best portable power station for wild camping? what’s worth buying?

[khairia74]

I am looking into portable power stations lately because i need a lightweight, solar-compatible backup for camping, car trips, and possible emergencies. i went through recent reviews from wirecutter, techradar, and tom’s guide, and two models kept coming up as the best:

BLUETTI Solar Generator Elite
https://www.amazon.com/dp/b0b6xtpk1j

jackery explorer 1000 plus
https://www.amazon.com/dp/b0c1ylr84j

i need something that’s powerful enough to run a mini fridge, charge phones/laptops, power a fan, and maybe a small rice cooker or cpap machine. solar charging is a must for me. i’m not sure which one gives better value and long-term reliability. has anyone here used these? or is there another one i should look at? any help or recommendations would be greatly appreciated

 

[molly 2]

I have a bluetti 180 p runs kettle 800 w watt toaster 900 w microwave 1400w etc

 

[Bear]

I am doing similar and its a nitemare in a good way with choices Afeiry and Vtoman are 2 others recommended by You tubers I follow

Good news is a lot are dropping in price due to too many produced some are saying.

 

[runnach]

It’s important to look at the recharge time, for example, bank is down to 20%, how to return to 100%, although much of the recharge time will be down sufficient sunshine if charging via solar, mains power if you have it, etc.

I know my Jackery 1000 explorer, can take an age recharging via the two solar panels.

 

[Moped]

Check out the Ecoflow 500w alternator charger. The leads are connected to the vehicle battery. It only works with Ecoflow Delta 2 and newer Ecoflow power stations and enables you to charge the power station whilst you are driving or your engine is running.

500w for a car and if you have a motorhome or a vehicle with a heavy duty alternator you can use the 800w version although you can throttle it down if need be. I'm only into the Ecoflow ecosystem so choices for me are simple!

As a suplement to solar charging the alternator charger is a very good unit to have as it offers fast charging unlike the 12v cigarette socket which only offers 100w maximum.

 

[wildebus]

One aspect I looked at was the Inverter output. Typically to get a higher Inverter output, you have to have a higher battery capacity, and vice-versa. Both useful, but you end up paying a higher price than you might want to.
Some people may want to get a Power Station primarily for the battery and not be interested in the Inverter use.
Others want the inverter and not need a large battery capacity. I fall into this group and have a VTOMan Power Station with a relatively small battery capacity but a fairly large 1500W Inverter. Useful for sporadic bursts of high power (primarily power tools in my case, but other uses could be to run an Air Fryer, Coffee Machine or Microwave - all fairly high power usages but only for short durations)

 

[Moped]

Check out the Ecoflow 500w alternator charger. The leads are connected to the vehicle battery. It only works with Ecoflow Delta 2 and newer Ecoflow power stations and enables you to charge the power station whilst you are driving or your engine is running.

500w for a car and if you have a motorhome or a vehicle with a heavy duty alternator you can use the 800w version although you can throttle it down if need be. I'm only into the Ecoflow ecosystem so choices for me are simple!

As a suplement to solar charging the alternator charger is a very good unit to have as it offers fast charging unlike the 12v cigarette socket which only offers 100w maximum.

Just to clarify the Ecoflow 500w alternator charger comes with an XT60 power station connection cable so can be used for any proprietory power station which has an XT60 input or with the use of an appropriate adaptor. You do have to update the Ecoflow unit to the latest software. If your power station cannot accept a full 500w through the XT60 connection you can lower the charge rate of the alternator charger. However most if not all modern 1000wh or greater power stations can accept a 500w charge rate.

It is the Ecoflow 800w alternator charger that uses the proprietory Ecoflow XT150 connection which is only suitable for Ecoflow Delta 2 and later or larger products. There is an Ecoflow XT150 to XT60 adaptor lead however it is out of stock right now.

As far as alternator charging goes the Ecoflow Alternator Charging unit is, in my view, a recommended buy for those who use a power station daily when touring, and who do regular driving most days, as it only needs 75mins to charge a Delta 2 or 3 unit from 0% to 100%. Especially on days when panels are not generating much solar.

