Camp power

Matt,

start your reading here;

Electricity for camping

Cheers Mick

Hi Matt,

Firstly, i would forget the fluro's, LED lamps/bar lights are much more efficient and produce better light in my opinion. There are so many around to choose from, just do a little research on what would best suit your setup, the Exploroz shop has some great ones.

Secondly, what you are talking about is pretty much the setup i have as far as power consumption devices, with the exception that i have a small laptop as well. I run the fridge (an 80litre Ebay special which is fantastc) and the lights off the dual battery tahts setup in the back of the ute and the chargeable devices i run out of the cab off the crank battery when driving.

I personally dont like generators as i like my peace and quiet when i get out and about. Plus the hassle of the room it takes up, the weight and the fuel to power it. Check my profile for the dual battery setup i have, works an absolute treat.

Tony.

Nothing wrong with an E10 matt, its a good bit of gear if you can afford it.

Nothing wrong with a dual batt setup or solar panels also.

But I guess, do you really need it in your situation ?
We find life easier with a more minimal setup.

All this stuff is hassles and something extra you need to carry, along with the accessories etc and if you don't have to play with 240vac 0 so much the better.

A alternate way is don't bother with it, we never have for all of the things you mention.
You are carrying an alternator anyway, so just budget for half an hour of charging you stuff up from the car each day that your not driving it.
With this type of operation things need managing - I.E. can't have your fridge on freezing all night or you may have a flat battery.

A worthwhile improvment to car charger is to have a form of fast idle operation
to save you holding the engine revs with foot (after few minutes Alt volts drop as things warm up, which slows re-charging).

As time an opportunity presents -->

Don't carry frozen food normally - so you can leave fridge off overnight.

When needing a new battery get a bigger more suitable one e.g. Century 80AH overlander.

Carry a small seperate gell cell - or one of those car jump starters, just in case.

We glued a super thin, always connected, flexible mono crystalline solar panel to roof such that you don't even know its there - keeps battery fresh and adds a bit of extra capacity.

Get a good fluro 12v light - despite claims otherwise they still put out more light per amp than your average LED ones, but still carry an LED based but independant latern as a backup and when away from car.

Hi there Matt,
We are currently travelling around Oz with our 2 kids, so have pretty much worked out our power needs (and wants).
I reckon for what it's worth, put in a dual battery system, it doesn't have to be fancy or expensive. I simply went for a redarc solenoid which was around $90, and then wired it in myself, it's actually a very simple instalation if you take time to read the wiring diagram and actually understand what is happening.
Once that's in, get a decent battery, I went for the biggest AGM deep cycle I could fit in. It was a 120Ah, and I think cost a tikkle over $200.
This battery is pretty much just used for the 40l Engel (which I also ran a dedicated feed and plug for, with good sized wiring) and will give me a comfortable 2 days on -10, sometimes even 3 days, but I try not to draw the battery down to far too often.

I also ran a seperate lead and plug to the back end, and use this to power an inverter, this also runs off the second battery, and we use it to charge the laptop and whatever else.

We also have a yamaha 1000, pretty much same as the honda. We only really take this out when we camp for more than a couple days, like a week or more, and are sitting still. However if you're keen on saving yourself about $1500, use your alternator to keep your batteries charged. I find it's not as economical, but I think a generator is a long term investment, cheap to run, but very costly to buy.

I found, once our generator was destroyed in the floods 2 months ago, we were forced to live without it, and did manage to do so. We were forced to run the cruiser a bit more, but our shower system works on the heating system of the car, so we crank it up for a while every night or morning anyway.

Which ever way you go, just enjoy the trip! But the less you take will be less you have to worry about, especially when you wake up in the middle of the night to your gear being washed down the hill :)

Cheers
Troy

Thanks very much for your replies everyone muchly appreciated. I will check out the battery packs as another option as i havn't considered them at all so far. Would a battery pack like this support an engel 32L fridge/ freezer? i think instead of saving for a generator i will save for an engel. This still dosn't solve my power needs but at least i will have the capacity to keep meat cold for days at a time! So many choices and not enough money hah

Matt,

I can recommend the Flyer battery pack system from sidewinder.com.
This unit comes with a built-in Isolator and cable to connect to the starter battery, then you put in any size battery you wish.
A good choice for your needs would be an 80Ah or 100Ah AGM battery which will supply sufficient power for 2 days at least and the battery pack will be recharged when the engine is running. An AGM battery is safe to use inside the vehicle and will not spill if tipped over.
Perhaps one minor thing to consider, is the lack of multiple sockets on the Flyer, but this can be overcome with a multi-socket box.

(P.S. Derek, perhaps you could whip up a solution for folk unable to make their own?)

The problem with the more common type of vehicle dual battery system is that it is mounted in the engine bay and depending on available room, may only accept a small cradle and therefore a small battery.

The Flyer is portable (although a 100Ah AGM battery will make it quite heavy) and can be taken out of the vehicle if required.

Bill.