Solar charging leisure battery's

[grahamjohndavis]

Hello folks. I'm new to the forum, looks really interesting. I have an 11 plate Cali SE and I have a query, wondered if anyone might know the answer? Every year we camp up in Cornwall for 2 weeks with no hookup. Eventually the leisure batteries run down, running the risk of warm beer. and its annoyingly noisy to recharge them with the engine on a very quiet campsite. So I bought a maplin 13watt briefcase solar charger and it is great a charging phones etc. I also understand that it can trickle charge the main battery through the 12v system using the Cali's cigarette lighter. Does anyone know if this will also trickle charge the leisure batteries at the same time? Or do I need to clamp the solar charger directly onto the leisure battery terminals? If so where are they located? (I know, read the manual . Thanks in advance for any help on this. I can certainly recommend the maplin solar briefcase if anyone is thinking of one. Comes with loads of different adapters. Took ours to a festival two weeks ago and after much initial Micky taking by friends they all started queuing up to use it. It even charges the new iPad 4s as quickly as the mains. If I can trickle charge top up my leisure batteries too that will be fab. Cheers. Graham. Bristol.

 

[SimplyDubs]

Hi there and welcome on board.

No reason why not.

I'm not sure on a 2011 model about the socket in the dash... suspect it's fed from the starter battery.

Use one of the rear sockets as they are isolated from the starter battery unless on hook up or charging from the alternator. Either the one on the side of the sink or the one by the rear seat.

Remember though... with a 13w charger, the best charging current you'll get for the leisure batteries is likely to be less than an amp... so it won't give you much of a boost and certainly wont recover drain from the fridge etc.

Rgds
M

 

[briwy]

We are just in the process of getting a California but I will be fitting a 100w panel onto the roof somehow or other when I get time. We have one on our Bongo which works a treat, cost about £200 with the controller and it is just wired in permanently to the leisure battery for the controller.
13w won't charge the leisure batteries much and probably isn't enough to make up for running the fridge (4amps?). Don't forget that the rated wattage on panels is with bright sunlight.

 

[grahamjohndavis]

Hi folks. Thanks very much or that info, just what I needed. Top tip about rear sockets. Want a beefier solar charger now though cheers.

 

[Andy]

13 watt solar pannel will not put much charge into the leisure batteries. Why do you want to charge van battery when you are camping .... it does not get used.
If you fit pannels to your roof & wire into leisure batteries you will invalidate the electrical side of your waranty. All this has been discussed several times before.... search the forum.

Sent from my GT-N8010 using Tapatalk 2

 

[grahamjohndavis]

I want to charge leisure batteries, like I said. Thanks.

 

[beardie]

Hello folks. I'm new to the forum, looks really interesting. I have an 11 plate Cali SE and I have a query, wondered if anyone might know the answer? Every year we camp up in Cornwall for 2 weeks with no hookup. Eventually the leisure batteries run down, running the risk of warm beer. and its annoyingly noisy to recharge them with the engine on a very quiet campsite. So I bought a maplin 13watt briefcase solar charger and it is great a charging phones etc. I also understand that it can trickle charge the main battery through the 12v system using the Cali's cigarette lighter. Does anyone know if this will also trickle charge the leisure batteries at the same time? Or do I need to clamp the solar charger directly onto the leisure battery terminals? If so where are they located? (I know, read the manual . Thanks in advance for any help on this. I can certainly recommend the maplin solar briefcase if anyone is thinking of one. Comes with loads of different adapters. Took ours to a festival two weeks ago and after much initial Micky taking by friends they all started queuing up to use it. It even charges the new iPad 4s as quickly as the mains. If I can trickle charge top up my leisure batteries too that will be fab. Cheers. Graham. Bristol.

Is it that you dont want to pay the extra £3 for the hook up or that there is none ?
I looked at panels at approx £200 a go and the break even point is about 70 days, or 5 years for 14 day holidays. A long time and the hassle of carting it around assuming its not glued to the roof

 

[grahamjohndavis]

Hi there, no, there is no hook up at this beautiful rather wild site (poly joke, near crantock) and we like to set up and just leave it, hence leisure batteries running low after a few days. Just started looking at beefier 80w solar suitcases, but just bought the maplin and would suffer great pain from Julia.

 

[briwy]

For us the point is for wild camping which we do quite a lot. Its not because we don't like campsites or paying for a hook up (invariably we have a hook if possible on site because we can brew up quicker ) it's just the convenience of ensuring the batteries don't go flat and being independent. After all, £200 is peanuts compared with the cost of a California.
I'm not sure about it invalidating warranty either (is there proof of this?). As far as I'm aware the manufacturer would have to prove that fitting the panel has caused damage which is fairly unlikely as its fuse protected and linked to the control unit which cuts it off from the battery when fully charged.

 

[sidepod]

100w from a panel should give around 8A, assuming of course wall to wall sunshine :lol: and panel optimised in position (impossible if it's attached to the roof.) Switch off the fridge whilst charging and you might get a bit in to the batteries.

