The Big “Beastly” Solar/Battery Upgrade Part I – Why?
Those of you who’ve deduced the hints in my previous posts already know what’s coming. For those of you who haven’t, now you know 🙂 The cat is out of the bag, the marmot is out of the hole, the bat has flown it’s cave. We’re upgrading our solar/battery system and it’s not just a small upgrade, it’s a BIG “BEASTLY” Solar/Battery Upgrade (BBSBU). We are going fully Monty, stripping our system down to it’s electronic birthday suit and building it up again from the ground up. We’re more than doubling our solar, we’re aaaalmost tripling our usable battery capacity, we’re going Lithium (oh yes we are) and we’re going to network the whole thing so that we can sit on our computers and collectively drool over how much power we’re generating.
It’s bold, it’s crazy, it’s unnecessary and we’re doing it anyway.
Yup, you heard me right. I did say unnecessary and that’s exactly what I’m going to talk about today. WHY in the world are we doing this? Wasn’t the old system working just fine? Why Now? Why Lithium? Why More Solar? What is the new system going to to enable us to do that the old one couldn’t?
Well, here are your answers…..
Why Upgrade?
So, the obvious answer is that our AGM batteries started failing ~6 months ago which gave us the perfect excuse to do a crazy upgrade, and since our buddies Technomadia already paved the way by testing out their Lithium system for us for several years, this was the perfect excuse to go Lithium and get a battery just a smidgen larger than theirs {{bwahahaha!}} And since we were getting bigger batteries, well we might as well add just a tad more solar than them too {{bwahahahahahah!}}. Makes sense, no? 🙂
Wasn’t The Old System just Fine?
Seriously though, we’ve been thinking about (and saving for) this upgrade for a loooong time. We even upgraded our inverter in 2014 specifically to be ready for this moment.
Our original 600 watt/ 440 AH system that we installed in 2010 has served us incredibly well over the past 5+ years. It was the PERFECT starter system for us back when we weren’t really sure we were going to boondock much and it’s pretty much satisfied our needs completely, especially when we tilt the panels in winter. In the years we’ve had the system I can count on one hand the number of times we’ve been forced to start the generator while boondocking. It’s been a great system.
However in 5 years technology has moved forward by leaps and bounds, especially on the battery side. We’ve tested the limits of our system quite a few times over the past years, and we’ve seen (first hand) the benefits of upgrades thanks to buddies who’ve paved the way for us. Plus we’re not boondocking/dry-camping newbies anymore. We know this is something we LOVE to do and we really enjoy the freedom that solar provides.
The bottom line is that we’re not looking for a starter system anymore. We’re looking for a leading-edge system that’ll see us through the next 5+ years and future-proof us against any rig upgrades (e.g. residential fridge) we might do down the line. It’s kind of like going from a tent to an RV. It’s not that the tent wasn’t working, it’s just that the RV is sooooooo much nicer 🙂
Why Now?
Well apart from our batteries failing, the planets aligned so that “Marvelous Marvin” was in the southwest desert and had time to squeeze us in. For those of you who don’t know Marvin Braun (e-mail contact HERE, website HERE), he was the fellow who did our original solar installation in 2010. We enjoyed that experience so much, we already knew we wanted him back for our “big upgrade”. He’s knowledgeable, solar geeky, infinitely patient (which, given the million-and-one-pain-in-the-butt questions we typically pose, is a huge bonus), happy to take you through every single detail of what he’s doing as he’s doing it, and just does all-around excellent work. You just feel “good” when you’ve got Marvin on your side (seriously, I’m not just saying that), and since we were diving into brand new territory with Lithuim (he’s been working with RV Lithium installations for 2 years already) we wanted that same support this time around 🙂
Why Go Lithium?
So the biggest (and costliest) upgrade that we’re doing this time around is switching our batteries from AGM (sealed lead acid) to Lithium (or if you want to be super-geeky-specific Lithium Iron Manganese Phosphate (LiFeMnPO4)). 5 years ago this technology wasn’t even on our radar. Now, it’s fairly established and it’s been adopted by both boaters & RVers alike, and for good reason too. Lithium has a ton of key advantages which make it very compelling, especially for nomadic types living in small spaces like us.
Now I should point out that Technomadia has already written tons of posts about Lithium (which I highly recommend) so what I’m about to write isn’t exactly ground-breaking stuff. But for those of you new to this whole thing, here’s why we’ve personally been drooling over Lithium for the past 2 years:
- Lithium Have ZERO ABSORB time. One of the biggest advantage of lithium is that they can bulk charge all the way. Those of you who have lead acid are familiar with their classic 3-stage charging cycle -> there’s the initial bulk phase where you push in a bunch of current (this basically takes your battery to ~90% charged), then you get to the absorb phase where charge voltage is held constant (current is way down) so that the last 10% charge can be “shoved into” the battery, then finally you get to the float phase (charge voltage drops, battery is full). The bulk phase is typically pretty fast, but the absorb phase always seems to takes forever. In our old AGM batteries it wasn’t unusual for us to need ~2 hours for absorb to be complete. With Lithium that 2nd phase is completely eliminated!!
