Portable power vs house batteries? Why not?

[HamSkoolie]

Warranty is 24 months, but as far as turn-around, I don't know.

Signature Solar warranty is 5 or 10 years depending on which rack mount battery you buy.

They also have a smart home panel that you can plug it into to charge, and if your power goes out, it acts as an automatic transfer switch to power circuits in your home.

You might want to look into that a bit more. Sounds like you're describing just plugging in to an outlet and if power goes out the unit kicks in and supplies your house.
THAT IS ILLEGAL, DEADLY, AND CAN PUT YOU IN PRISON FOR NEGLIGENT HOMICIDE
If it's "plugged in" to an approved grid disconnect set up that would be okay but you can't just stuff power back in through an outlet. You could injure, main, or kill a lineman.

Re: solar, I've fooled with a few portable panels and found you almost never get close to the output potential--and if you do, it's not for very long as the sun moves. Perhaps the larger permanent mount units work better, but in my mind solar is a partial solution.

Solar panel ratings are for comparison and are LAB numbers. They represent the panel at dead noon on the equator at a specified temperature. The further you are from the equator the more atmosphere lowers the amount of energy per square unit and the higher the angle at which the photons hit the panels (tilt panels help alleviate this aspect). Toss in some dust and you won't see the spec numbers.

But you can still run 24/7/365 on nothing but solar. There's a bus out there with a family of I think 6 and even when he pulls in to a park with electrical hookups he doesn't connect. That's running a washing machine, drier, air conditioning, etc. He's got a lot of solar and a 24kWh lithium battery out of a Nissan Leaf so it's not for the average person but it can be done quite handily.
Of course he's probably got as much in his electrical system as most people have in their entire bus and then some.

Look up the Brocolli Bus

 

[Brdfrd]

You might want to look into that a bit more. Sounds like you're describing just plugging in to an outlet and if power goes out the unit kicks in and supplies your house.
THAT IS ILLEGAL, DEADLY, AND CAN PUT YOU IN PRISON FOR NEGLIGENT HOMICIDE
If it's "plugged in" to an approved grid disconnect set up that would be okay but you can't just stuff power back in through an outlet. You could injure, main, or kill a lineman.

Look up the Brocolli Bus

I'm not a flipping idiot. It's a "smart panel" that connects to your service panel, designed for this purpose.

I know folks are making solar work. But, I don't want to drill my roof full of holes and cover it with panels. You don't like "all-in-one", I don't like the idea of drilling holes in a perfectly good roof--to each his own. Portable panels are always an option for a hybrid charging option.

For what it's worth, I like the multi-use possibilities of this system--as opposed to an investment that will sit idle for us 11 months of the year.

 

[Hutchy-SKO]

I'm not a flipping idiot. It's a "smart panel" that connects to your service panel, designed for this purpose.

I know folks are making solar work. But, I don't want to drill my roof full of holes and cover it with panels. You don't like "all-in-one", I don't like the idea of drilling holes in a perfectly good roof--to each his own. Portable panels are always an option for a hybrid charging option.

For what it's worth, I like the multi-use possibilities of this system--as opposed to an investment that will sit idle for us 11 months of the year.

Thank goodness there's people in here that KNOW EVERY DAM THING to keep us from unintentionally committing homicide and ending up in prison, phew that was a close one!
one other option is building your own "all in one" system. Will Prowse has kind of cool milk crate system tutorials on his YT channel for ideas. Cheaper and does most of the stuff with better overall specs.

oh and try broccoli bus, misspelling is a thing

 

[TheHubbardBus]

I know folks are making solar work. But, I don't want to drill my roof full of holes and cover it with panels. You don't like "all-in-one", I don't like the idea of drilling holes in a perfectly good roof--to each his own. Portable panels are always an option for a hybrid charging option

We're incorporating solar as a charging source, as off-grid and long term boondocking are what we're into, but I think many in the conversion community consider solar a 'given' when in at least some use-cases it isn't warranted. A healthy bank on a weekend camper? Why bother. A constant mover that never stays in one place for long & can charge at a healthy rate from the alternator? No thanks. And if you're OK with the cost of running a quiet genny for an hour or two a day - which you probably want to have available anyway even with solar - then maybe the juice isn't worth the squeeze.

 

[dzl_]

how much do you really save by the time you put everything thats in a portable power station into your own build? a BMS, an Inverter, the ability to charge at multiple voltages.. im sure you save some..

Generally speaking I think you can save quite a lot for a medium-ish to large system, but as you mentioned this will depend heavily on the size of your system and your needs, and as you alluded to, once you tally up the cost of all the bits and bobs, time and possibly tools, the savings will be somewhat less than they first appear. And for a small and simple system a 'solar "generator"' (misleading term) may be competitive or more attractive depending on your other priorities.