 

[Moped]

A high 1800w inverter within a 1000wh size battery type power station is handy to have on those campsites and aires that only offer 6amp power or even less. You can use the power station inverter to power the high wattage AC stuff without the risk of triggering the hook up RCD and without having to juggle things switching the fridge off and other 12v low wattage items you might be running from the hook up.

And you can top up the power station when everything else other than the fridge is switched off. Setting the charge rate limit to below the maximum spare hook up capacity available. (As an aside to this I definitely WOULD NOT buy a power station that DOES NOT have an accompanying available app that you can link to with bluetooth. The ability to choke ànd limit the AC charging rate is a must have with any power station that offers rapid charging).

One aire in Spain we stop at charges €0.70 per kw for electric so generally everybody gets their portable solar panels and power stations out to bring hook up usuage down to zero! We run the fridge on gas in this particular aire and dont bother with hook up, whilst at the same time running our AC electrical gadgetry from the power station inverter.

 

[Moped]

Amazon Prime weekend coming up and the offers are starting to appear.

So potentially a good time to buy for anybody considering a portable power station, solar panels, alternator chargers,

Noted that the Ecoflow Delta 3 Plus is on offer at a lower price than the Delta 3 which I have. Also noted that the new Bluetti Elite 100 V2 has a launch offer of £449. As I said previously a lot depends on which product range you have a preference for. The Ecoflow alternator charger ĥas made a big difference for us. Bluetti do something similar offering 560w maximum charging currently on offer at £199.

I went for the Delta 3 because:-

a) The cooling fan is almost silent
b) The cooling vents are front to back with no side vents or side connections making storage in use easy. Items can be packed either side of it.
c) The AC sockets and USB ports are all at the front which is convenient and also helps with storage.
d) 2 carrying handles
e) can be used with the 800w Ecoflow alternator charger.
f) the excellent app works with bluetooth so no need for wifi
g) we already have Ecoflow kit which has proven reliable
h) the body profile has narrow width and long length which suits us for storage. We can place it next to an older (very heavy) 2400wh device we have with similar body and (noisy) venting arrangements. The older power station, whilst having a large battery, is very slow to charge and has a 1000w invertor. Rapid charging, the 1800w invertor, the ability to use the alternator charger, the much lower weight adding to portability, and the silent running made it a good addition to our power arrangements both indoors and outside.

 

[REC]

An interesting thread...wonder why the op never came back to read it!

 

[Robmac]

An interesting thread...wonder why the op never came back to read it!

Happening more and more Ruth.

 

[Mtbcol]

We're fans of Ecoflow and have 2 x Delta 2's. Could you join one, or even two, Delta 2's to the Delta 3 to expand it? We also have the 800w alternator charger and the Wave 2 (mainly for the dog if we leave her in the van). As our purchase of a new to us motorhome fell through ( turned out to be a rust bucket) might splash out in a Delta 3 and do another self build on a bigger van.

 

[Boris7]

Happening more and more Ruth.

It’s not that surprising really Rob.

People are more and more used to instant information free of charge.

There’s little reason to invest in long term involvement in a forum nowadays, unless your older or have a personal investment (not necessarily financial)

A sports car club forum I was a member of for many years is effectively completely on face book now and us older members who don’t like Facebook communicate elsewhere.

 

[guerdeval]

I have a Vtoman 600 p/s and a 2000 thingy foldable solar panel bought as a pair from Amazon, turns out the panel is too powerful for the power station so is incompatible ,just another consideration when buying, I only found this out on here when trying to use for the first time recently, so 2 years on they remain unused, always ask on here before buying anything particularly from big chains as they know nothing about the stuff they sell,lucky for them I know nothing about the stuff I buy.

