Dreadlocks outfitting of InTech Discover

[dreadlocks]

oh yeah thats the top of my mind.. I'm making a steel frame its going to sit in that will carry the weight from multiple load points on the panel and keep it rigid.

If I was any good w/3d software or drawing I'd post up what I'm thinking and gather feedback, but I'm a left handed programmer so all that stuff is stuck in my head until I make it.

basically the plan is two 72in pieces of zinc coated 1.5in angle running length wise on panels (65in), about 3.5in will overhang each end and angle legs will be tucked under panel.. the top I'm bolting a stabilizer pin on each overhang facing out, tack weld em on there for good measure.. then on the rear gate I'll mount 4 small pieces of 2in angle iron, two at the bottom with holes for pins/padlocks, and the two at the top will be carved out with grinders to have a slot for the stabalizer pins to drop into.. then I'll put 4 aluminum grab handles on the panel and wherever they align on the ramp I'll put tie down loops for backup straps.

edit a fuckit, here's my crude drawing:


@ITTOG lol, when I woke up and saw panel covered in snow I really expected to come home to a lower SOC.. not an actual increase, given fridge dont run much when its that cold but I'm just happy that I was able to come home to a higher SOC than I left with.. If you've ever tried one of those portable 120w briefcases under a tree, in the rain and snow you'd know it was a fools endeavor.. sure its putting out a pathetic amount of its rated power, but its usable and still takes a nice dent out of my power deficit.. This 45lb panel is mounted over my axle, contributes nothing to my tongue weight and was significantly cheaper than another 100AH of lithium.. so yeah, I'm elated to go so long with such little storage capacity and weight. only 75lbs and my fridge kept running for 5 days with crap sun, no setup, and its going to recover tomorrow back to full and keep on going completely off the grid.

not to mention my portable panels torture test in good solar conditions that easily provided me with 100% more energy than I've ever consumed in a day (123AH).. its really nice being able to hookup so much solar and load to a single battery,

 

[dreadlocks]

Wired the portable panel up to 100ft of 12awg marine cable, through the pre-provisioned solar outlet on the trailer.. and hit the max output for the 100/30 controller pretty easily now that I have it on a 40A fuse.. I'm going to put 150ft of wire in three 50ft sections on a reel.




as you can see I also hooked up the temp sensor, shame the app wont convert it to F but I can convert metric to imperial close enough in my head.. the BMV display shows Fahrenheit.

edit here's the cable reel, works really nicely and fits in a milk crate:

 

[dreadlocks]

Went out memorial day weekend to a place I've been going since I was a kid, it was packed, noisey and other campers were super annoying, the cacophony of construction gensets was absurd.. but my oldest son made a ton of friends and upped his mountain biking skills flying around the park.. Took him out shooting for the first time, did a lil bit of wheeling down a pretty gnarly trail to find our shooting spot.. then later that night mom and lil brother went to bed early so we stayed up late around the fire talking about deep stuff.. fantastic weekend, here check out this sharp shooter:


Only brought the one solar panel on the roof, each day we got ~4h of sunlight and never had any need to run the generator at all.. this weekend used: toaster, coffee maker, microwave, radio (w/new 120w subwoofer), dewalt battery charger, furnace, fridge, tablet/phone/nintendo chargers.. about ~60aH a day average, battery was floating ~91% SOC and would drop to ~30% soc in morning after making a few cups of coffee and then suck up the sun real quick and then go back to float for most of the day with shade.. was ideal solar conditions on Sat-Sunday, felt awesome not needing the genset and being fully off the grid.. no setup or sun chasing required!



Temps outdoors were between 30F-68F, inside temps were between 65F-78F.. heaters did a fantastic job, my wife even got REM sleep and kicked her blankets off.. dont think I ever seen her do that in all our years of tenting it.

Need to get the radios back up and permanently installed ASAP, both the Audi and the Trailer; so that's the next area of focus.. Mamma bear isint going to let me wonder off with her son and a truck full of guns again without some form of communications.. I swear she gets a scratchy broken comms from a few miles away using handhelds and she instantly assumed the worst.. not that I was just trying to see if the'd work (they keyed each other and broken words got through but thats it).. good news is she seemed keen on getting her HAM when I told her that we could had easily used a HAM repeater even if we get well beyond direct line of sight for GMRS... so I'm sending her a link to practice exams and we'll see if she does anything with it.

Here's a photo of the 8in subwoofer w/built in amp I just put in, nothing crazy.. but it makes a massive difference on the quality of the built in stereo and is basically invisible where I put it under the microwave.