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Lithium charges super fast! Lithium Can Charge MUCH faster. This really goes hand-in-hand with #1. Lead acid batteries have high(er) internal resistance and that resistance increases the more current you try to push into them. Lithium, on the other hand, have very little internal resistance so they can take in just about as much current as you can put into them. When you add the fact that they have zero absorb phase (which really does save a ton of time), this means they are able to charge SUPER fast. If you want an analogy lead acid is kind of like swimming through mud (it’s takes effort to begin with and the more mud you get on you, the harder it gets) whereas lithium is kind of like swimming through water (it takes very little effort and goes swimmingly all the way). So with Lithium you just pack in as much power as you can produce until the batteries are full. Job done!
- Lithium Don’t Need to Be Fully Charged. Another HUGE advantage of Lithium is that they don’t need to be fully charged. In fact they kinda prefer it when they aren’t. Lead acid batteries really need to be fully charged on a regular basis. It’s a chemistry thing. When lead acid batteries don’t fully charge, sulphur crystals start to build up on the plates inside the battery deteriorating both performance & lifespan. You can get around this (somewhat) by equalizing the batteries (basically putting a really high charge on them and de-sulphinating those plates), but over time it’s really not good for them. Add-in the long absorb time I talked about in #1 and you’re basically always fighting the battle of getting those batteries fully charged. Lithium, on the other hand, doesn’t care AT ALL about being fully charged. They are equally happy at 50% as they are at 70% and are perfectly OK if you never, ever, ever take them to 100%. So, if you’ve got a week of cloudy days where you’re batteries never get fully charged, it’s perfectly fine.
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Lithium has more usable capacity than lead acid Lithium Can Be More FULLY Utilized. The “typical” rule of thumb for lead acid batteries is that you don’t really want to take them below 50% discharge. You can go lower, but you’ll reduce their life span quite quickly. So, if you have a 440 AH battery pack, that means only ~50% of it, or ~220AH is usable. Lithium, on the other hand can be taken down to 20% without any reduction in life span. So, that same 440AH battery pack in lithium now yields 352AH of usable power, 1.6 times more than lead acid!!!
Note/ I should mention here that the draw-down limits of Lithium are super important. One of the negatives about about these batteries is that they will DIE (kaput, gone, forever dead) if you take them too low and you MUST have controls in place to prevent this (we’ll cover our controls in later posts). So, whereas you might survive drawing down your lead acid batteries too far, you will NOT survive doing that with your Lithium. -
Lithium are around half the weight of lead acid Lithium Are WAY Lighter. Lead acid batteries are heavy, and bulky. The 440 AH that we had in our bay weighed 264lbs. In comparison 400AH of Lithium weighs 110lbs, less than HALF! Plus it’s SMALLER in size too! By going Lithium we’ll be able to increase our usable capacity quite substantially while decreasing our battery weight. And we’ll be able to fit the whole darn thing into a smaller compartment too. Win, win and win.
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Lithium can support heavy loads with very little loss (Source: Elite Systems) Lithium DON’T Lose Capacity with Big(ger) Loads. This might seem a strange advantage, but bear with me. When you put a heavy electrical load on a lead acid battery they lose capacity. So, that 440AH lead acid battery pack of yours actually delivers way less than 440AH when you load it up. It’s called Puerkert’s Law and it’s one of the many reasons you don’t want to use lead acid to drive stuff in your rig that sucks a lot of electricity (at least not for long(er) times). Lithium, on the other hand doesn’t have that problem. It can deliver pretty darn heavy loads with barely any loss of capacity. As long as you have the charge you can drive these babies aaalmost as hard as you’d like.
- Lithium DON’T Lose Capacity At Low Temps. One of the other annoying things with lead acid is that they lose capacity in the cold. So, yet again your 440AH lead acid battery pack actually delivers way less than 440AH as it gets colder. We learned this the hard way in 2011. Lithium, on the other hand, don’t have this problem. If you’ve got a 400AH pack it’ll deliver pretty darn close to full capacity even if it gets down to freezing. Kind of like a good cup of coffee, it’s really nice to have consistency 🙂
Note/ Lithium does have some temp-related issues, especially relating to charging (if it’s too cold) and deteriorating lifespan (if they get too hot), but we’ll talk about how we address these issues in our installation posts. - Lithium Last Longer. Probably the hardest thing to accept about Lithium are the costs. They are not cheap (at all), but they do make up for it by lasting about twice as long as lead acid. Our old Lifeline AGM batteries are rated to last 1000 cycles (at 50% depth-of-charge). Our new Lithiums are rated for at least 2000 cycles (at 80% depth-of-charge). If you keep your system for the rated lifetime of the batteries, the cost per usable amphour are about a wash.
Why More Solar?
Well very simply because more is always better, right? Clouds, partial shade, hot summer days and low winter sun all decrease how much solar power you can produce, so the more panels you have the more flexibility you have in each of those situations. Plus if we’re getting all that sexy lithium capacity (and we have the space on the roof to do it), we may as well max out our generation capacity too.
What Is The New System Going to Enable Us To Do?
