Justified?

[Kevin D Pem]

When traveling to replenish my water supply the other day I had to stop by and talk to a man that had an unbelievable solar setup.
He had more hidden behind the walls of his cargo trailer, than I was expecting and power envy immediately set in. Why?

3000 watts of solar on his 14 ft cargo that caused me to stop. Inside though were 16 or 17,(can't remember) LiFePo4 200ah batteries. Well the number had to be divided by two, as his system was 24volts. His system was protected, by the book of best practice. His inverters were 4000 watt magnum inverters
His MPPT controllers were morning star controllers. His whole system made containing my salivating almost impossible! This is hard to imagine from someone that feels the way I do about lithium, but it happened just the same. .

That aside, we had a couple of thick overcast days here in the desert SW and my 100amps at 24volts available battery power took a hit that will take a few days to recover from. This condition could have been avoided with double the battery power!

For me, it's all about justification, and so far the number of days that require a larger bank don't seem to justify doubling the bank, but a few points taken from that system I saw, have made me think about the advantages!

My continued posts on this topic are only intended to give you more information should you be contemplating going with solar, and I hope it helps you plan!!!

 

[TheLooks]

Not really, I saw a "go big or go home" comment from our most frugal poster. You must have known that someone would go bigger then you? Your system was/is designed to sustain YOU, his system must have been configured to sustain whatever he wanted.

 

[Kevin D Pem]

I'm disappointed! At the end of the day, so to speak, I found the reason for such a grand system!

This system even has fuses between the batteries, the way Tesla fuses between each cell. I was so impressed I had to share the experience, truly the build is exceptional, a professional would truly be proud to say he did the job!!!

But as an old favorite radio personality always pointed out, there's more to all stories, and this is no exception!!!

Now! the rest of the story!!!

What would you do if you migrated to a place like Quartzsite during the winter to avoid the cold at home! Yes eventually you would install solar, right?

But why would your wife be popping the breakers in your 4000 watt system? And why would you go to extremes to fuse everything to protect your build? After all, 30 amp service in your RV doesn't really require that much work!!! If you were Tim Allen, I could see it!!! So the question begged an answer, and an answer I got!!!

So Quartzsite has Tesla charging stations at Carl's Jr. So if you like cardboard, you can eat while you wait, or walk over to Micky D's for a baby big mac! But what happens when you're EV is a Chevy, and you like off grid life in Quartzsite?

Need I say more? Justified!!!

 

[GTS225]

I was starting to think he may have been a HAM'er that also belonged to a local emergency response team. But I also had the fleeting thought of an EV, and you confirmed it.
Good for them, but it's a heavy investment to support an EV while camping for the week.

Just my 2-pence.....Roger

 

[TheLooks]

When I go to Quartsite I am going to run my generator. I can buy several generators for the cost of an extreme solar/battery setup. That should have said several expensive generators.

 

[Kevin D Pem]

Everyone must make their own choices!
However that Beggs the question. Where can you buy an expensive generator for $300.00?

 

[TheLooks]

Show me a lithium battery of any amp/hrs and I will show you a lot of money. The equipment to direct all that power is not cheap either

 

[Kevin D Pem]

When I was deriving my power via ICE, I had batteries and inverter for quiet time use.

To go one or the other (petro/renewable), is the cost of the generator!

For a small office fridge and lighting on my slide in travel camper experiment a few years back. I had a simple 250 watt panel hooked up via a DC to DC converter as the controller. To that I had a home assembled lion battery (90ah). The weight limits of the axle was 350 lbs. So lithium was the only way.

I could have used tool batteries, but I was learning about lithium, and as usual I need to know things inside out!!! Many times I wonder why I can't be like everyone else, but I can't! Even my first computer was a component level kit!

Point to be made here, is the only difference in my system, and a minimum system is size!!!

The only difference in costs between solar and ICE is the generator, if you are set up for quiet times.

As for lithium. If I had the space, and didn't know what my part in the destruction of the earth was, I would have LTO batteries!