Solar/fridge query

hairydog said:
A split charge relay will get about 20Ah of power into the leisure bank for every hour you drive. So you would need to drive for five hours each day to keep the batteries up, less any sunlight you get.
Fit a B2B charger and you will only need to drive for three hours a day.
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Funny how we are fine with 3 x 100ah leisure batteries charged from 2 x 100w solar panels (less than useless in winter in the uk ) and our Durite VSR ....

40l Waeco coolbox runs 365 ...and all our cooking is electric (couple of microwave meals/slow cooker stew and a brew in the morning from electric kettle) along with watching TV and having the eberspacher running ...

Even over our Xmas/new year break ...without hook up,Just driving between 50/100 miles each day .

The ONLY time i ever use mains hook up is over a few weeks in the crappiest part of the year when we havent shifted the van for a few weeks .
 
Ed on Toast said:
I have 300 w (2x 150w panels) feeding 3 x carbon gel batteries.

I am considering a fridge freezer (under counter 5 cublic feet type) with a freezer of about half that size on top.

I spend all year, out n about. Would a modern conderser type F/F run off my solar, all year, with the occasional alternater input to the batteries.

You good advise and guidance, most welcome.

Any make models advice also welcome.

Thanks

Ed

:egg:
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TAKE A LOOK AT the Engle range some in this link Engel Waeco ARB Portable Fridge freezers maybe not the cheapest but up there with the best and seem quite efficient
 
We have a Waeco CR65 comp fridge. gas blown air heating. 200W of solar 225A trojan t105s in the summer no problem what so ever. October onwards you are fighting a losing battle as the solar is not worth a toss most of the time. You will need EHU of some sort if you have no other means of getting a decent charge.

r4dent
Most 12v fridges are just that ...12v so using they can't run on EHU. The battery charger would, of course, run on 240v but if he has sufficient Solar the EHU isn't needed.

Like I said this is about compression fridges, the use of absorption fridges is a different ball game.


Waeco 12v comp fridges do run off EHUs and not the battery when on EHU as they have a separate power supply fed from the EHU.
 
r4dent said:
"all that technical stuff" was an attempt to help a fellow member who wants to use his fridge whilst wild camping so no EHU. You camp your way and he'll camp his. Please do not criticize people who want different things to you or those who try to help them.


We have enough outside people saying what we can and cannot do, lets not be divisive within the group.


Most fridges turn them self off at night because the fridge is cold enough. But if you do turn it off at night it may be a little warmer in the morning and use extra power to cool it down, so no real reduction in power consumption. Turning a fridge off at night is, in practical terms, pointless.



Most 12v fridges are just that ...12v so using they can't run on EHU. The battery charger would, of course, run on 240v but if he has sufficient Solar the EHU isn't needed.

Like I said this is about compression fridges, the use of absorption fridges is a different ball game.
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whoops ! that was me having a laugh with Jac, an old mate ,who will find the ''technical stuff '' a bit hard to take in . so no criticising going on here
 
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Hmm, I drove 266 miles on Monday on unde 7 hours including Caz’s ciggie stops.
 
hairydog said:
This discussion is specifically about the crappiest part of the year. In the summer there is no problem, well, not much problem.
You can say what you like, but physics is not going to rewrite itself to follow.
Driving 50 to 100 miles a day will make a huge difference. Typical traffic speed in the UK is 28mph, so that's over three hours a day.
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Yes it amazes me at times. if I look on the cars trip the average is about 18mph. Recently 2 weeks in France with very good 250ml runs up and down M1 included and my average was 31mph and I don't mess about.
 
hairydog said:
This discussion is specifically about the crappiest part of the year. In the summer there is no problem, well, not much problem.
You can say what you like, but physics is not going to rewrite itself to follow.
Driving 50 to 100 miles a day will make a huge difference. Typical traffic speed in the UK is 28mph, so that's over three hours a day.
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You obviously missed the bit about the 'crappiest part of the year"
Nearly two weeks of off grid with no hook up.... Including fridge use AND all our cooking by electric.... In the depths of winter.
Travelling each day between 50-100 miles or so to recharge the batteries to near as damn 100% (NASA BM2 reading)
No hook up needed (or fitted for that matter) and solar doing sod all.
 
hairydog said:
Get someone to explain what "average" means
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I don’t need to thanks. I don’t think it helps much as if you travel the distance quicker you will get less charge time. For topping up batteries it is time not distance that matters and I have just had a couple of weeks in a very quiet, out of season(?) Scotland where it was usually 50 miles in an hour travel time no problem. That meant on days with little or no solar the batteries continued to deplete without EHU
 
Floridaphill said:
Hello

I have a solar panel on my van.
The fridge is a 30 litre compressor fridge and the panel is 60w with a mttp controller and a 100Ah battery.

I saw this article which is good https://www.jerbacampervans.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/MMMFeb12.pdf
In summary its 1 watt of solar for 1 litre of fridge capacity.

I based my set up on this and it runs the fridge from around April till November, out side that theres just not enough sun hours.

Hope this helps

Phill
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I have seen this supposed link between fridge capacity and power consumption before - it is just not the case.

I haven't read the full article and TBH probably won't as it sounds quite poor (gawd, sounding like HD now!). as an example, scanning though it, I see the comment "Cooling an 80-litre fridge takes significantly more power than a 40-litre one".
Load of rubbish! Taking my own 94L fridge as an example, it uses an average of about 10W per hour. the makers of my fridge also make a 45L model using I would think the same compressor. The specs of that 45L fridge says it uses ..... exactly the same as mine.
The running power of a fridge is not dependant on the size, although the initial cooldown period is, but that is a minor part of the total time.
 
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