So kind of like the bionic man, we’re going to be able to go further, faster, with less weight and basically just look really cool doing it.
Our lithium batteries, combined with more solar panels are going to enable us to breeze through all of “corner cases” we experienced in our old system.
- Extended Cloudy days where you can’t fully charge your batteries? No problem!
- Partial shade on your roof? Still no problem!
- Winter days where we’re too lazy (or too hungover) to tilt the panels? No sweat!
- Super cold mornings in the Sierra Nevada when you need extra juice. Done!
- Never having to wait around for absorb time? Positively delicious!
- Charging at the speed of light? Aaaaaalmost!
- Running your air conditioner or washer/dryer on your batteries? Well, we’ll talk about that later…..(and yes, that’s a tease).
Plus (and there are HUGE bonus points in this) we are going to be able to geek out like only geeks can on power generation and battery charging. It’s just frikkin’ cool!
Coming up Next -> Component Details & Why We Chose What We Chose
Related External Links:
Technomadia Lithium Series -> Click HERE
Our Original Solar Series (2010-2014):
Welcome to the club – it is about time!
*grin*
Did I mention our system will be just a smidgen bigger than yours? Not sure I mentioned it {{grin}}
Nina
Admittedly, I’m a sceptic. And it’s always going to be a matter of budget and what it is that one needs to be comfortable in the “boonies”. Granted, we’re relatively new at this. And a 30 day “test” in southern Arizona in January is not entirely conclusive. We had mild weather after all. I’m sure that in the future, we will have other “tests”, intended or otherwise. But, for now at least, we’re satisfied with OUR “starter system”. During our 30 day test, we never went below 80% and never started our generator. And this was with creature comforts except for roof air.
High tech, or not, a cursory check on EBay for RV Lithium batteries suggests that I can replace my 440 ah deep cycle battery bank 10 TIMES for the same cost of 400 ah of Lithium. This makes MY choice easy…at least for the next MANY years.
Well like I said this is no longer a starter system for us. For newbies and/or those on a budget the system we had out first 5+ years would still be my recommendation. In fact I know folks who happily RV with much smaller systems than that! But we’re looking for the next step now, and we’re deliberately going big…and bold.
Great that you’re happy with your system and hope it brings you many more years of excellent boondocking.
Nina
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Gee can we have your old system?
We’re actually keeping it all except the solar controller and our old battery monitor (which we may sell). Our 6 solar panels are being re-used as is our inverter. Old batteries are toast and will be tossed.
Nina
This says, A commitment to more full time on the road… Awesome!
Most definitely. We don’t see ourselves coming off the road anytime soon. Of course unexpected events could change everything, but our current plan is to stick with it.
Nina
Nina:
Can you please email me Marvins email address. The one you have as a link continues to fail and I get the mailer daemon message. Thanks.
Allan
OOoooooops. I made a typo in the post. Correct e-mail is marv@precisionrv.com. Sorry about that!
Nina
AS Chris says, It’s about time. I just bought a 400AH LFMP system. 120 pounds compared to 360 pounds (6 T-105’s). No more filling batteries, no more specific gravity checking, and etc. Congrats!
Chuck
Sweet upgrade! We’re really, really looking forward to using ours.
Nina
Wow and Wow again. Wonderful information in terms that I can even understand as a quarter-Geek. Thanks so much for the info! And thanks to those in the vanguard who paved this path…especially Technomadia.
OOOOOOOHHH!!! I can hardly wait for the future posts!!!
Timing couldn’t be better guys. We learn Monday if our NEW home becomes reality Monday, Thanks you two and Chris & Cherie’s http://www.technomadia.com/ we two want to go this route. AM Solar is who we will go with. Can you ask Marvin where he will be in Beginning to mid May. We will be picking up our beast in Southern Utah if everything goes good Monday. Fingers Crossed 🙂
I will definitely ask him (and will likely send him your email if that’s ok).
Nina
Fascinating project, I will be waiting on future posts. You make it sound like the cats meow.
One can never have enough juice [or tank capacity 😉 ]. As to your latest project, all I can say is Wow! Are we on the same page or what?… My new Magnum PT-100 just arrived yesterday. And I’m specing out placement of some serious house panel wattage right now. Of course with that, the current 630Ah of lead will be totally overmatched. BIG solar needs a BIG battery bank if one is to take advantage of all that power. So how does one do that without hauling 1,000 lbs of lead? Lithium baby! Can’t wait for your next installment in this series…
Exciting stuff!! I might be a geek, but I really do get excited about solar gear and planning all that stuff. Good luck with everything!! You’re going to love it!
Nina
Wow! Very, very nice! I was impressed when you gave us the tour/rundown when you where at Markham Park, but this is outstanding.
Wow! You’re definitely taking us back in time now 🙂 Can’t hardly believe it was over 5 years ago we were there. Darn impressed you’ve been reading the blog that whole time too!
Nina
Congrats! We upgraded to Lithium in December. Love the faster charging and less weight!
Sweet! And they really are pretty to look at too 🙂
Nina
aaahh, I knew the ever-adorable, Marvelous Marvin had to have a role in this! Please tell him “hello” from me, and that he changed my life for the better. 😉
I sure will Suzanne! He really is a lovely guy.
