| Author |
Message |
Alan Heaberlin (66.218.59.227)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2003 - 4:40 pm: | |
Some of you might remember seeing my pictures of the Voodo Lounge a couple of years ago. I'm finally working on my conversion in earnest and from time to time I come up with a question of a subjective matter and I could use some helpful advice.
First off the Voodoo Lounge is a 1975 Flxible New Look. Out of service from SCRTD it was bus #7386. The only destinations on its sign were LAX and Disneyland. Thus it has highway gearing and easily cruises over 70. It was then used by the US Olympic committee along with several dozen other identical buses and supported the 1984 Olympics transportation needs. Eventually it ended up with the famous group of Flx's at Kramer Junction (US 395& SR58) where it was sold in 1991. I bought it a year ago and took delivery in February this year (it sat for 6 years). It has the DD8V71 and VS2-8 auto gearbox. It is the same as Scott Whitney's Dustyfoot. The gentlemen I bought it from had started a half-assed conversion to a traveling restaurant of sorts so the original seats had been removed and restaurant booths installed with a rudimentary kitchen. When I took delivery I made them take all the junk out.
Now to the question:
I plan to use a combination of electrical sources based on a 300 watt solar system and will rely on shore power when I need A/C, though I have a genset big enough for that purpose when absolutely necessary. I probably will not use a large inverter but will use small inverters for my computer and other AC loads and rely on 12 volts for everything possible.
What is the best type of plug for my shore power cord to accomodate the widest number of RV parks and deluxe campgrounds? I salvaged a 30 amp converter/charger that will supply my needs nicely but it has a Trailer-type plug. Having owned a couple of RVs but always being a dry camper I don't have much experience with RV parks. I'm prepared to use adaptors when necessary but I'd like to be set up for what I'm going to see most often. A consensus from the group will be helpful.
Thanks and I'll have another good question for you all later on.
Alan Heaberlin
Voodoo Lounge
www.buffalorun.com |
Peter Broadribb (Madbrit) (208.186.37.159)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2003 - 4:51 pm: | |
Alan,
Be wary of small inverters. The quality of the output power is often not good enough for running delicate things like computers.
Peter. |
Alan Heaberlin (66.218.41.153)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2003 - 5:45 pm: | |
Yes Peter, Point taken. However there are a lot of high quality stable 60Hz inverters on the market now. I've been seeing them for about $300-400 for ~500 Watt units. I can buy several of those and dedicate them to one or two appliances if needed and take the $thou I save (from not buying a Trace or Xantrex) and buy a couple more batteries and another BP150 solar panel. You made it to Bakersfield lately? |
James Robinson (Jjrbus) (68.27.86.91)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2003 - 5:51 pm: | |
as I travel I see a lot of 30/50 in comercial parks and 20 and 30 amp in state/private parks, so 30 seem's to be the most common, I carrie a 20 to 30 adapter and a 50 to 30 adaptor and have yet to be someplace I could not hook up. |
Tom Caffrey (Pvcces) (64.114.233.67)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2003 - 7:27 pm: | |
Alan, for the price of a couple of those 500 watt inverters, you can get a 2KVA inverter that will include a powerful charger with 3 stage controls, temperature sensing to take care of your batteries and search mode so that the idle current on the inverter doesn't eat you up.
All of this in an inverter designed for RVs to be the primary source of power when you are boondocking and power sharing capability for when you plug into a small shore power circuit. And with a fully automatic transfer switch.
Actually, the cost of a good inverter can often be matched by the installation and battery cost for a balanced setup; a 100 amp charger ought to have 500 amp hours of house batteries to make them have a good life.
If you go with small inverters, they ought to be kept turned off until you turn on the device they are supposed to power; their idle current is 7 or 8 watts. You will likely not want to continue with them for very long if you are not always plugged into a PP.
For what it's worth.
Tom Caffrey PD4106-2576
Suncatcher |
Geoff (Geoff) (66.238.122.36)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2003 - 10:02 pm: | |
If you want a really nice setup you are going to have to spend a few bucks-- and not much more than if you try to make do with a bunch of small inverters and a separate charger-- I picked up a Trace SW2512MC inverter/charger for $1200 on eBay. Last weekend I was parked in a campground on a 30 amp plug with voltages dipping down to 111 volts. It was also hot and I wanted to run two air conditioners. With my 50 amp shore cord plugged into a 30 amp adaptor and the inverter control set to a 30 amp plug-in, the inverter was able to kick in and carry the surge load everytime the second A/C kicked in. If I would have been on straight shore power I would have blown the circuit breaker each time. That is one of the benefits of the SW series inverter-- it locks in phase with either shore power or generator output and supplies power at times of overload. It also has a 100-130 amp charger for the house batteries for fast charges.
That is the way to go.
--Geoff
'82 RTS CA |
jmaxwell (66.42.92.19)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, June 11, 2003 - 12:05 am: | |
Alan: You are equating the cycles of electricity(60Hz) with the waveform (1 to Absolute SW). The waveform represents the stages of inversion in converting DC to AC and in the cheapo inverters it can be very dirty, especially with the smaller, cheaper ones. Simply put, it is a very choppy waveform with relatively few steps in it. Making it occur 60 times a second does not clean it up. And, while 300 watts of solar is better than just a basic system, it will require some constant restraint on power demand if u plan on it being your primary source of recharging. I have 240 watts of solar and if I relied on it I would have to camp like a Tibetan Monk. |
Gary Stadler (Boogiethecat) (68.7.217.217)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, June 11, 2003 - 12:25 am: | |
Alan, I did just what you propose re: the small inverter dedicated to my compter... I have no reason for any other AC unless I want some higher power, then I turn on the Onan. So I researched and got a 125 watt true-sine wave inverter made by Exeltech (XP-125)
http://www.exeltech.com/ex_root/ex_products/ex_inverters/ex_xp/ex_xp_specs.htmand
It works perfectly for my computer. Interestingly, with the LCD monitor being powered by 12 volts, the remainder of the entire computer including motosat stuff uses a meager 18 watts!!
I did notice that with the inverter running, my wireless mouse didn't have as much range as it does when the computer is running on shore power, but the addition of a simple corcom line filter at the inverter's output took care of that in a jiffy. The problem was a little bit of RF generated by the inverter, which is normal.
I've found the unit to be prefectly reliable, excellent waveform, all around recommended.
Cheers
Gary |