Solar system

[Wampbat7]

Hi,
I'm a new owner of a 2013 Jayco feather ultra lite x17a. I wanted to start out with a smaller camper. I'm looking at camping off the grid and wanted to know about solar panels. Can anyone tell me where I can get the electrical diagram or schematic for my camper. And if you know what size system I will need?
Thank you

[ARoamer]

Welp, it depends on what you want to run, how you intend to camp, how long you intend to camp, your batteries, quite alot of factors figure in. Portable panels and a charge controller may be best if you camp in shady areas and may be a good choice. Portable panels are an easy target for thieves. Permanent mount panels are at the mercy of placing your rv in the sun. And then there's the issue of tilting or non tilting the panels to get maximum output. A schematic for your trailer's wireing isn't really necessary as you hook your charge controller to the battery and use the existing 12v systems. But if you do want a schematic, contact jayco customer service with your trailer's VIN number and usually you can get one.

There is lots of info online, do some studying, thats the best way to not over or under do it

[DanNJanice]

Lots of good info there.
https://www.jaycoowners.com/forums/g...ith+solar.html

[Wampbat7]

Thank you so much for the information.

[fisduki]

Look up Will Prowse on Youtube. His older videos will give you everything you wanted to know and more about solar and campers.

Most of his recent videos are just reviews on batteries and components, but he still does some solar panels, but more for home installs than RV installs.

[Wampbat7]

Thank you

[fisduki]

Something else, I bought a Jackery 500 and a Twelseavan 120w portable solar panel for ours. We do boondock, but not a lot, mainly when we go to state parks. In our 174BH, the Jackery will run our little 8k BTU AC unit if we plug it directly into the Jackery. But the main reason I bought that is to run the Wagan Tech cooler I got. In our TT, the fridge is about the size of a shoe box and for anything longer than a 1 night, maybe 2 nights if we really planned well, so it just doesn't hold enough food for us. We are planning on a 10 day drip coming up this summer, so I wanted something we could actually store more food in, specifically a gallon of milk! The Wagan Tech will hold at least 6 gallons of the square Costco milk gallons.

But back to the solar. The last trip when we were using both the Jackery and the Twelseavan to power the cooler, the cooler was drawing about 55-60 watts most of the time. The Twelseavan was more than able to keep up with that. I think I saw it dumping about 72 watts into the Jackery at one point.

For our TT battery, I have upgraded to a 100AH lithium, but other than a cheap charge controller that came as part of a solar panel package I bought early on, I have no way to dump the power from the solar back into it. So far, it hasn't been an issue due to only short 2 night trips. Been looking at a Victron charge controller, but just haven't gotten that far yet.

[TaftCoach]

You won’t need the schematic. Solar will recharge your battery (batteries). Unless you invest in a large system what you will be running are lights, your 3 way fridge, vent fan, furnace ( big current draw). You will not be running your AC, microwave, 110 outlets.

The systems are simple. Think about using a battery charger at home to charge your battery. Now replace the outlet you plugged into with a solar panel ( energy source). You will need a solar controller that replaces the battery charger. Your battery stays the same.

The difficulty becomes how to mount the panels, route the cables, and sizing the system. Larger battery capacity allows you to run more stuff but require more panels to recharge.

RV with Tito, also on YouTube has many videos and keeps things simple.