PlethoraOfGuns
Well-known member
Working on more electrical things. If there is one thing that makes sure everything else works well, it's electricity. Cities would come to a standstill without electricity. So would construction sites, as everyone knows that electricians actually run the show. Well, I guess the van will still get around and do stuff, but the electricity will make it all the better!
Got the batteries fully wired up with some nice big cables. We'll build a shelf up above them for additional storage. And I guess the door to this cabinet will also have a vent on it so these batteries can get some fresh air.
Many of the components are very close to one another. No enough room to run cables between, and will save lots of money by making our own buss bars out of 0.5" copper pipe. Just flatten it in the vise and hammer bends into them. Drill holes to go onto threaded posts and all good. Not sure how many amps these could carry, but I'm sure it's at least what we need, and the runs are extremely short.
The inverter is huge and was the first piece to be mounted. Oriented it right in front of this vent as these need lots of airflow. It had the option to hardwire it, so that's what we did.
The rest of the components mounted. Having this side panel removable makes things very easy for servicing, but most times the hinged seat lid will be just fine. This space filled up quick. During the build my brother suggested to get a way to charge the rear battery bank while driving, off the alternator. In case of days when sun just isn't doing it. We have 600watts of solar, which will be sufficient for our needs. But if you have 4 days of rain, that might leave you in a pickle. So the blue box here is a dc to dc charger to charge the rear batteries from the front. The solar charge controller will be mounted outside the cabinet on the wall later, as we planned to have it out there so we can read data and fiddle with it. Plus, there is no more room in this electrical cabinet for anymore stuff.
Everything mostly done in there. Still need to hook up the wires for the dc to dc charger, waiting on fuses. Still have no way to charge these lithiums. We been using them, and everything seem fine. They are still almost full and haven't been charged since at least summer 2020. Just for that I'm sold on lithiums. I would never imagine leaving lead acid deep cycles sitting for 6-8 months without charging. The circuit breakers for all the solar and the 12v fuse panel are mounted to the bottom of the seat lid. All the wires are in wire loom and fold down nicely when the seat is closed. The gas strut has just enough power to hold the seat lid open with all that extra weight.
Here it is all closed up. Nobody will ever suspect what's in there! Got two vents for air flow, should be enough me thinks.
And got all the controls installed on the wall. The top switch is a three position selector for all the outlets between shore power and inverter power. The middle switch is to control the inverter. And the bottom is for the battery shunt, which tells you all the data about what's going in and out of the battery bank.
Got the batteries fully wired up with some nice big cables. We'll build a shelf up above them for additional storage. And I guess the door to this cabinet will also have a vent on it so these batteries can get some fresh air.
Many of the components are very close to one another. No enough room to run cables between, and will save lots of money by making our own buss bars out of 0.5" copper pipe. Just flatten it in the vise and hammer bends into them. Drill holes to go onto threaded posts and all good. Not sure how many amps these could carry, but I'm sure it's at least what we need, and the runs are extremely short.
The inverter is huge and was the first piece to be mounted. Oriented it right in front of this vent as these need lots of airflow. It had the option to hardwire it, so that's what we did.
The rest of the components mounted. Having this side panel removable makes things very easy for servicing, but most times the hinged seat lid will be just fine. This space filled up quick. During the build my brother suggested to get a way to charge the rear battery bank while driving, off the alternator. In case of days when sun just isn't doing it. We have 600watts of solar, which will be sufficient for our needs. But if you have 4 days of rain, that might leave you in a pickle. So the blue box here is a dc to dc charger to charge the rear batteries from the front. The solar charge controller will be mounted outside the cabinet on the wall later, as we planned to have it out there so we can read data and fiddle with it. Plus, there is no more room in this electrical cabinet for anymore stuff.
Everything mostly done in there. Still need to hook up the wires for the dc to dc charger, waiting on fuses. Still have no way to charge these lithiums. We been using them, and everything seem fine. They are still almost full and haven't been charged since at least summer 2020. Just for that I'm sold on lithiums. I would never imagine leaving lead acid deep cycles sitting for 6-8 months without charging. The circuit breakers for all the solar and the 12v fuse panel are mounted to the bottom of the seat lid. All the wires are in wire loom and fold down nicely when the seat is closed. The gas strut has just enough power to hold the seat lid open with all that extra weight.
Here it is all closed up. Nobody will ever suspect what's in there! Got two vents for air flow, should be enough me thinks.
And got all the controls installed on the wall. The top switch is a three position selector for all the outlets between shore power and inverter power. The middle switch is to control the inverter. And the bottom is for the battery shunt, which tells you all the data about what's going in and out of the battery bank.
