due to lack of distances needed

high power, pfft!!

a proper high power subwoofer would physically destroy a motorhome

 

[suavecarve]

Tam - have you seen the battery in classifieds at Portsmouth?

TN Power Lithium (LiFePO4) Battery - 216Ah

Hi, We're currently out in the Van, but on our way back to Portsmouth (2nd week in Sept), and toying with changing our relatively little used (127 charge cycles) Lifepo4 battery for a 560a version. Thinking of doing this for no other reason than our...

www.motorhomefun.co.uk

Shhh I m giving that consideration but I cant seem to run out of the 200 ah I have got. I could go park under some trees and then it would become useful

 

[Sandancers]

Having read all of this thread, (I deserve a medal) and having just fitted solar for the first time this year, my take on the subject first raised by the OP is as follows;

If fitting solar just be certain you have worked out what you need and why you need it in terms of stored electrical power.

So often on here I have seen people proudly proclaim that they have fitted 29 megawatts of solar and 103 lithium batteries just because they can. Well, excellent, but if you only need run a dab radio thro the day then really you don't need all of that.

When fitting the first and so far only solar panel on our MH roof I put in enough wiring to add a second panel. But so far one 115W panel has proved two things;

1; when the sun shines it gives plenty of power to run all we need and recharge the lead acid batteries.

2, so far this summer the sun has not shone enough to do all we need and recharge the batteries.

Therefore I very much doubt a second panel will be fitted.

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[Nanniemate]

I must confess, I haven't read all the post, a bottle of red wine intervened BUT, I long ago came to the conclusion that, in the UK, solar makes little sense.
When one needs it most, in Winter, the sun is, usually, not available.

It would cost me at least a £1000 to convert to Solar and, in my mind, that's an awful lot of nights EHU hookups to RELIABLE electric at an extra £5 per night.

Give me £1000 and I'll get solar put on. All the spare cash can pay for my new gas bottles

 

[L' Hobo]

Give me £1000 and I'll get solar put on. All the spare cash can pay for my new gas bottles

If you can do it for less than £1000, why did you go for gas? You could have gone for full Solar?

 

[MisterB]

If you can do it for less than £1000, why did you go for gas? You could have gone for full Solar?

You would get a decent lithium AND (second hand) solar for that money, so you wouldn't need as much gas .....

 

[chaser]

I truly don't know why anyone can run out of electricity if they have a couple of panels on the roof, in ours we have two 100a batteries and two 100w panels, and on most days by 11 o clock they have switched off with the batteries around 14 volt , although we aren't big users no TV system, and hot water on gas.
I am always amazed when we get up and the batteries are showing around 12.7 , this is with a large compressor fridge on all the time, and it doesn't seem to make any difference where or how we park within reason.
Now this is without all these fancy controllers just two panels off eBay , less than £100 each and a Chinese controller, cheapest I could find at the time from Amazon, around £20 AGM batteries about £60 each and all this has been working for 5 years without fail.
Please believe me , I am not bragging about this in any way just stating what we have and it works, sometimes I read on here about all the thousands folks have spent on solar and still running out of power, and really can't believe how they manage it.
I had never had much to do with solar before this but am still amazed how they work, non stop power for completely free.
Fantastic.

 

[funflair]

I truly don't know why anyone can run out of electricity if they have a couple of panels on the roof, in ours we have two 100a batteries and two 100w panels, and on most days by 11 o clock they have switched off with the batteries around 14 volt , although we aren't big users no TV system, and hot water on gas.
I am always amazed when we get up and the batteries are showing around 12.7 , this is with a large compressor fridge on all the time, and it doesn't seem to make any difference where or how we park within reason.
Now this is without all these fancy controllers just two panels off eBay , less than £100 each and a Chinese controller, cheapest I could find at the time from Amazon, around £20 AGM batteries about £60 each and all this has been working for 5 years without fail.
Please believe me , I am not bragging about this in any way just stating what we have and it works, sometimes I read on here about all the thousands folks have spent on solar and still running out of power, and really can't believe how they manage it.
I had never had much to do with solar before this but am still amazed how they work, non stop power for completely free.
Fantastic.

You have answered your own question

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[chaser]

You have answered your own question

It wasn't a question and I don't see how I have answered a non question either

 

[funflair]

It wasn't a question and I don't see how I have answered a non question either

Apologies, I thought you were "questioning" why anybody runs out of power when they have solar panels on the roof, I was trying to say that they obviously use more power than you, there is no right or wrong way only the one that works for you and we are certainly ll different.

 

[Jo662]

I truly don't know why anyone can run out of electricity if they have a couple of panels on the roof, in ours we have two 100a batteries and two 100w panels, and on most days by 11 o clock they have switched off with the batteries around 14 volt , although we aren't big users no TV system, and hot water on gas.
I am always amazed when we get up and the batteries are showing around 12.7 , this is with a large compressor fridge on all the time, and it doesn't seem to make any difference where or how we park within reason.
Now this is without all these fancy controllers just two panels off eBay , less than £100 each and a Chinese controller, cheapest I could find at the time from Amazon, around £20 AGM batteries about £60 each and all this has been working for 5 years without fail.
Please believe me , I am not bragging about this in any way just stating what we have and it works, sometimes I read on here about all the thousands folks have spent on solar and still running out of power, and really can't believe how they manage it.
I had never had much to do with solar before this but am still amazed how they work, non stop power for completely free.
Fantastic.

