Real world inverter use while camping?

[lloydus67]

Not to throw a Spanner in the works, but most of the 200amp batteries I have looked at, have a maximum discharge rate of 100amps. I assume that you have checked yours can deliver 200amps?
Lloyd


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[WilSurf]

Next question, anyone had experience having a DCDC charger mounted under their tray or underbonnet long term? It will be subjected to dust and possibly moisture.

Yes, I have a Projecta DCDC charger under the bonnet for a few years now, charging the dual battery.
It works, but when it's hot and i do many start-stops, it will cut out due to temperature protection.

[WilSurf]

Not to throw a Spanner in the works, but most of the 200amp batteries I have looked at, have a maximum discharge rate of 100amps. I assume that you have checked yours can deliver 200amps?
Lloyd


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I have a Renogy 200Ah in the camper trailer which has 200A continues discharge.

[plusnq]

My Enerdrive B Tec also does 200A.

[nab]

Yeah it has 200A discharge. I will look at the projecta DCDC, kick ass ones any good?

[plusnq]

I had a Kickass 2000 unit originally. Worked fine on AGM’s but would trip the safety on the BMS of the lithium battery. Gave it to my son who uses it in his 4WD with AGM’s and is happy with it. I replaced it with an enerdrive 2000w unit and have had no issues.

[WilSurf]

I have the Projecta in the car and a Renogy in the camper trailer.
Both work as intended, both have MPPT solar.

[nab]

Finally made a start to the install. So far I have a 200A Kings lithium battery, Renogy 2000W inverter, Renogy 50A weatherproof DCDC charger and Renogy shunt/monitor (found some good deals so stuck with Renogy).

First step was to remove all the existing non factory fuses/VSR battery isolator from under the bonnet and install an 8-way midi fuse holder. Decided the best place was on top of the battery so just welded some bolts to the existing battery clamp. Simple to remove when a new battery is required too. Would have been nice if the existing cables were 50mm longer but didn't want to extend them 50mm for the sake of a neater install haha! I labelled the inside of the lid to make fuse identification easy, room for a few extra circuits too.
Ran a new 25mm cable to the rear battery while I was there.



The battery dimensions are 238W x 521L x 219H so it is a big unit. I literally had 3mm spare to play with to get the battery tucked right up under the tray between chassis and tie down rails so took a bit of fluffing around to get the mounts right. 2 mounts are directly attached to the chassis and 2 will hang from the tray. I used bolts on the bottom so the tray will hinge down for access and to physically get the battery in there.

[nab]

What do people do with the shunt display? Nowhere to really put it on the dash inside the cabin, looks like it isn't weatherproof either so won't last long mounted to the side of the tray. It has bluetooth and can connect to my phone but I would like to have a simple display nearby.
Any shunts that have an IP67 display, surface or flush mount? I can't seem to find any...

[lloydus67]

This is flush mount and says that it’s a water proof surface.
So I presume up rating of some description


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[nab]

Cheers, yeah I did see that one but it looks pretty much the same as my Renogy one so wasn't convinced it would repel water any better.
I ended up flush mounting it to my under tray "connection box." We'll see how it holds up on the Gibb next year... I also mounted my compressor where the old battery was and installed some covers to neaten it up.

[WilSurf]

Finally made a start to the install. So far I have a 200A Kings lithium battery, Renogy 2000W inverter, Renogy 50A weatherproof DCDC charger and Renogy shunt/monitor (found some good deals so stuck with Renogy).

I hope you didn't use the supplied wiring for the inverter as they are way too thin?

[nab]

Haha definitely not, it came with 16mm cable! I'm yet to install the inverter but I have some 70mm cable ready to go. Calculations say 50mm will suffice for my needs/distance but went the next size up as it cost buggerall extra from my supplier.

[WilSurf]

Glad you do.
I have used 0B&S for my AllSparks invertor.
Made a bracket for the remote switch which is now easiy reachable and still out of the way.

[nab]

I'll be doing something similar to yours with the remote switch, try and mount it out of the way.

[nab]

I didn't get enough time to permanently wire/mount the inverter prior to our recent trip. I temporarily screwed it to an internal wall and attached the anderson plug. To use it just open the door, plug it in and away we were.





Max power usage was 1.9kw @ 156A. That was with coffee machine, milk heater/frother and freezer going at the same time.



The 200A lithium worked great. I have a 110W solar panel mounted on the roofrack which at it's peak was pumping 107W, 8A. Easily powered the freezer and fridge all day - along with making 3 coffees - and put in a poofteeth back into the battery but still "lost" around 40Ah a night.
By sunset of day 5 of not starting the car, the lithium was at 26%. I wasn't confident the lithium would last the night so I plugged the freezer into the van which was fully charged.



Another experiment was to see if the 98AH AGM and 320W of roof mounted solar in the van would handle the freezer/fridge combo. For 3 nights I put the freezer into the van, by morning the battery was at 12.2V. Without the freezer, the battery was in float mode by around 9:00am. With the freezer attached it went into float mode after lunch some time. The panels put out max 308W so I was very happy with that.

Again, thanks for all the input. My usage seems to compare to others here.

[WilSurf]

We used the inverter last weekend for the first time.
Using the induction cooktop, we boiled water for tea and made a meal.
Maximum power draw was 176A and we used for the cooking a total of 10Ah.
Wife was very happy with induction, cooking just like home. :-)
With the 300W solar blanket, the 200Ah battery was full in no time.

[nab]

I haven't told my missus that we can run an induction hotplate yet....

What is your induction cooktop rated at?
What brand is it?
What heat setting did you use it on?

[Foo]

I haven't told my missus that we can run an induction hotplate yet....

What is your induction cooktop rated at?
What brand is it?
What heat setting did you use it on?

That can be fixed for you. 

Foo

[Spada]

Talking about inverter use,

Our new van is gasless so all cooking is 240v now (or bbq). Last weekend cooking dinner was a Japanese curry. Chicken in the air fryer for 10 minutes at 180°, curry sauce & veg in a frypan on the induction level 5 for about 10min, and microwave rice 700w for 3min. combined use was around 45ah.
From a 3000w inverter I could run the air fryer & microwave or the induction & microwave both together no worries, but the air fryer & induction together would trip the inverter if the induction went above level 5.

It was great cooking outside without being affected by the wind 

2 coffees from a Nespresso mini & milk frother in the morning was about 6ah.

I've got 600ah lithium, so should be good for about 3 days of no charge at all, but with the overcast weather my 1060w solar had me back at full capacity by around 11am 

[WilSurf]

I haven't told my missus that we can run an induction hotplate yet....

What is your induction cooktop rated at? - 2000W
What brand is it? - Dune 4WD ($59.99)
What heat setting did you use it on? - We used wattage settings, we have used 1200W, 1600W and 1800W.

[Fizzie]

Our new van

& hi-jacking the thread for a moment , but we haven't seen a write-up yet!

[Spada]

& hi-jacking the thread for a moment , but we haven't seen a write-up yet!

You got me there Fizzie, not a lot to say really other than we've turned fully to the dark side and bought a stock standard off the shelf caravan  I'm struggling to find any real mods to do 

Maybe I could get a little white poodle to complete the look

[nab]