Nina
I might have missed this in your posting, but have you looked into the addition of a super capacitor for storage along with your battery system? I understand they have a greater storage capacity and are quite small.
Hmmm…ultra capacitors are really not something that’s used in RV applications. They’re mostly used as transient or back-up power for short periods of high demand, and are not really suitable (to my understanding) for long periods of low/slow demand such as what we need in our rig. I’d have to look into it more, but that would be my first thought.
Nina
P.S. Paul used to work for a company that used these in high end server systems. Your question took him way back!
Consider installing several farads worth of capacitor storage right at the inverter terminals when you start running the A/C from the batteries or install the residential fridge. Both of these have large starting surges, just the thing a supercap excels at handling.
Ha! I KNEW you were going for lithium!! I just couldn’t figure out how you were going to be doing it while in the southwest, but now I see it all, Marvin was the missing link! Exciting, Nina!
We got our lithium batteries up and running about 6 weeks ago, but as we have to have the entire roof replaced on our 7 month old rig due to delamination issues (under warranty, thank goodness ), we haven’t yet put the solar panels on, or installed the MPPT. Can’t wait to read your next installment, as you will be completing your project before we complete ours – the roof is only due at the dealership early March.
I hope your project goes smoothly, and I am sure all your readers will, like peter and me, be eagerly awaiting each update!
Oh noooo! You had to have the whole roof replaced. I have to admit it would be ultra hard for me to have the lithium in house and not be able to hook them up. I was sooooo excited before we got ours that I could barely sleep (I know, so pathetic LOL).
Hope your repairs go smoothly so you can get those babies going soon!
Nina
Thanks Nina, we hope the repairs go smoothly too, it’s a real bummer looking at a pile of solar panels sitting around just waiting to be used, and all this arizona sunshine, and having to pay for electricity!
Am about to read part 2 of your installation blog, can’t wait!
Lithium smithium, you guys are way behind the curve. I just got a 1.5 gigawatt flux capacitor installed and can’t wait to get my rig up to 70 mph for the first time. See you in the funny papers kids . . . And good luck with your install.
HA! We thought about one of those, but couldn’t fit it in our bay. See you in the future 😉
Nina
This is awesome and we are definetly looking forward to what you chose as we are preparing for solar and studying. Thanks for the information and congratulations–happy for you
Oh, no–are you going to have more solar capacity than the cowboy now??? You write so well Nina and you make me chuckle, a good thing!
Oh yes indeed. My goal is to have just a smidgen more than aaaall our good RV buddies LOL. I think our “advantage” will be short-lived though. Perhaps we’ll get a day or two of bragging rights before we see someone with a sexier system. Such is life 🙂
Nina
Hi Nina,
Thanks for all your info and insight! I am wondering what battery monitor you have, as we are looking at adding one. Might it be the Trimetric 2030RV?
Thanks,
Roy
Our old battery monitor was a Xantrex Linklite. If you’re interested shoot me an email and I’ll definitely make you a good deal. For the new system we don’t need it.
Nina
Will follow with interest, and take this opportunity to thank you and Paul for your ‘starter system’ info sharing. When we were setting up this phase of the our coach for more full-time and also more boon docking. I read your above links, as well as followed the then oh so relatively new world that Chris & Cherie’s embarked on.
I decided to go the safe route, and stay with AGM on this go around. But I did so in away that built off of yours and Chris & Cherie’s experiences:
1) I did an energy usage audit. Added 30% for growth of new electric usage (AKA residential ride, and HiFi (Got Tubes?), etc. And then ended up doubling that amount. (X’s 4 Lifeline L16’s for 800AH)
2) I doubled it, to both have reserve capacity, and to also hopefully extend the life of the AGM bank. (We try stay in the 70-80% SOC ranges overnight. So less in/out usually equates to less usage of the DOD 1000 cycles.)
3) We did the same with the Solar Panels. Oversized to 1200W, paid up for higher efficiency panels that could produce a bit more power at lower angles of the AM/PM sun movement. Without tilting.
4) We tried to by components (Inverter/Charger and Solar Controller that could be easily adapted/programed for use with a future Lithium approach in the future.
We’re not rushing the demise of our battery bank, hoping for another solid 4-5 years of usage ahead. (Now about 3 years old.).
Recall I said ‘Thanks’ – we would not have installed our robust system, and attempted to future proof many of the components, if it had not been for the lessons learned shared by you and Paul, Chris & Cherie’s (And sure, another group of fellow RV’ers and two or three from the boating community too.)
So thanks again, really looking forward to your future posts on this adventure. Suspect in about 6-7 years, I’ll be tossing out another ‘Thanks’ for your lessons learned on the lithium adventure:)!
Best,
Smitty
It really sounds like you installed an outstanding system! If we hadn’t gone Lithium this time around we would definitely have gone the next size up in lead acid, much the same ones you chose. And 1200W gives you plenty of solar to play with. Great system! Thanks for sharing.
Nina
Smitty, Sounds like a nice system. Which higher efficiency solar panels did you go with? I’m planning out my new system right now!