Well everyone’s power use is different.
I have 2 x 100ah lithium battery’s with 1x150 w (I think) solar panel,which keeps the battery’s topped up . We use a microwave,Airfryer and boil a kettle on the oven hot plate.
We recently had 6 days on a THS,and the lowest the batteries went down to was 68%.
So having the lithiums fitted,along with an inverter and a B2B, has been a gamechanger ,allowing us to use everything in the motorhome without ever being on EHU.

 

[chaser]

Apologies, I thought you were "questioning" why anybody runs out of power when they have solar panels on the roof, I was trying to say that they obviously use more power than you, there is no right or wrong way only the one that works for you and we are certainly ll different.

I was just pointing out what we manage on so where can these people who have probably 5 times more capacity going wrong, from our experience it seems almost impossible to have the problems they come up with.

 

[Raul]

I was just pointing out what we manage on so where can these people who have probably 5 times more capacity going wrong, from our experience it seems almost impossible to have the problems they come up with.

It’s quite simple, some will run in deficit, due to unpredicted harvest quantity. Electrical energy you can’t see it but exists, there fore some struggle to quantify what they got, or misunderstand the season potential. Winter it’s pretty weak in therms of solar harvest, and many will size for summer only. This is where you need to supplement by other means, and make sure you have a large enough storage.
The ppl that use it year round for years, learned that no year is the same, and contingency plans are a must.
In you case, low user, and maybe not full timing trough the winter, I can see why you struggle to understand the situation when you run in deficit.

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[headlight]

It all depends on usage.
Last year was our first year with solar, only a single 100 watt panel, and it more than coped with our, admittedly light usage, being fully recharged by lunchtime every day bar one.
Allowing us to stay off EHU for weeks at a time.
This year I fitted a second 100 watt panel, partly because I thought that last years sunshine hours were higher than a "normal" UK summer and therefore this summer would be less and also because I knew that this summer we would use more electricity having found out how to get Sky Sports, BT Sports, Amazon etc via a firestick and mobile phone hotspot, so we would watch more sports and therefore use more electricity.
Even with the poor summer weather we have had this year the 200 watts of solar has had us fully charged by lunchtime/early afternoon at the latest.
We haven't been on EHU once since the original 100 watt solar was fitted in May 2022.

 

[funflair]

It’s quite simple, some will run in deficit, due to unpredicted harvest quantity. Electrical energy you can’t see it but exists, there fore some struggle to quantify what they got, or misunderstand the season potential. Winter it’s pretty weak in therms of solar harvest, and many will size for summer only. This is where you need to supplement by other means, and make sure you have a large enough storage.
The ppl that use it year round for years, learned that no year is the same, and contingency plans are a must.
In you case, low user, and maybe not full timing trough the winter, I can see why you struggle to understand the situation when you run in deficit.

Unpredictable indeed, as you can see below 3 days ago solar yield was not brilliant and we eating into our battery storage getting to around 60% if the low yield had continued we would have gone even deeper, luckily the sun is shining and 20A going in at just gone 10 am.

 

[Bessy765]

We have 750 watts ofsolar a Victron 12/2000/80 invertercharger and 2 x 100 amp Transporter Lithium Batteries. We tend to spend three or four days at each place. We managed 90 days from 23 rd Feb till 22 nd May without hook up. And are in Northern France with overcast but bright sky. This was yesterday at 14:45

we do not have a b2b and have had this system for over three years, we can run the hab a/c for reasonable periods of time if the sun is shining a lot to need it the panels are producing well. The trick is not to try and turn the van into a fridge. We use a Tassimo machine and if the batteries are full we run our Dometic absorber fridge from the inverter and hot water from the Truma. Obviously balance supply against load. Our system is warranted for 5 years and the batteries for 10 the only proviso was not to run the engine to charge the batteries for more than 15 mins If stationary. Something so far we have not had to do.

 

[Hoovie]

You have answered your own question

On my last camper, a Camping Gas 1Kg bottle used to last me 3 years as I was not a big user of gas (as everything was electric or kerosene) so why people need to fit refillable gas bottles I don't know

 

[chaser]

On my last camper, a Camping Gas 1Kg bottle used to last me 3 years as I was not a big user of gas (as everything was electric or kerosene) so why people need to fit refillable gas bottles I don't know

That's the way to go how did you produce your electric?

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[KLWinton]

Could I ask, How many cookies could a good cook cook If a good cook could cook cookies? Asking for a friend.

 

[Minxy]

That's the way to go how did you produce your electric?

Massive hamster and wheel!

 

[Hoovie]

That's the way to go how did you produce your electric?

I repurposed the main LPG locker....

 

[Captain Yoghurtpot]

Apologies, I thought you were "questioning" why anybody runs out of power when they have solar panels on the roof, I was trying to say that they obviously use more power than you, there is no right or wrong way only the one that works for you and we are certainly ll different.

Agreed.
Our in-built electric sauna is a bit power hungry, but if I switch off the Hot-tub and sun lamps, we can just about manage on a couple of Duracell AA's.