As you may remember during 2021 I did go on my travels but did not report my travels as usual because I was concerned about how people felt about me traveling during COVID. Well, I did upgrade my solar on my Four Wheel Camper from 170 Watts to 210 watts.
I had gotten an email from NewPowa, who produced my 170 Watt panel that they had an upgraded panel with the same width as 170 Watts panel on a new 210 Watt panel. See picture above.
This meant I could just unbolt the old panel and transfer Z brackets to the same spacing and put higher wattage in my camper. Above is the finished look and the weight difference was negligible.
The panel comes with MC4 connectors and FWC uses SAE connectors so I did need to change the connection on the solar panel prior to installing on roof of the camper. Above shows the MC4 connectors to the left and SAE pigtail connected to the right.
Above are the labels from the two solar panels. This change resulted in a 20% increase in wattage for my travels.
Of course I checked and had a 30 amp charge controller installed in a previous post so there was no issue with the change.
For those with FWC campers I used rubber expanding inserts drilled through the roof skin into the 1”x1” aluminum supports and sealed them with 3M marine sealant. As stated above I reused these same mounting locations.
I have a previous post on my original 160 Watt panel install and how I did it.
As a refresher I have 3 ways to charge. Solar, DC to DC direct to engine, and 120 v charger. I have a Renogy charge controller that does what is needed to use both solar and DC to charge my lithium battery.
The new solar worked great during my 2022 travels.
Brent
macaloney@hotmail.com
No comments:
Post a Comment