Jim
I like your plan!!!!
Can’t wait to see how it all comes together.
Seems like an awkward question, but how will those batteries behave at the higher altitudes encountered in some of the passes of the western mountain ranges?
Lithium work just the same at higher altitude (there’s no altitude effect on the charge/discharge curves).
The only time you run into problems is if they get overly cold (they have trouble charging if they get too cold, although they’ll still deliver charge to your coach without a problem) or too hot (it shortens their lifespan). As an example our Lithium are rated to deliver ~90% of capacity at -20C (-4F). That’s well sub-freezing and temps we don’t ever hope to see in the coach. In most “normal” situations they deliver full capacity all the time.
Nina
We love the Boondocking, Dispersed Camping, Wild Camping, Off the Cord and our Solar.
Our coach is all electric with 8 AGM batteries and 1280 watts of fixed solar pannels.
After we learn the tricks we have been hitting 95 – 100% each and every sunny day.
The tricks,
After our solar were installed, the first thing we had figure out is how to take advantage of all those amps coming and going. To take full advantage of our solar system we had to consider everything that plugs into an outlet. We had alot to consider. Basically even when our electron hogs there off, they’re on. They still draw power.
To see the power savings we started isolating these plugins with power strips. Power strips are our friend day or night. This enabled us to turn off things like DVDs, DVRs, HDMI boosters, the stereo receiver and coffee maker when not in use. The plugs for our TVs and microwave are not readily available so those will stay on unless we tripped the circuit breakers that control them . We simply placed power strips on the wall, we only used two sided 3M tape. Now we can turn them off and on at will. Ours is an all electric coach so that includes an electric refrigerator with a power saver button on the front control panel. We turn that off and on sometimes to save battery power. We purchased a separate wireless monitor for the refrigerator and freezer with alarm settings. Another trick we use in a refrigerator is 4-60 ounce jugs of frozen water. “Ice blocks” useing blocks of ice is nothing new I mean that’s how the whole refrigerator thing got started. Another thing we use is little blue fan to keep the air in the refer moving.
We have triped off the inverter, one of the biggest power hogs, that takes everything down except the 12 volt system. We have also strategically placed small battery operated motion detector LED lights around the coach.
We have a two burner Induction stove top that is NOT wired into the inverter so we purchased a portable True Induction stove top and plugged it in, now we don’t have to run the generator to cook.
What all these measures do is not allow the batteries to be drained needlessly.
Any more tricks up your sleeve?
We really have to thank you Wheelingit, Technomadia, RVGeeks and Gone with the Wynns for making us think and figure out what we need to do to make this system work. We enjoy all of your articles on your blogs, Facebook and Youtube.
You guys are the pioneers.
Thank you,
Dave and Kathy
Nomadic RVers
Sounds like you guys have it dialed in!
You mentioned it briefly, but the only other thing I can think of is turning off your fridge at night. We have friends with residential fridges who do that, and they’ve told me the fridge holds it’s temps just fine. Since the fridge is probably one of your biggest power draws, turning it off overnight really does save a lot of battery juice, especially on colder nights where your lead acid battery capacity will be diminished.
Another little trick is to wait in the morning until the sun gets some solar in before turning stuff on in your rig. Mid-AM in winter (with panels tilted) was typically when we got our best/highest solar generation (panels looooove cold weather and with our MPPT charger we’d often see over 40-42 amps in the mid-morning from our 600 watts). So, giving the batteries a chance to suck up that bulk power early on (and so get into absorb phase earlier in the day) gives you a head start to getting them fully charged every day. The earlier you can get to that long absorb phase the better! We used to use this trick a lot in our rig. We’d typically try and wait until 11am or so to turn on my big “sucker” computer and the TV.
Nina
Oh yeah. I would bring the temperature down in the refrigerator to about 34° from 38°, turn the frigerator of night about 11pm but the alarm will go off about 7am,
I have the alarm set @ 42°.
The wife does not like alarms going off to warn me to get up and turn on the refrigerator. So now I just turn it off during the day it doesn’t seem to make a big difference unless it’s a really warm day.
Happy wife, Happy life !
Our system has been peeking around 58 to 62a, theoretically the most we can expect out of it in the summer should be 71a. not too shabby for fixed panels.
Thanks for all the other advice.
Can’t wait to hear more about you new system and someday your new electric refrigerator. I wish ours had a wine drawer.
Got to go it’s time to turn the refrigerator off! 🙂
Hmmm….wine refrigerator. I hadn’t (yet) thought of that. We do have 1-2 empty bins now….hmmmmm 🙂
Nina
Great Article, I look forward to the next installment.
Mel
Very cool guys. We now have battery (power) envy.
With the hybrid inverter (which I know you have as well) we have pretty much ditched the 50 amp cord and just carry one of those yellow contractor grade 15 amp extension cords and can run the AC, microwave, coffee pot, charger, etc… on 15 amps without having to drag out the anaconda! When on shore power, the LFPs make up the difference and then get recharged. 😉
Totally! We’ll probably be running our hybrid most of the time from here on out. With our solar supplying the majority of our power needs, we won’t need much shore power anymore. Plus we can hookup to just about any kind of outlet and still run almost everything in the coach.