 

[Geek]

I wonder if power packs and folding solar panels are part of the caravanner mindset, where all the faffing about is the main point of the trip.
My motorhome has a leisure bank thst is sufficient. It has a b2b charger and a solar panel on the roof. The bateries look after themselves. It has a (small) inverter which must be nearly 20 years old.
All thus stuff just does its thing with no input or effort from me.
I honestly don't understand why people would pay more to have a heavy, awkward box that simply duplicates the job of the existing parts of the van.
Is it to have more toys to faff with?

 

[mariesnowgoose]

I wonder if power packs and folding solar panels are part of the caravanner mindset, where all the faffing about is the main point of the trip.
My motorhome has a leisure bank thst is sufficient. It has a b2b charger and a solar panel on the roof. The bateries look after themselves. It has a (small) inverter which must be nearly 20 years old.
All thus stuff just does its thing with no input or effort from me.
I honestly don't understand why people would pay more to have a heavy, awkward box that simply duplicates the job of the existing parts of the van.
Is it to have more toys to faff with?

I've never owned a caravan.

In our case it's not worth retro-fitting all that stuff at great expense to our old camper van as we have no gadgets of the electrical kind in it.

If I ever needed to use electrical gadgets on the road, a power bank would certainly suffice and would easily tuck under the bench seat where the few tools we carry currently pack away, and without it taking away too much in the way of storage. Plus the power bank could be useful elsewhere and not just for the van.

The only things that we really need essential power for are phones and tablets for recharging purposes, don't really need an expensive electrical system for that either.

Once in a blue moon I might need to use a hairdryer when on the road, but even then I can happily live without it (except maybe when the weather is very cold). If I was that desperate (which I doubt) and no access to a power bank, I just book into somewhere with EHU for electrical use.

A power bank is a "might be nice to have" for us, but not all that necessary, just occasionally might be handy.

Simple is best. And much cheaper. I quite like not giving my dosh to Amazon or Temu

 

[Nabsim]

I wonder if power packs and folding solar panels are part of the caravanner mindset, where all the faffing about is the main point of the trip.
My motorhome has a leisure bank thst is sufficient. It has a b2b charger and a solar panel on the roof. The bateries look after themselves. It has a (small) inverter which must be nearly 20 years old.
All thus stuff just does its thing with no input or effort from me.
I honestly don't understand why people would pay more to have a heavy, awkward box that simply duplicates the job of the existing parts of the van.
Is it to have more toys to faff with?

I think along the same lines but we all have different needs and means of filling them. After my recent wild camping trip (in a tent) I find I need some way to charge my phone and watch. Investigations say it's a bad idea to add a battery in the sidecar charged from the bike alternator so not sure which way to go. Not doing anything yet anyway as may not need anything before next year now

 

[Mtbcol]

I think it may be more for people who are self converting or upgrading as it MAY be that buying an all in one (battery, inverter etc.) power bank is cheaper and/or more convenient and maybe cheaper that buying the parts separately, and if your not good at 12v electrics then you've not got too much to do. Just my thoughts

 

[mistericeman]

I wonder if power packs and folding solar panels are part of the caravanner mindset, where all the faffing about is the main point of the trip.
My motorhome has a leisure bank thst is sufficient. It has a b2b charger and a solar panel on the roof. The bateries look after themselves. It has a (small) inverter which must be nearly 20 years old.
All thus stuff just does its thing with no input or effort from me.
I honestly don't understand why people would pay more to have a heavy, awkward box that simply duplicates the job of the existing parts of the van.
Is it to have more toys to faff with?

I suspect a lot of folks got caught up in 'the emporers new clothes',
of watching too many 'Vanlifer unfluencers' YouTube clips of solar chargers...
Most of them having been sent them for free to do reviews on....

I guess they work for some folks BUT Id personally rather have power built in and no pfaff.

 

[Pauljenny]

We managed for 20 years with just 2 freestanding 12x 20" solar panels feeding into the fag lighter socket , able to fit through the rooflights, with the smallest, cheapest inverter.

No telly, no vast array of technology. Just a small netbook and one mobile phone.
Never ran out of power, once.
Even at Druridge Bay and Manchester, in August.