Tucson tortoise: Edit for photos

[noseoil]

I spoke too soon about the inverter & power, my math is wrong! The 1,000 watt inverter needs about 10% to process voltage, so that's about 8 amps at full draw. Add the systems to it and it's a hungry little beast. It drew down the battery in a few hours and dropped out due to low voltage with everything powered. I guess the tree & its shadows don't help with charging either. No worries, as I'm going to order a smaller inverter (300-400 watts) to run the TV & entertainment stuff, since it doesn't need that much power. I'll keep the bigger one in place, in case I ever need to run something drawing more current. There's still lots of room on the bulkhead to mount another inverter. Live & learn I guess. Electrical & electronics were never my long suite anyway.

Worked on a TV antenna this morning. Used some gray 1" conduit & a cheap store-bought flat panel antenna (bow tie type). Works great! I get better reception in the trailer than we do in the house (adobe walls & several layers of wire lath are tough to get a signal through).


Used two U bolts, drilled through the tongue box side & fastened to the inside with hex nuts. Made a couple of wood spacers to block it out & plumb things up to make the mast sits right. The bottom one has a shallow hole it sits in & the top one just spaces the mast from the box & acts as a clamping surface for the conduit. I may do a longer one, but this fits in the truck & it works well enough for now.

[Graniterich]

If you are using 300 watts on a 1000 watt inverter, you will not use much more amperage then a 300 watt inverter using 300 watts. If we forget about the fact that inverters are not 100% efficient, a 300 watt load would be about 2.5 amps.

[noseoil]

OK, thanks!

[Graniterich]

Woke last night and realized that I was off by a factor of ten! 300 watts would pull 25 amps! (watt/12v=amps)

[noseoil]

Great minds think alike! That was the problem I had with my thinking about loads, AC & DC power consumption. The conversion process (mentally) from AC watts to DC current is where I get confused from time to time, along with many other things. 1 amp at 110 volts equals nearly 10 amps of DC current, add about 10% for conversion of the voltage & now there's a significant current draw happening.

I'm thinking that at some point, I may well put another group 27 battery in the tongue box (it's big enough anyway). I ran wires from the tongue box to the galley (#8, a hot & a ground) in conduit, and it's beginning to make more sense to me to have it available, just in case. A buddy of mine did the same thing with his teardrop. He has 2 group 24's in an ice chest on his tongue. They were brought into the galley with welding cables & split out from there. He never runs out of power & has a solar panel as well.

Just when I think I'm getting finished on this thing......

P.S. Had a nice camp out last night. We decided to "go camping" in the driveway so it was a good night's sleep. We both slept in until nearly sunrise this morning, 7:00 for a change!

Here's the antenna mast, a couple of detail shots of how it fits together, lower & upper mounts at the box.

[Atomic77]

I agree with KC...absolutely first class. With all the comforts of home!

[roamer]

You don't realize how much juice you are using until you try to provide you're own. A lot of home appliances are 1500+ watts!
A toaster, hair dryer, microwave, etc. Things we use ever day and don't think twice.
I put a 1750 watt unit in my toy hauler with big batteries to get us by when the generator isn't on.
Haven't decided on what I will do in my current build. Always a balancing act!

[noseoil]

Back at my favorite thing (almost) the wiring again! I decided to get a smaller inverter just for the entertainment system, so it's mounted behind the sound bar under the shelf. Tucks in nicely & can't be seen now. The panel which is the close-out for the wiring chase is in place now. This is the front where I added a 12 volt receptacle, switch & volt gauge to monitor the battery from inside the cabin. Just removed the panel, drilled a few holes & put it back in place.


The back side, wired & the panel now ready to install. Putting it all back together again. Nice to have the TV on a swing arm, better than having a hard mount as it can be moved easily to access the power panel & wiring.


This should draw a lot less than the 1,000 watt inverter. I'm keeping it for the galley, but this one (200 watt Wagan) is really all the entertainment system needs, and then some (the Wagan is a superior inverter, galley crapped out after a few bad roads & bumps:edit).

[capnTelescope]

I thought that regulator looked familiar. Thanks for the shout-out.

Just for the record, my Little Red Campfire has it's own "medium pressure" regulator and doesn't like being fed 30 psi.. I'm considering converting my system to tank-pressure. All it takes is to replace the regulator with a tank connector pigtail. I already have the right connectors.

I still like the idea of the medium pressure piping, but I did high pressure air test my plumbing, just in case. I'm betting it's easier to keep C4H10 enclosed than it is air.

Congrats on the maiden voyage.

[Gunguy05]

I haven't comment on your build much, but I have spent a lot of time going over it, and over it.

It looks like you have really done a great job going over things endlessly in an effort to "get it right" the first time, and now all of the finishing touches are coming together well.

Great job, you have something that will serve you well, and you can be proud of when you are done!

[noseoil]

Brad & Brian, thanks for the kind words. It's moving along now pretty well, but still have a way to go on things.

Brad, not sure I'd want to have the full pressure running in the line with propane. 30 PSI is plenty. The Little Red Campfire you show has an image in the list with a regulator attached to the tank. Can you just have a line made to attach to it and use what's already in the camper? Sounds like it's six of one or a half dozen of the other in this case, but whatever works & is easier would be fine. I just get a bit squeamish having high pressure propane running in a line. Fuel-air explosives come to mind for me.

Brian, you comment about "going over things endlessly" is where it feels like I am all the time on the build at this point. There aren't that many things left to do, but it's all detail work, which seems to take the most time in general. Yesterday I spent a few hours shaping 4 little pieces of aluminum for the lower corners of the galley (2 for each corner) & didn't finish. It's the only place where water can get in during a rain or while running on the road now. Sorry about the lousy shot quality, but it's cropped out of a picture I wasn't trying to get from the stove. There's one vertical strip of green & one piece of the 1" molding which are both set in epoxy to seal this area. And so it goes.....

[noseoil]

Not a lot of progress to report. Been a bit busy. Have a new concrete driveway, now that the trailer's nearly finished. No more crawling around in the gravel. Hung the rear speaker boxes this afternoon between shoveling & other work. Wanted to make sure things cleared, wires worked & everything was right before putting in the rear skin & buttoning up the hatch. We now have tunes!


Also want to take this opportunity to thank everyone for their input. Merry Christmas! Hope 2016 is a great year for one & all. All the best, tim

[Sheddie]

Hi Tim,
that sure is looking good.
It is great to see that you had a successful maiden voyage and that all the finishing touches are coming together.
Wishing you and your family all the best for Christmas and the New Year.

[Atomic77]

Merry Christmas!

[dales133]

Merry Christmas Tim