Nina
Well.. well.. well… just wait and see what’s next up our sleeves 🙂
Seriously guys, welcome to the club. It’s been so exciting in the past year to see just how many folks have embraced lithium & larger solar arrays. We couldn’t be happier with our choice so many years ago, and our system continues to serve us well (ok, but I AM insanely envious of the roof space you have to work with!).
I know you’ll be basking in the abundance of lithium & solar (and the glow as of your digital readouts as you watch the amps go here and there), teasing us with all the amazing places you’ll be staying.
Yeah I figure we’ll probably have at least a few weeks of bragging rights before we lose the edge LOL. I’ve got to make the most of this precious time
We’ll have to plan some more joint boondocking so we can geek out on our 2 systems together.
Nina
So I take it you’re not quitting the full time boon docking life style anytime soon. lol
Seriously, I so enjoy your stuff. I regret I didn’t begin RVing as soon as I retired, 12 years ago. Even as I bump up to 73, I still think about full timing. The wife is sure I’ll hate it. And maybe she’s right. But honestly, thinking about painting the house, weeding the garden (again) and struggling to go anywhere almost anytime of the day, in the midst of 15 million people, who seem to be going to the same place is just not putting a smile on my face. I’ve always enjoyed nature, but I’m not quite sure I could do it for month(s) at a time. We’re drivers. Probably 35,000 miles pulling our trailer for five years. Then 17,000 miles driving our new to us, aging motorhome over the past two years. Not exceptional for full timers, but the longest we’ve been on the road is 4 months. Sometimes we drive 5,000 miles in a month. The wife loves it. She even drives sometimes. Maybe 5%. I’d love to sell the home, take some of the money and buy a larger motorhome and get on with enjoying this beautiful country. Been looking for another motorhome. Been encouraged by the number of older RVer’s quitting the life style. But only because they’re already in their 80’s which tells me, maybe another 7 or 8, or even 15 years.
Oh I definitely think that you’ve got many more good RV years ahead of you, even if it’s only part-time. As long as health is good, there’s no reason you can’t keep going. By the way you guys have done a lot of miles part-timing! Most of our years on the road we’ve only managed 5-6K miles each year, in fulltime travel mode. Kudos to you both for getting out there!
Nina
Thank you for this great information . I am getting ready to put solar to work in our rig. Also, I would like to share your wheelingit.us with my Facebook followers at Living the Rv laptop lifestyle. I think they will enjoy following your great posts. Let me know if I have your permission to share your link. Have a great day. Ron and Reida
Sure. Feel free to share the link 🙂
Nina
Thanks Nina. I am sure my followers will enjoy following you. Have a great day. Ron and Reida
Great article. We are looking at some upgrades soon. I look forward to hearing how it goes. Could you add costs to your article? We would like to have a budget before we dig in, and asking vendors is just downright scary!
NICE!!!
We will be going to Lithium when we upgrade as well…..just have to sell this coach first.
You will like the larger array……we have 1220 watts and I’ll be putting probably 2+KW on the next coach. Yes….we are power hogs…… 🙂
I have a design done right now that has a naked RV roof that is 8’x 43′ with NOTHING on it….lots of panel space. AC is basement, no skylights (side lights), vents are low profile or out the side, fans are out the side. That roof “might” end up totally covered in panels.
Nice!! We’re parked next to an RV right now that has basement air, and the first thing I said to Paul when I saw it was “look at all that extra space they have for solar panels”!
Nina
Exciting changes for sure! You’re years ahead of us as we’ll be adding solar to the 6v AGM’s next summer.
Thanks for your review on Sam’s in DHS. That’s what brought us here and we’re 3/4 thru our month here before starting back east. Had dinner with a couple who met you on your last visit here.
Hot diggity!! I have been waiting for this. I have followed technomadia and their updates and have been wondering WHEN you would complete the lithium upgrade. Since you picked up uour super duper inveter I have been dying for your battery upgrade. Congrats!!
I know! We waited ore a full year since we bought that inverter to do our upgrade. We might even have waited longer, but our batteries dying finally gave us the impetus to do it. It’s a big investment, but we plan for it to last us many years.
Nina
I don’t get it…
Hi Nina, We have a similar size rig and have been following your blog for sometime now. Will you be posting the cost and source for the equipment? Also in your research have you come across anyone that has had the lithium batteries installed in the sliding battery tray? I know this may not be the best place due to exposure to outside temperatures, but not sure how concerned I should be as I don’t intend on spending any time in temps below freezing. Thanks again Bob
I’ll definitely be posting some equipment details.
As for installing Lithium in an external bin, it’s not really common. Apart from issues in charging (when it’s very cold), perhaps the bigger issue is deteriorating battery lifespan when it gets too hot…and those external bins do get hot. Marvin said it could be done, but he’d want to put in some insulation and perhaps have a way to temp control a bit (heat/cool as needed). You do want to keep those pricey batteries in a *reasonably* temp-controlled environment.
