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ABOUT THE ENERGY GENERATION SYSTEM:

This section is mainly about solar electricity generation and storage, as energy is a subject that crosses over into other areas such as plumbing and electrical. All planning has been along the lines of making VP able to be self sufficient for as long a period as possible. For instance all hot water will be generated by waste heat from the Detroit while travelling and solar when still. The biggest fridge/freezer is a very energy efficient eutectic one built by us.

The solar generation is bigger than found on many houses, 10 x 175 watt 24 volt panels or modules. They reside on a purpose built aluminium profile system, along with some piping for the solar section of the coolant used for hot water generation. The profile system will also allow us to hang a motorised full length awning off each side, with no side struts. 16mm squared positive and negative in conduit run down to the bin area where the Super Combi power management centre resides, along with the large battery bank. The Super Combi is way more than an inverter, it can blend the output from your battery bank with shore power if needed to run a welder for instance. It can also blend multiple DC input sources to charge the battery bank such as solar, alternator, generator, and shore. It will even start and stop your generator when required. The Super Combi will also output up to 3 Kw of 240 volt power for whatever use you require it for.

The battery bank is of approximately 1,000 amp hours at 24 volt which weighs a ton (literally). It will be spread out on the bin floors to keep the weight as low as possible and connected with 70mm square battery cable to avoid any voltage drop.More picturs of the energy generation will follow as it is developed.

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I have decided to add the LPG energy to this section as well. Still pulling my hair out over idiots that do not have any idea of what needs to be done, though that have an installers ticket.

Have had about 5 visits from up to 3 “gasfitters” at a time. They seemed to have no problem with the location of the gas storage area and indeed plumbed all bottles there, only to find they had used illegal pipe and connections. Then they decided that the main gas line should be run outside, under the coach. Can you believe it. At that point I said go. They had also installed the regs lower than the bottles (illegal) and installed a bayonet fitting inside the barbie compartment (they must be outside). So, lesson learnt, find a guy who works on RV’s.

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