Saturday, June 13, 2020

Cargo Home - We have POWER!

Well from a high-level view the system went together as advertised. I would like to acknowledge Will Prose whose book I bought and used as my guide to this panel. He has multiple Youtube videos and has been a wealth of knowledge for me. He is a good communicator and speaks in simple easy to understand words so that even a guy like me can get it.

I did make some modifications to his proposed set up. All my Battery cables are 1/0 gauge. The major change was a more robust MPPT from Victron Energy. I went with the MPPT 150 I 60 - Tr. I am set up to have 8 solar panels on the roof of the Cargo Home but I have room for at least two more. I am using Rich Solar panels @ 100Watts each, which is 800Watt all running at 24v.

Here is a link to his website and the system I duplicated: RV Solar Power Blue Prints

So my previous post I had all the components mounted on the board. As I started to wire them, I made some adjustments moving the power strip to the top of the board and adjusting the red battery cut off switch.


I connected the batteries and switched the battery cutoff to battery bank 1 or "on". I have both breakers tripped to the DC side and to the MPPT which does not have solar connected. I then tested both the DC and the AC Inverter.

On this video I had connected two solar panels in series to make 24v and then connected it to the MPPT to see if I could get a flow coming in. It was a raining cloudy day but was able to pull 8watts. It worked was all I was concerned about it and I am pleased with the results.