Battery life on solar

[juliuss]

I'd like to thank everybody for there help in advance, I have a 2011 Itasca Ellipse 42QD that I just recently purchased and wanted to know how long will the refrigerator stay running on battery power without the generator? What is the longevity of the coach batteries?

Thanks, Juliuss

[vsheetz]

Need more info. What refrigerator? Battery bank - what type and how many?

[juliuss]

Vince,
The refrigerator is a Samsung residential, and the battery bank is 6 gel batteries don't know the size yet but I believe they are original equipment. The coach has a 100 watt solar panel on the roof but I don't believe it supplies much power.
thanks for the help.

[zman-az]

To many factors to give you a exact time. How hot is it outside, what temp is fridge at, is fridge empty, is the solar in the sun, do you have all other appliances and lights off. I would suspect you could get about 24 hours or so as that is what I feel I can get out of mine although I never let the batteries get that low. I now run 685w of solar and had fridge running 24/7 with batteries fully charged at late afternoon not running any other powered devices. When I got up in the morning batteries would be at 12.4v.

[CPO_Retired]

Check your manuals but the 100 watt solar panel on my rig only trickle charges the chassis battery not the house batteries.

[tagcat]

I think Doug is right,the 100 watt is only for the chassis battery. The 6 house batteries have me a little confused this is most of the time for solar,if it is 100 watts would be a little under powered We have 500 watts with 6 new coach batteries ,have changed out halogen lights to led ,smart t.v.,samsung frig,.While traveling if weather is warm will use gen for a/c tell sun goes down then switch to coach batteries start at 100% watch t/v use computer, use lights to read ,by morning we are at 60% batteries are at around 12.5 v.
I will be checking in to adding a auto start for gen if volts drop.This is all cost $$ but we are full time haul a 24" trailer so camp ground are a little bit of a hassle while going from point A to point B sometimes we will take 5 or 6 days before we have hook ups.Will be doing some dry camping in Big Bend this winter for several week so this will come in handy.
You should be able to hook more panels to your system .Many factors come in to play. As Doug said look at manual.

[jerichorick]

Originally Posted by juliuss

I'd like to thank everybody for there help in advance, I have a 2011 Itasca Ellipse 42QD that I just recently purchased and wanted to know how long will the refrigerator stay running on battery power without the generator? What is the longevity of the coach batteries?

Thanks, Juliuss

Your rig is the big sister to mine. With the residential refrigerator, 2800W Magnum inverter, 6 AGM batteries and running the water heater on propane your are good for at least 7 hrs before the generator starts.

We were dry docking at my in-laws. DW cooked a turkey breast in the convection oven for a couple of hours. About 4 hours later the generator started to refresh the batteries. I had no idea what to expect because the coach was new to us and we were just "living" in it as normal. That was before I changed the cabin lighting to LED.


We have changed the most used lights in our coach to LED's from M4products.com Here is a link to what I put in the ceiling: Elite Series Retrofit LED to replace Small 10w G4 / T3 Halogen

The color of these lights is so pleasant. We leave them on most of the time. Coming in from the bright outdoors is not as bad to the eyes now because these new lights work so well in the daytime. Even better at night of course.

But, back to your question. I am truly impressed with the function of the power systems with this coach. (I do recall a problem that some of the QD's had at one time. The generator had starting issues. The fix was to replace the power output leads with a heavier gauge wire. I hope your coach is upgraded.) The inverter and AGM combination is fantastic and the auto-start system for the generator is the best.

If all is functioning as it should be, with a little conservation you should be fine dry-docking where the generator hours are restricted. Just make certain that the batteries are at full charge before the quiet period starts.

Rick Y

[juliuss]

I would like to thank everybody for there help as I am starting to understand the systems better. I am only getting about an hour on batteries so I believe its time to replace them.

Thanks Juliuss