I am unsure about
>recharging batteries. do I need a solar panel, or just a plain battery
>charger? I don't know.
I bought a camper and did all the research for the RV on solar (Y2k
preparations etc). For the RV wend all out and bought two 50watt siemens
panels (with the blue crystals), a special amperage increasing charge
controller, and a 400 watt wind generator. spent the bucks... So far only
the controller has been installed--but, the catch is the the rv has a lot
more stuff to run (off two 6v 220ah golf cart batts in series, hope to add
two more). I run a microwave, 2500watt inverter, tv/vcr, wife's hair dryer,
lights, etc. in it.
The boat is a different issue. I put a 12v RV battery in the included
marine batt box in my boat (batt left over from the RV). It works great,
but its not a gel batt so could leak into the containment box (what they're
for) if It tipped or rolled, etc). I hooked up with clamp a 500 watt
inverter--so can run wallwort type adapters for cd player, cell phone, etc)
and a std cig plug with Y --in to this I plugged a small solar panel ($29)
1 watt that I bought from a catalog to get some special deal on another
product. Anyways, it dosent put out much power, but appearantly is enough
to counter act the battery's natural discharge/loss, so its always been
sufficiently charged to run my cd and internal cabin lights on day trips
without any external charging which is worth something. I do have a car
type ac charger for batts (deeps and starters) so if it gets weak can do a
real charge in the driveway. I would recommend the 5 or 10 watt type
solar chargers (that have a blocking diode for night), this should keep the
average deep cycle type marine/boat battery topped off/charged through the
week with no problem. They cost about $60-90 and often hook up with spring
clamps (like jumper cables have-which can be long term attached inside a
marine battery box lid), then the panel sits nicely on the cabin top slider
or to the side of it, etc...
What Need for a four day weekend trip with a wife, two teenage sons
>(music)
I'd recommend lots of Valium and Prozac. ;-)
and what dad wants is a weather report. issues: Batteries- how
>long will they last?
The lights on a P19 don't seem to draw a whole lot of juice compared to
what a 12v deep cycle battery can put out. If you are worried about
running appliances off of it (CDs boom boxes, weather radios, etc...) these
devices can also run on thier own batteries to stretch capacity, and for
that I highly recommend "Renewal" brand batteries--they are alkalines and
take 25 charges, yet after the initial charger "investment" of about $10,
the batteries only seem to cost about 20% more than regular alkaline
batteries. A real deal.
This would significanly "stretch" the use of the boat battery for lights,
etc... But a solar panel is a great idea as over 4 days, some input is a
necessary great idea (different from a day or overnight trip where you are
back to shore power when needed). You can get a panel from mail order like
damark catalog, the northern equipment catalog, ive seen some on ebay
online, or from many RV suppliers both on line, or near where you live.
The cig plug with clips can be obtained from your local auto store or
walmart. Some panels are the soft "roll up" film type that may mount
more easily than solid/stiff/fixed frame plastic ones. And with solar
panels "brown" silicon (as opposed to "blue" silicon" chips) are
"amorphous" type (silica bonded to an aluminum substrate) and are *much*
less efficient in producing electricy than the Blue "grown" crystal chip
type panels (which cost more). The one on my boat is a 1w amorphous panel
(very small--dashboard size)
Also you can stretch some of the light requirements from electric to
chemical by buying chem light sticks and running them up your mast (white)
Costs a bit but saves electricity all night if that is more precious for
music, etc...
Hope that helps....
Thomas
P19 #578
Colorado Springs