Could you check my wiring diagram, please?

[VermonTear]

I may have learned just enough to be dangerous. I've adapted an excel diagram I found here to try to figure out my Inverter / Charger wiring plan.
Can you experts check me out -- and fill in a few of my blanks?



Ken

[Martiangod]

I wouldn't use a 12 volt CB between bat and fuse panel, I've found them over the years to be less then reliable, freeze open, or freeze closed, I'd use a 30 or 40 amp spade fuse for the master 12 volt line.
For saftey's sake I'd put a inline spade fuse30 amp on your charge line to tow vehicle
As for the 110 side, I'd split that circuit to minimum 4 with 15 amp breakers on each leg, may sound excessive but, two separate circuit for the galley and two of the cabin plugs on one 15 and the third, most likely for heater on its own 15.
You probabbly think thats excessive, but I'd want the fridge alone, and not want any combination of micro / coffee maker / frypan / slowcooker / induction plate / griddle / heater / ac sharing the same circuit at same time
Now if your going to run an induction plate or an AC, Personally i'd put 20 amp breakers on those cicuits

[Alan and Lianna]

Here is where I can see a problem, a short in any of these lights(or an open on either side) and the cabin is dark because they're all on the same fuse?

Alan

[eamarquardt]

Unless you have one heck of a battery pack getting 1000 watts out of an inverter and battery is overly optimistic. If you do get it out of the inverter you're going to have a tough time finding enough juice to recharge your batteries.

I'd plan on using a/c power only when shore power is available.

Cheers,

Gus

[VermonTear]

Here is where I can see a problem, a short in any of these lights(or an open on either side) and the cabin is dark because they're all on the same fuse?

Alan

Good point, Alan. I'll fix that. Two fuses, minimum.

Thanks,

Ken

[aggie79]

I wouldn't use a 12 volt CB between bat and fuse panel, I've found them over the years to be less then reliable, freeze open, or freeze closed, I'd use a 30 or 40 amp spade fuse for the master 12 volt line.
For saftey's sake I'd put a inline spade fuse30 amp on your charge line to tow vehicle
As for the 110 side, I'd split that circuit to minimum 4 with 15 amp breakers on each leg, may sound excessive but, two separate circuit for the galley and two of the cabin plugs on one 15 and the third, most likely for heater on its own 15.
You probabbly think thats excessive, but I'd want the fridge alone, and not want any combination of micro / coffee maker / frypan / slowcooker / induction plate / griddle / heater / ac sharing the same circuit at same time
Now if your going to run an induction plate or an AC, Personally i'd put 20 amp breakers on those cicuits

I'm with Chris. I'd split the AC load with additional breakers. Also, if the first outlet is a GFCI receptacle the rest of the "downstream" receptacles on the circuit are protected and
another GFCI is not needed.

[Shadow Catcher]

You need only one GFI in the AC line to protect those circuits on that line.

[VermonTear]

As for the 110 side, I'd split that circuit to minimum 4 with 15 amp breakers on each leg, may sound excessive

Chris,
We won't be using much 110 unless we're connected to shore power. No fridge, no electric appliances. At the most when we're off the grid we might run a coffee grinder for 20 seconds, maybe run an 850 watt toaster for 2 minutes in the morning -- but if our voltage is up okay (otherwise we'll toast over our camp stove like we did when we were backpacking. The 110 outlets in the cabin are to watch DVDs on our laptop if we are on shorepower (without buying DC charger adapters for the laptop), and maybe to recharge a cell phone -- again only if we're on shorepower or have sufficient voltage in battery to keep us whole. If we're traveling (on the move) we can keep the laptops and cells charged in the car, but our DC outlets in the vehicle are dead when the ignition is off, so that's not an option when we're parked (and I'm too green to run the motor to charge my phone!). Anyway, that's a long way of saying I think 4 breakers is overkill in our case, as our 110 use is . Maybe two 15 amp breakers -- one for the cabin, second one for the galley. Sound good?

But now that I finished rationalizing all that, I'm starting to wonder if you are right. There we are, in our little 4x8, on a cold night in the White Mountains, connected to shore power, watching a DVD on the pluged in laptop, someone's loaned us a cute little ceramic heater... Hmmmm... maybe we do need two circuits in the cabin. Same thing could happen with an electric fry pan that suddenly appears in our galley while someone else plugs in their -- where did that electric razor come from? Did I just argue myself into 4 15amp CBs?

