JuliaAnne2018 said:
I won't be leaving for a while yet. At least not for two weeks. I also bought a 300w rechargeable generator. It can be 1 of 3 ways - the sun for which I got a solar panel, and AC or car battery port.
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I suspect you don't understand how complicated this really is...
Even the smallest commonly available air conditioner uses (after allowing for the waste of an AC inverter, which you can't avoid except with a generator) about 525-550 watts of electrical energy per hour, when it's working hard. That means, in 12 hours it's going to use about 6500 watts. A typical solar panel-- I don't know what size you have, but most are rated at 100 watts per hour under ideal conditions-- will produce no more than 1200 watts in those same 12 hours. Even worse, conditions are never ideal. For 2-3 hours, near noon on a perfect sunny day, you may get as much as 90 watts an hour. When the sun is lower in the sky nearer dawn and dusk, expect much less. In the real word, on a good day a 100 watt panel will produce something more like 600 watts, and even that's not accounting for periods of rain, etc. In order to frequently run an air conditioner under real-world conditions, most experienced users estimate (exact figures vary) about _12_ 100 watt panels. These would cover an area of about 86 square feet. The last time I priced out name-brand panels for such a setup, counting mounting hardware it was well over a grand.
But sadly, it's even worse than that. You'll also need a solar controller to make the panel array work; prices vary enormously on these with type and quality (and you get what you pay for, as a rule). Plus you'll need a battery bank. I have one large enough to (barely) run a tiny air conditioner about 8 hours, and even at that I'm discharging it a bit more than is wise. (The more you discharge a conventional lead-acid battery, the shorter its lifespan.) This battery bank cost me over $700, and weighs, with cabling and mounting hardware, probably about 500 pounds.
Before you leap into this... In the real world, you're simply not going to be able to have solar air-conditioning in _any_ car. No one can-- the necessary panels and batteries are much too large and weigh far too much. Your 300 watt device may be very useful, but it's meant for recharging phones and laptops, not powering serious loads like an air conditioner.
A gasoline generator could give you your air conditioning. But, they're noisy and create a highly toxic exhaust. Unless professionally (and expensively) mounted a generator can't even be safely run _near_ your car-- you have to use a long extension cord. They're also one of the most "stealable" items in the USA, especially the good ones, to the point that locks and chains and such often aren't enough to deter thieves-- they'll work hard and do really outrageous things if they have to in order to steal a generator. Plus, you'll burn a gallon or two of gas a day, every day, and have to do frequent oil changes and other maintenance on the generator.
I'm sorry if I sound harsh, but I'm being this way because telling you what you want to hear at this point would do you an enormous disservice. The 300 watt device you bought can help make your life easier, but will only do light-duty things like recharge cell phones and laptops, or maybe power an LED light or two at night. But things like hair dryers, hot plates and air conditioners... Not so much. For that you need serious, expensive, large, complicated and heavy hardware.
