Solar Power Setup For Van

I have installed solar panels directly to the roof of my van.

Solar power setup for van.

When included with the rest of the electrical portion the solar panels electrical were the most expensive aspect of the van. In the end we decided to take the easy way out and get ourselves a yeti 400 from goalzero. Buying solar panels for your rv or camper van is a great way to charge your batteries. Instal charge controller in a convenient place.

Bridge the two batteries with the 4 gauge cable connect the negative terminal from battery a to the positive terminal on battery b. Straight forward and easy install process. It has given us the freedom to camp in remote locations for long periods of time to save money in caravan parks by camping on unpowered sites to power all of our electronics whenever we. This is pretty much the closest thing to a solar system plug n play out there.

They have been installed using metal brackets with no insulation between the frame work of the panels and the van. Creating a reliable and efficient caravan solar set up and making our van self sufficient was by far the best thing we have done for our life on the road. Building a diy solar setup for a camper van rv truck camper or travel trailer requires quite a few parts to work in harmony. They often come with their own charge.

But before going into buying panels and batteries and components you should consider the best type of solar panel for you. Cost of installing solar panels on your van. Overall the whole system cost about 2 000 but it s totally worth it to be off grid. Do not hook up your solar panels to the charge controller until the batteries are connected.

For parallel wiring all the positive wires go together and all the negative wires go together. The goalzero yeti 400 and our 100w solar panel became the meat and bone of our van solar system. A solar panel produces roughly 6amps of power per hour. Six steps to set up solar.

Eg the grounding of the panels is directly connected to the chassis of the vehicle and therefore connected to the starter battery. Buy our van build guide ebook. Easiest solar power setup for van living. Install the batteries in your van this is dependent on the type of van rv truck you have.

The first thing we did was mount our solar panels to our van s roof and wire them together in parallel using a signstek y branch wiring connector. Whenever you re working on your electrical setup make sure your van s solar panels are disconnected first and foremost and that the entire system is shut off. So three solar panels would require a 18a charge controller. Once installed they provide clean quiet energy you can use anytime the sun is out.

This blog post will lay out all of the individual components at a 101 level so that by the end of the post you ll have a good understanding on what the individual parts are and a good direction to go to learn more about those pieces of your camper solar setup.