It may be more prudent to invest in another leisure battery to plug in when the van ones run down?

S.

 

[NickE]

Has anyone run their engine, while camped up, to charge their leisure battery? If so, any estimates on how quickly it does it? Say from 50% to full.

 

[nickstjt]

I wondered if we can put some numbers into this problem?

In my 2011 brochure it says:
"Fridge: electric 12V, power consumption approx 50W when cooling; cooling approx 30% of the time, silent approx 70% of the time"

So I take that to mean that the fridge takes 50W x 30% on average = 10W (just under 1amp). So a 13W panel would struggle unless you were in the arctic circle during their 6-month long day

But a 100W panel should produce 10W average if it was sunny for just 2.4 hours (100 * 2.4/24). Also, bear in mind that you aren't trying to match the fridge requirements, just to keep it going for 2 weeks in tandem with the battery. I don't know the capacity of the batteries - is it 72Ah for one or two? 10W for the fridge is under 1 Amp, so the battery could run the fridge for 72 hours (3 days) - I have certainly camped Thu-Sun with no hookup or driving in the summer.

Obviously, other stuff can load the batteries too! Also, please bear in mind I haven't tried this and make no guarantees - just dredging up my school Physics. And no idea about the warranty issues. Feel free to point out any obvious flaws in my rough numbers
Cheers,
--Nick

 

[grahamjohndavis]

Thank you for info. I wonder if turning the fridge off whilst charging would actually extend the overall time for a cool fridge in reality? Wouldn't the fridge warm up whilst off and then have to work extra hard later to chill back down again and draw more juice? Where as If left on would it not just pop on and off for briefer periods to maintain a constant Low temperature? I don't know. Gonna try the 13w panel anyway as it's what I've got, it's only two weeks old and I got looked at rather threateningly yesterday when I gently suggested that we might need a more powerful one. it must help a bit eh? Cheers.

 

[beardie]

You could try it at home with fridge on and watch the current drain figure on the overhead display.

 

[sidepod]

Alternatively, you could work out how long it'll take you to consume all of the wine/beer/food in the fridge. If it's under 72 hours then you're going to the shop and the battery will charge.

Easy :lol:

S.

ps. I think you'll find each battery is 72Ah giving a total of 144Ah (assuming you have 2?).

 

[grahamjohndavis]

Defo a lot less than 72 hours to empty fridge. Unable to drive by then though

 

[Tangle Foot]

Put ice blocks (if the site has a freezer) or bags of ice in and the fridge won't kick in so often...

 

[Andy]

Has anyone run their engine, while camped up, to charge their leisure battery? If so, any estimates on how quickly it does it? Say from 50% to full.

Around 20 minutes, as I discovered last weekend. My battery's were down to 40% so I ran engine for about 20 minutes which charged up to 100%. Control panel said charging at 19 amps.

 

[NickE]

Thanks for that. Very interesting. That certainly makes the cost/hassle vs benefits of a solar panel less appealing than I'd thought.

 

[RobdeBear]

Could anyone tell me if the two 'leisure' batteries that the manual tells me I have by virtue of the auxilary rear heater are both available to drive all rear circuits? Or is the extra battery for the rear heater available only for that? Also an numpty's explanation of the charging display figures on the control panel would be helpful to me and I suspect others fascinated by this thread. Thanks!

p.s. I too was impressed by how quickly a 20 - minute static engine run seemed to charge the batteries but then it did seem to drop more rapidly than normal shortly after that.

 

[sidepod]

Both leisure batteries are connected in parallel (ie plus to plus/minus to minus) thus maintaining 12v DC. (connected in series ie plus to minus like a torch you'd have 24v Dc).

This means both batteries power all camping equipment circuits.

The manual is slightly confusing in it's description of the extra battery for the heater. It simply means that if the vehicle is spec'd with a heater then the extra battery is required to cope with the additional load.

A quick charge via the engine/alternator will give a boost but won't be the same as a good deep charge via the hook-up.

S.

 

[RobdeBear]

Thanks for that. Good news then for when it warms up or, when we head South which I suspect will be the sooner of the two ;-)

 

[MKRW]

Hi there, no, there is no hook up at this beautiful rather wild site (poly joke, near crantock) and we like to set up and just leave it, hence leisure batteries running low after a few days. Just started looking at beefier 80w solar suitcases, but just bought the maplin and would suffer great pain from Julia.

Fantastic site. We visit Holywell every year and walk over the cliffs to Crantock. (My wife has been pushing to go camping there, but not been able to justify not staying with my mum....)

 

[Tangle Foot]

The batteries after a short drive will show 100%.... but only for a short time.

You need to look at the amps. If it's +25ish then it's a long way off charged.

+ve amps= charging
-ve amps= draining

The lower the +ve amps reading when charging, the closer to charged. Not sure if this makes sense??

 

[RobdeBear]

It makes more sense than anything in the manual! Thank you!