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  1. J

    your reviews of portable power stations and portable solar panels?

    The watthours they usually measure by the type of battery they use. For instance a "goalzero 400" is 428 watthours divided by 10.8 volts gives you 39.6 ah battery. Some power stations divide by 11.1 volts, thats the typical voltage the mfg use to measure for a 3s lithium battery. If a power...
  2. J

    Install Solar Panels on Minivan Roof in Series or Parallel?

    install in series, you get more amps if your using an mppt controller. Below is a post of someone with 200 watts of panels connected in parallel. When they rewired in series it increase their output. https://vanlivingforum.com/showthread.php?tid=41071
  3. J

    Any experience with Beaudens LiFePO4 power station?

    "I’ve seen the question about regulated 12v output asked many times and the reasonable response has been that voltages are more stable with this chemistry. What sorts of appliances have issues?" Some 12 volt fridges seem to be very sensitive to voltage drop when the compressor kicks on. My...
  4. J

    What Should I Do To Power Heat, Fan & Laptop In My Van?

    get a large panel, you can easily fit a 365 watt panel on your van ( its what I have) . I  been getting up to 21 amps of charging power in February with that panel. (max I got with a 240 watt panel was about 12 amps) . 21 amps will easily run your gaming laptop and still have amps leftover to...
  5. J

    Stranded in Quartzsite

    after you replace the bearings and drive off, if you can still feel a wobble in the front end, its probably the rotor or shaft it goes on that got worned due to the bad bearing. It happen to me before and I had to replace those parts. I had to use a cordless impact wrench to get those parts off...
  6. J

    Am I In Carbon Monoxide Poisoning Risk From Portable Power Station?

    I have over 312 ah of li-ion (similar to your lithium) and another 220ah of lifepo4 inside my van where I sleep, those types of batteries don't give off fumes.The batteries that give off fumes are lead acid, those batteries I wouldnt keep inside my van unless it was an agm. Your very safe with...
  7. J

    Care of New Batteries

    from my own experience with agm's is to get the voltage from the battery terminals with a multimeter directly especially if charging with solar. Every single charge controller I owned was off by .5 volts, instead of charging to 14.4 volts I was only charging to 13.9 volts for years. Some agms...
  8. J

    battery capacity issue

    are you measuring the voltage off of the battery terminals while charging? You have to have 14.4 volts at the battery terminals for several hours to fully charge, some charge controllers go to float too quickly.  I suspect also the battery is being undercharged. It happened to me too. Once it...
  9. J

    Let's talk insulation!

    Window covers for summer or winter will definitely help, all my windows in the rear of my van are covered over with foam insulation. I concentrated on the sides and roof, the floor is only insulated in some areas. There is no overkill for foam insulation, I put layer on top of layer of foam...
  10. J

    AC installation alternative

    If you want to install an AC and you got power to run it, there is always a way. It doesnt matter where you install it, front or back, just use flexible ducting to take the air to where you need it, and exhaust the hot air out of your van. That how I run my swampcooler, I have it in the back of...
  11. J

    Lithium battery

    A 200 watt panel maxes out at about 10 amps of charge power. Any lithium battery that can handle a 10 amp charge rate or higher will work.
  12. J

    More solar. Less battery.

    how much room do you have on the roof? My situation this last summer was trying to run my 26L fridge (set to 26 degrees) and also my swampcooler and roof vent from a 220ah lifepo4 and using a 240 watt solar panel to charge everything. It was barely keeping up. The fridge even though it was...
  13. J

    Large 365 watt solar panel performance

    I charge both battery banks seperately. With the 3s li-ion being lower voltage (max 12.6 volts) I get more amps then the 14.6 volt lifepo4. But the panel puts out the same wattage for both battery banks, about 170 watts. I prefer using amps instead of watts its easier for me to add and subtract...
  14. J

    Large 365 watt solar panel performance

    I recently upgraded my astrovans solar system, I replaced the sharp 240 watt panel with a LG 365 watt panel. With the 240 watt panel in winter (southern california) I was getting a max of about 9 amps charging a 4s lifepo4, and 10 amps charging a 3s li-ion battery pack. With the new 365 watt...
  15. J

    Minivan recommendations?

    once you start loading up a minivan with equipment/batteries etc it is going to affect the mileage, I get a measly 11 mpg on my 1986 astrovan with the v6. Luckily I don't drive too far. I suspect a bigger v8 would probably get better mileage driving a heavy van. I like the astrovan because of...
  16. J

    DC Voltage Question for Recharging Batteries

    a dc to dc boost converter will do it. It will take your 12 volts and boost it up to 19 or 24 volts easily. Just make sure you have a small fan blowing on it while in use. If you need to charge devices less then 12 volts you need a buck converter. And to charger other devices that are 12...
  17. J

    My battery died

    I always carry a small agm just in case your type situation happens to me. I encountered situations where I tried to jumpstart somebody with jumper cables and it just wouldnt crank over. At least you got 4 years out of it, my last used 35 dollar battery I bought barely lasted 2 years. Spare...
  18. J

    Converting clips to a plug?

    it depends what the compressors amps use is. When the compressor motor first starts it might use more then 15 amps for a few seconds and that will blow the fuse on the cigarette adapter. Since your compresser came with clips, it probably powerful enough to blow the fuse. The cigarette plugs max...
  19. J

    Why curtains for the front vs Reflectix

    I seperate the front from the back in my astrovan to keep the heat and cold out. I didnt use a curtain I built a divider with foam sandwiched between hardboard and then built a sliding door. This works great in cold weather In this picture straight ahead is the sliding door
  20. J

    First Step

    The isolator should work good. The only problem I see is that the alternator has to put out at least 14.4 volts all the time to charge lifepo4 and hopefully there is not too much voltage drop from alternator to the lifepo4. The more the voltage drop the less amps the battery will get. For...
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