I wouldn't use a 12 volt CB between bat and fuse panel, I've found them over the years to be less then reliable, freeze open, or freeze closed, I'd use a 30 or 40 amp spade fuse for the master 12 volt line.
For saftey's sake I'd put a inline spade fuse30 amp on your charge line to tow vehicle

Thanks for that advice. I'll look that stuff up in my Waytec catalog and try to understand it. Then I'll be able to call a spade a spade (sorry, that was really lame -- it must be Friday )

best...

Ken

[VermonTear]

Unless you have one heck of a battery pack getting 1000 watts out of an inverter and battery is overly optimistic. If you do get it out of the inverter you're going to have a tough time finding enough juice to recharge your batteries.

I'd plan on using a/c power only when shore power is available.

Thanks Gus. I do plan on mainly using AC when connected to shore power. The inverter is there only for the little conveniences that we'd like to have (if the voltage is up -- like 2 minutes of our 850 watt toaster or 20 seconds of our coffee grinder) when we're not connected. Between times we only will have 100 hours and what the car's alternator can help recharge (if we're on the move). I'm hoping the 1000 Watt Inverter/Charger I just bought can do that for us. If not, I just spent a lot of time trying to figger this all out and a lot of $$ for diddle...

best..

Ken

[VermonTear]

I'm with Chris. I'd split the AC load with additional breakers.

Thanks, Chris. I'm starting to be convinced.

ken

[VermonTear]

You need only one GFI in the AC line to protect those circuits on that line.

Got it! Thanks. Also, thanks to your often times mentions of Lifeline Batteries, that's where I ended up. My GLP27T 100AH is on the way. Bigger one's were tempting, but 1) to big, and 2) out of my budget. Hopefully the 100AH will work out for our style of camping.

best...

Ken

[Shadow Catcher]

Ken speaking from first hand experience, what you want now may differ greatly from what you want in the future. The progressive dynamics power center has 14 DC circuits and I am using all of them along with the five AC circuit breakers. As an example we went with a Sirius satellite receiver attached to the stereo, the fuse for the radio is 15 A and the fuse for the satellite receiver is five, yes I could've attached both lines together but I would've had to have a separate fuse in-line for the sat receiver and that would've been hard to get to.
So during this building phase think of where you might want to go and then add more than that. This goes along with my, it is better to have it and not need, than need it and not have it philosophy. you might also want to consider what I did in using all LED lights and computer case fans instead of a Fantastic Fan. I have two Antec 120 mm three speed case fans there wired separately through a switch so that either one of them or both of them can be used. They draw .15 A on low and .39 A on high so a max of .74 A with both of them on high. There are a number of articles on this website featuring how to slow down fantastic fans using a resistor or PMW. That struck me as being a huge waste of power. I know there are others that have gone this route as well and are equally happy. The rated CFM is 100 ft.³ and while I doubt that as being somewhat optimistic we have never had the need to use ours on high.
Our Lifeline battery ended up upside down after the accident and from what I can tell it has suffered no damage.

[Martiangod]

But now that I finished rationalizing all that,

Ken

Fun arguing with yourself isn't it

Oh, and don't forget that cool little electric griddle you just found at a garage sale on the way to camp....

You won't regret stepping up the wiring
I'm already regretting not doing enufff as my trailer evolves
I'm running 4 breakers now, main and 3 branch circuits, will be adding 2 more for certain

Also on the 12 volt side, I split everything, not that theres much, but now Its evolving and the walls are done its as the build evolves, but by splitting the initial stage allows me to tap into an existing to add ( ie: the stereo I wasn't going to put in )
Most I'll have on any 12 volt line is 2 items......so far

[VermonTear]

Here's a revised wiring diagram-- with still a few open questions about CB amp size, wire size from shore to inverter/charger, and grounding needs. Thanks for all the input thus far, hope I've got the corrections right.


Shadow Catcher>> Thanks for your thoughts about computer case fans vs the Fantastic Vent Fan. For better or worse, the Fan was one of my (I thought) easy decisions -- so it's been sitting here since December waiting to be installed. Oh well, next build....

Ken

[Shadow Catcher]

I am forced to admit I have a couple of "I bought it now I have to use its". Our tear has the FF housing with no fan and I added the case fans.