by McDave » Tue May 30, 2017 1:06 am
I'm afraid that kettle is gonna be a killer. I have gone round and round with the coffee conundrum. I tend to be awake early, obscenely early. And I just gotta have some coffee. Soon. I don't need to make a pot really, just 2 or 3 BIG cups, well they are about 10-12oz mugs. I don't want to bother other folks, or even let them know I am awake. So no genny/Mr.Coffee. Or microwave. I don't have a kitchen in the classic form, but I do have a reefer, sink and microwave. In general we eat at restaurants when we go to bike rally's. If I'm cookin', it's probably BBQ or tin foil Hobo packs that can be thrown in the fire. Sometimes a Dutch Oven in the coals. Anyways, Most coffee pots are 950w and up. If I had a moderate solar set up, I wouldn't worry about recharging batteries. They could work all day while I was gone. Like I said, I don't want to start the gen. early AM. Also, refeer will be cycling all day and I may not return till late night, so again, I don't want to start gen. to charge batteries. I've been able to go about 3 days before recharge is required, but then you have to start gen or truck and run for 1-2 hrs. If I was using Mr. Coffee, thats about all I could do.. based on my admittedly small battery. Here's how I see the numbers,
125ah deep cycle at 50 % usage = 62.5ah available before 100% charge
Norcold reefer=4amps/hr when running. Currently it cycles on for 1 min/10 off. That's about .39a/hr x24hr= 9.59ah/day
I have about 40ft of rope lighting that consumes 28-30w at 100%. I run at 50% usually and say 4hrs/day = 5.0ah
Pump, fan and "other" parasitic loads approx. 10ah
Old timey mini CRT color TV for am news/weather 1hr = 3.5ah
There is probably some stuff I'm missing but this is close.
Reefer 9.59
lights 5.0
pump, fan etc. 10.0
TV 3.5
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Total 28.09ah
available amps 62.5
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amps remaining 34.41
Mr. Coffee 950w x 20min = 26.38ah
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available amps 8.02
That's just one day, so I would have to run genny at some point every day. Not a big deal, but I won't do it early am or late nite. Now, obviously there is lots of room for improvement here, but the point is Mr. Coffee is a hog. So, I've come up with a few alternative heat sources. Propane burner, butane burner and a alcohol stove. I'm not in love with any of them in a 6x12. but we'll make it work, for now. I do have a fire extinguisher mounted on the side door, so..
McDave