 

[cadillackid]

for me its portability.. since I drive more than one bus, a portable power station is perfect.. although I have like 500 Amp hours (12 volt) of batteries in the Dev bus that runs everything I need.. but for outings I like the bigger battery than a little hand held for keeping my laptop charged

 

[Stinky-ClassB]

Everyone seems to be focused on 'saving'. A few bucks more or less isn't and issue for me. I built my own system because I wanted to have some fun and learn. It's not cheaper and it may not be better but 'I did it MY way'.

 

[dzl_]

Everyone seems to be focused on 'saving'. A few bucks more or less isn't and issue for me. I built my own system because I wanted to have some fun and learn. It's not cheaper and it may not be better but 'I did it MY way'.

Yes this is the other big advantage to the more DIY route, learning+control+a system you understand that is tailored to your needs. Its a great fit for a certain type of person / set of priorities

 

[Rucker]

<snip>

I know folks are making solar work. But, I don't want to drill my roof full of holes and cover it with panels. You don't like "all-in-one", I don't like the idea of drilling holes in a perfectly good roof--to each his own. Portable panels are always an option for a hybrid charging option.

For what it's worth, I like the multi-use possibilities of this system--as opposed to an investment that will sit idle for us 11 months of the year.

I did quite a bit of research on VHB (very high bond) double sided tape and concluded it would be adequate for the solar panels on my fiberglass shuttle bus.

I'm not against unistrut and bolts, have at it! My panels are an inch or two off the deck, secured with 6 standard aluminum brackets and mounted on the back half of the roof.

I did NOT want to put roof penetrations in my shuttle bus however that was just skittishness. I ended up adding screws in addition to the VHB, I think three per mounting bracket, predrilled to get the right grip, and laid RV roof tape over that.

If I had a metal roof I think I'd be perfectly good with the same solution, though I'd do a little testing the figure out the right quantity and count of screws.

 

[HamSkoolie]

I did quite a bit of research on VHB (very high bond) double sided tape and concluded it would be adequate for the solar panels on my fiberglass shuttle bus.

I'm not against unistrut and bolts, have at it! My panels are an inch or two off the deck, secured with 6 standard aluminum brackets and mounted on the back half of the roof.

I did NOT want to put roof penetrations in my shuttle bus however that was just skittishness. I ended up adding screws in addition to the VHB, I think three per mounting bracket, predrilled to get the right grip, and laid RV roof tape over that.

If I had a metal roof I think I'd be perfectly good with the same solution, though I'd do a little testing the figure out the right quantity and count of screws.

WOW
I hope you have good insurance.
That low clearance all but ensures slower airflow under your panels than over. Higher airspeed over the top means lift which means whenever you're traveling you will have the panels pulling against that tape.
Hopefully your system has a lot of square feet of tape in contact with the roof AND panels.
There are YouTube videos of things flying off roofs....including panels that were mechanically fastened to the roof, others that were taped. And of course all those sheets of plywood and mattresses that people thought they could hold up there with a hand out each side door.


Good luck.

 

[David from Ontario]

I was strongly inclined to use the EcoFlow Delta Pro as the plug-and-play heart of my skoolie electrical system. What changed my mind was the current limit on DC charging. I want to use the bus's alternator to charge the house batteries when driving down the road. In March I corresponded with folks at EcoFlow about this. This is from their response:
1.The 8A fuse can support up to 8A, and the 10A fuse can support up to 10A. Our car charging cable supports up to 8A, it does not support 18A. If the current of the output exceeds 8A, there may be a risk of burning the car charging cable. We're so sorry that we can't confirm if the current of your output can be set to 8A.
2.If you want to use the DC-to-DC converter to charge the DELTA Pro, please make sure the specification of the input meets the requirements of the solar input.

So I'm instead building a system using mostly Victron components. But the DC-DC charger is from Renogy. The folks there told me that if my alternator is 100 amps or more, it will support their 60 amp DC-to-DC charger. That's what I bought: seven times more charging power from the alternator than I could use with the EcoFlow Delta Pro.

 

[cadillackid]

Everyone seems to be focused on 'saving'. A few bucks more or less isn't and issue for me. I built my own system because I wanted to have some fun and learn. It's not cheaper and it may not be better but 'I did it MY way'.

thats one of the reasons I completely built my own Air-Conditioning systems.. it definitely wasnt cheaper, however I have a system tailored exactly to what I need and I know what each and every part in the system is and where to get it should it break...

 

[La Camioneta]

All good points, dug a bit deeper and a crate looks pretty slick and saves quite a bit.

http://https://diysolarforum.com/threads/milk-crate-portable-power-station.4927/

Something like this will do nicely.