Nina
It appears that a ‘temp controlled’ environment could mean that you will cool or heat the Beast and the battery compartment with the AC unit or you will move around to suit the climate. You are installing a power station, we are installing a residential unit and do not plan to run our AC off the LFMP array. Would you be so kind to ask Marvin his thoughts when you cannot ‘temp control’ the location of the batteries? We do not plan on being in extremely cold or extremely hot (Nina’s flip flop rule) areas but will move as the seasons and temperature change. Still you will get the hot or cold spell at times. Thanks for clarifying if you can.
Well it all depends on what your coach looks like, but basically he would start by insulating the compartment. And as for a bit of temp control I imagine there are many ways you could achieve that -> small thermostatically-controlled fans, small heaters etc.? This is me speculating by the way, not Marvin (I’d prefer to refer you to him for specific installation details).
And finally all of this really has nothing to do with running your AC off the batteries (power draw is not the problem here). It’s aaaall about protecting your expensive battery investment. Lithium lifespan degrades in hot temps and they really do prefer a *somewhat* reasonably controlled environment. Plus they just won’t charge when it gets too cold. I think it’s all do-able, but it just depends on your individual space and environment.
Nina
SO, possibly an incoming air source underneath the rig that would always be in the shade and re use the hose that would vent the hydrogen gas to the outside with a fan attached to move ambient air through the battery area….. has possibilities. Thanks!
And as far as running your AC off the batteries, when the batteries were inside a compartment in the coach as opposed to being in a compartment below, the AC would keep the temp down. That is what I meant with my AC comment.
If it gets to cold to charge, we are gettin’ out of there!
No need to worry about hydrogen gas venting with lithium (no such thing), but yes some kind of air circulation/cooling set-up like that might work to help temp-control the environment.
Nina
Chuck get one of these recording thermometers and put it in the area you currently have your batteries. Nice way to track temps to gather data on the Hot/Cold temps.
Marv did my setup in the Airstream. While in my winter storage place (inside, no heat) I put this one with the remote probe between my two Lithiums and tracked the temps. I also had a small 200W ceramic heater pointed at the batteries on a temperature controlled switch just in case of low temps. Even here north of Denver I didn’t see temps below 32 and the heater only came on a few times (Kill-o-Watt logger to capture power usage).
The LCD with the Lithiums can tell you temps in each set of cells so easy to check prior to turning on charging. Charge should be 32 degrees and above and as mentioned elsewhere -2F for any discharge/use.
I’d be more worried about high temps while parked in the summer. You would need a way of checking those to see if there is any uplift in temps over ambient.
Love my Lithiums.
Thanks very much for chiming in Gary! If anyone wants to read the details of Gary’s setup he did quite a nice write-up on the Airstream forum here:
http://www.airforums.com/forums/f448/lithium-batt-solar-install-2015-classic-135819.html
Nina
Sorry forgot to post the link for the recording thermometer. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00T2CEID2?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o08_s00
Thanks, I agree the high temperatures are more the problem than low (we are in Florida). Appreciate the info and the link.
Comgratulations on your new lithium and solar upgrades! And major upgrades too. Wow!
This is a lot of fun to read and learn about. I’ll be following along as you continue this series of blog posts. If it’s not to personal, I hope that at the end, you may be able to provide a cost sheet breakdown of the upgrade project?
With all this great RV solar and lithium geekiness, the biggest takeaway I get is the incredible amount of added freedom, independence, and ability you’re gaining for boondocking. Now your biggest boondocking issue will be fresh water and holding tank capacities.
Wait…didn’t Chris and Cherrie, last years upgrades…? 🙂
I would assume that you are aware of the 30% tax credt for outfitting your home (RV qualifies) with a solar system. What are your thoughts on this? Will you be able to take the credit even though you have an existing system? Are there any resources you are aware of that give advice on this other than seeking out an individual tax advisor? Thanks, we look forward to following you project.
Yup, very aware of the tax credit (tax form 5695). We utilized it for our first installation and will certainly be utilizing it for our new one.
The easiest resource to look at is the instructions for the form:
https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i5695.pdf
Also see here, specifically for upgrades:
http://www.wholesalesolar.com/solar-information/federal-tax-credit
But ultimately, I’m not a tax professional and have to point out that a professional would be the one to contact for detailed advice 🙂
Nina
This is interesting, especially the little tidbit about possibly operating the washer/dryer on batteries. I look forward to hearing how much you guys can run at once to test out those new batteries. 🙂
Congratulations Nina and Paul! We have our 600W solar panels, 440 AH LiFePO4 battery by CALB, and 2kW Magnum inverter system for the third year in our class-C motor home. We are very happy with the system. The CALB batteries performed well so far and it seems no loss of detectable capacity at all. We did this upgrade ourselves. Once you have the Lithium battery the AGM or other Lead Acid batteries became horrible memories…
In fact, we have not used our generator for two and half years the carburetor needs to be removed and cleaned, a major rework needs to happen sometime in future.
Solar and Lithium is the way to go for RVers!
Beautiful set-up! Thanks for sharing! The CALB Lithiums didn’t really show up on our research radar, so it’s great to hear you’ve had good experience with them.
Nina
Glad to hear you are doing this upgrade. I have read most of technomadia’s post. They really paved the way for many RV’ers.
