StealthDiesel

Anyone have any experience installing an AC inverter in their RV?

Since our RV solar panel system is a total success, I am upgrading our inverter.
I bought a nice small 1000W AC inverter & am now planning out the cabling. Like all my projects, I don't have time to take shortcuts nor mickey mouse it.

I didn't really think about it but to get 1000W AC + losses out of 12V DC takes over 100amps DC.

100 amps DC is 1 or 2 gauge welding cable territory plus a guy better install a 100+ Amp heavy duty fuse. Plus heavy duty connection lugs, junction block, etc, etc...
None of this is hard, just way more than I was thinking I was going to do plus more time.


Is this what everyone is doing to install their inverters?


Thanks for any info...

morkable

if you need any welding cable I have a lot of 2/0 welding cable

Mike Holmen

I'm running 3500 watt inverter (DC to AC) on my RV. I just bought some cheap booster cables and removed the clamps on one end. Most electrical stuff inside the RV are really fussy on the quality of the 60Hz sin wave. My inverter the tv, microwave will not turn on, but the coffee maker will. Best advice is to buy a high quality inverter.

Remember to remove the RV inverter fuse (AC to DC), so you don't over power the new inverter by trying to charge up your batteries.

I run four high cycle 12 volt group 31 batteries and have two 100 watt solar panels. Still its hard to beat a gen set as batteries still go dead quickly, and take forever to recharge back up.

carl48

as mike said you need to get a true sine wave inverter. nearly all electronics is going to inverters even shavers and i pods. they do do not like quasi- square wave and can destroy some power supplies if you try to use them especially computers. mout the inverter near the batteries to keep the leads as short as possible. i use a 150 amp fuse link between the batteries and the inverter.

Lil Dog

With all that juice I would have gone with bigger batteries. 6V RV batteries and probably 4 of those instead. IMHO.

I only run a portable 60W set of panels and 2 6V RV batteries for mine and it seems to keep the batteries charged. Mind you I don't have a TV or anything like that and use the Microwave as a bread box.

Mike Holmen

My brother runs six 6v golf cart batteries and a high end sin wave inverter. It works well but hard on batteries, and he is on his second inverter. The microwave sounds funny and TV is noisy. Four batteries don't last with kids and a wife.

Really hard to beat a gen set. Honda makes probably the questest low maintaince gen sets going.

We send lots of time at the lake without power. Having power sure is nice during the weekend outtings. We run a 6500watt gen set. We aren't hooked into the power grid.

Hey guys what deal on getting free local TV? I'm not rural and not willing to start dragging around my sat disk.

My 3500 watt inverter works (gets hot quickly) great on power tools, blow dryer.

Lil Dog

Honda or Yamaha are good gens. Lots of friggin Princess Auto specials running when I'm out and the campground sounds like a construction site.

StealthDiesel

Thanks for all the info guys.

We are just using the 1000W inverter for laptop & cell phone charging, stereo & occasional TV use. It's a cheap inverter, non-sinusoidal, but seems to power up everything we need just fine.

Princess Auto has 2 gauge welding cable for about $2/foot, I only need about 8 feet total, plus connection lugs plus a 100Amp inline fuse I still need to find.

I came very close to buying an off-shore generator, (you can buy a 3000W Chinese generator at Costco for about $600 bucks).
They are incredibly noisy & you will have no friends in a campground. The Honda's & Yamaha's are really nice but very pricey.

So I went for a $1000 solar system instead. 2 x 100W panels plus a really nice controller/regulator plus 6 gauge wiring everywhere.

It works fantastic, 8 amps at 8am in the morning on a sunny day. Batteries fully charged by noon! The most I have seen is 12amps charging at mid-day.
Quiet, no carrying around a generator, no dealing with gasoline & ZERO maintenance. We have 2 x 6V golf cart batteries.

The downside to solar is that you can't run your air conditioner.
Our 27foot Triple E 5th wheel is really well insulated with double pane windows & takes a while to cool down.
Our plan is to run the fans full out before bedtime to cool it down now that we don't have to worry about the batteries going dead.

Bankdude

I've been on an off the fence on adding an Inverter to my solar system. Take a few pictures if you can and keep us advised on the outcome.

Lil Dog

Sounds like a sweet setup StealthD. I am a big solar fan for being quiet and free power.

StealthDiesel

Well the small 1000W inverter has been just fine.

I ended up finding pre-terminated 2 gauge copper stranded battery cables & a 100amp fuse at Canadian Tire. 2 x 3 foot lengths for about $20 each.

The cheapo inverter works the radio/stereo & TV just fine.


I can't say enough about the solar system though. We just spent 4 days last week at Wabamon Prov Park just east of Edmonton with no hook ups.
We had a really shady campsite which was good with all the heat, but not good for the solar but they still kept up batteries fully charged up.

The other benefit is that the solar system charges my trailer batteries while I'm running down the highway.
This way I arrive with fully charged up batteries, which means I can run my trailer air conditioner off a 15amp AC circuit.

Prior, if my batteries were low & I plugged into a 15A cct, I couldn't run my 13.5 BTU trailer AC because it would kick the breaker.
When both my batteries are low, the converter/charger in my trailer will give them 15-20A to charge them up.

Lil Dog

Hmm, The truck charging circuit should top up your batteries on the road.

morkable

Yes that is true, your truck should be charging those batteries when driving

StealthDiesel

The voltage drop from the truck's alternator to the RV batteries is significant.
The length of the wires, the small gauge of the wires, all the connections, etc..

The truck will maintain the RV batteries driving down the road but no way it will fully charge them up like the solar panels.

winkdemon

if your seeing more then a 1v drop in that for the charging voltage you have a problem some were in my system , all my trucks have a 12 guage wire that runs for charging and it keeps my battieries charged. t