Getting your step by step installation with a professional will be great info.
Thanks so much for sharing.
I’m really looking forward to the future posts. Our batteries are due for replacement and I’m considering all options. We currently have four 6V AGM batteries, wired for two lines of 12V each. We have a 3000W inverter and most everything on the trailer runs on 110V (12V for stereo and water pump only; fridge is 3 way). We only have 200W portable solar panels that we plug in outside and move around chasing the sun. The current batteries charge very slowly and don’t hold a charge for long. How are the lithiums for charging from the tow vehicle? It’s so disappointing to drive all day to the next site and still not be charged up!
I’m definitely not an expert, but I’m thinking that you might be under-solar-powered for your system? With 4 AGM’s and only 200 watts you’re probably not achieving full charge everyday? Usually folks recommend having at least the same amount of watts as you have total amphours (so, if you have 400 amphours of batteries, say, you’ll want at least 400 watts of solar). Much less than this and it becomes hard to fully charge your batteries.
Lithiums definitively charge super fast, but they are finicky about temps (best kept inside your rig) and are also a tad tricker than AGMs to install.
Nina
Thanks, Nina! I think you’re probably right, but the 200W portable is the largest I could get from Zamp Solar and the most I could manuever. I can’t bring myself to mounting panels on the 1948 Spartan Manor! I also have an aversion to generators, so I wanted to get a battery solution that could last for 5-7 days without charging. Maybe that’s not realistic.
“and we’re going to network the whole thing so that we can sit on our computers and collectively drool over how much power we’re generating.”
Can you go into detail about the method you will be using? Wired/wireless, web page, serial port, canbus converter, etc.
I’ll be going into more detail in the next posts. But basically we’re using a Blue Sky UCM and will network via ethernet (which we’ll likely connect to a router…haven’t quite decided yet). This part of the project is still being worked on, so when we have it all set-up I’ll write more.
Nina
Humm… Lots experience with BS on prior coach and they make great products! But with your Magnum inverter already installed and that “network” being able to seamlessly integrate with their awesome solar charging unit (PT-100) and a wireless or Ethernet (MAGN-ME-MW-W or E) connected web monitoring “kit” readily available – I would’ve bet that’d be the way you are going ALSO ;). I especially like that the Magnum remote has a PT menu all ready and waiting for my PT-100 unit! Either way it’ll be fun to compare systems… Isn’t tech geekiness fun?
Do you leave your inverter on al of the time, even when hooked up to shore power?
Thanking you I advance.
Joe
With the hybrid function of the inverter (paired with the Lithium) it makes sense to leave it on, especially if we’re in a spot where we’re paying for electricity. The hybrid will favor our batteries, reducing our electricity draw.
Nina
It’s perfect for boondocking too! The Magnum 2812/3012’s are very smart with their standby “search” mode. When “off-the-cord” with no draw like at night, the inverter remains in an ultra-low power state while it searches for at least a 5 watts of demand (that threshold is adjustable). When it sees that, it instantly turns on with a switchover time of only 16 milliseconds. Once the demand is gone, the inverter goes back into standby. This is perfect when you like to boondock and have an all electric RV! At night with no other big draws, our Samsung RF18 only “trips” the inverter on when the compressor comes on and that saves battery juice. To keep 120 volt phantom loads from other items at bay, we make liberal use of power bars and in-line on-off switches. Our Magnum is left on all the time since the phantom draw from it while in standby is so low and of course the refer needs a reliable power source.
I read on Marvin’s website that he recently did a 1,920 watts solar power installation job.
Hot rockets that’s a lot of solar. Guess we have a new max to aim for 🙂
Nina
I am hoping that Marvin would consult with Travel Units on where to put the obstacles on the roof so I can max out the solar power panels on the roof. I am hoping for a 2,120 watts maximum when everything is completed (if not, then 1,590 should be it). Marvin would be doing the solar power installation after taking delivery and we purchase the merchandise needed that we need to RV if we decide to do this option.
Sounds like an awesome set-up, and you’ll have rocking loads of power too!
Nina
Nina, I am just curious now that you’ve had your solar power installation for a while how many times have you really needed to use your generator? I know that you talked about using it in Michigan, but want the total number of times. I was hoping to not have a generator on board to save weight and avoid another maintenance item to do so that is why I want big time solar power wattage. Plus for most of the dry camping campgrounds that I will be going to will have generator restrictions and we won’t be able to use one during the hours designated or just for an hour or two. I would be asking for a sunny spot at these dry camping campgrounds to take advantage of the solar power.
I honestly can’t recall us having to use the generator for power since we got the new set-up. In Michigan we were able to run 4 days in a no-generator campground loop just on our batteries and whatever meager solar we were getting thro’ the trees. We’ve run the A/C off the batteries for a whole afternoon (in a mostly sunny site) with no problem at all, and we’ve rarely needed to worry about our power levels at any time (we are VERY abundant these days and don’t need much solar to fill up!). We DO run our generator about once per month simply to exercise it (for the health of the generator), but I honestly don’t recall having to use it for power since we got the new system.
Nina