 

[dreadlocks]

Here's a nice photo I took while on my roof of the solar:


And I've nearly finished installing the Kenwood APRS Radio into my Audi, just got to run two ethernet cables and a speaker cable to the hatch tomorrow, started raining on me hard in the middle of this and I hadda take a break.


if you look in the coin tray you can see the new location of my RedArc TowPro Elite control knob.. within easy reach for fine adjustment and manual use.

edit: Night Shot


Once I confirmed the Kenwood 710 worked fine, I opened it up and modified it to transmit on GMRS, took longer to take the screws out than to modify it.. left is doing APRS right is doing GMRS.

 

[Stan0]

I've been enjoying your discover trailer setup. We have a Max Flyer Plus, basically an Explore. I have a few question about your solar panel attachments to the rack. Our rack is of the same material I believe and I see you used angle Iron. We have 2 100 watt renogy panels we are planning to mount on top of our rack in series. I think I want to use the angle iron like you did so I don't raise the panels any higher than necessary. What kind of bolts do you use for the rack to attach the angle iron and angle iron to solar panel?
How is it going down the road? Should I worry about air under or do you think it is solid enough? I have more but don't want to be a pest. Also on your advice and others here we went to Lithium Battery. thanks S

 

[dreadlocks]

Stainless Steel w/Locking washers + locktite for good measure.. Rivnuts would be ideal IMO.. its 1/4in thick angle, the roof racks are aluminum.. you might get some of those buttresses off the Intech store if your attaching multiple skinnier panels or find some way to make the cross bars more rigid.. I'm relying on securing to the cross beams more towards the outter edges than the inner so there is less flex than in the middle.. but I may still pickup some of those buttresses when I make an order w/em.

So far so good, Ive had it up to 75mph with it so far but not through any midwestern wind gusts so we'll see, mines pretty damn rigid.. and far enough back from the nose I'm not worried about it.. I'm more concerned with branch impacts than anything else really.

Glad to hear I inspired your own build, feel free to ask whatever.. derail away I dont mind, besides good chance someone else is or will be wondering the same thing you are.

 

[Stan0]

Thanks a ton. I am considering 3/16 aluminum angle or 1/4 aluminum angle to lighten weight on top on rack and be comparable with panel without painting. Will order crossbars from Intech for rack to stablilize and bolt to. I have z brackets with panels but they lift it up an inch or so. I like the way yours sit into the angle and sit on the rack. That's my goal.
We plan on using our 100 watt solar suitcase to augment. Was hoping I could hook this thru it's 20 amp controller direct to battery. I have read and heard conflicting opinions. Otherwise I could enter suitcase panels into the series at my mc4 branch connectors , by passing the 20 am controller all together. Do these ideas fly?

 

[dreadlocks]

it'd be best to use seperate controllers for portable vs fixed.. if you wire em all together its likely one or the other will be bypassed since they are different pannels in different locations.

Aluminum would work, compared to my panel the angle is not much weight.. since mine's so tall I wanted steel to take a hit from a brach w/out twisting the frame.

 

[Stan0]

thanks again, if I follow you... When I set up at location, I would just connect the suitcase panels/ with it's own controller to the battery direct. The rack top solar will be always connected once installed. So both systems will feed battery at same time.

 

[dreadlocks]

yep thats how I'm doing it, roof top has one controller and portable is getting its own.. If you go w/Victron MPPT solar they are testing a feature right now that lets multiple SmartSolar's stay in sync so they both go from bulk/absorb/float together.

 

[Stan0]

Already have controllers so I will monitor results as I go forward. That will change the game if they can develop that tech. On the way are a Renogy battery 100 , 2 100watt panels, 40 amp rover, mppt. Wanted battleborn but a 20% discount was hard to pass on so I stayed in renogy family. Called Intech and ordered two crossbars for our rack and they INCLUDED the rack gussets as a warranty upgrade free of charge if they weren’t installed on your original rack.
I like Intech and so far have enjoyed doing business with Renogy.

 

[dreadlocks]

Picked up a 2003 KTM 65 SX from my boss today at work, hasn't ran in a few years but I got a killer deal on it.. I'm so excited, my son has no idea.. and nor does my wife hah

 

[RandyP]

Here's a simple diagram of the electrical system on my discover, or at least the ideal situation I'm currently working towards and most of the way done.. figured I should start keeping track of this for my own sake.

Fuses, Negative Bus, and other lil things are omitted.. I may start adding that stuff later, shrug.

View attachment 512431

*subject to change at any time

Hello Dreadlocks, just now took the time and interest to look up your nearly complete 12v TH electrical system. I see you have installed the solar and refined your over voltage protection for the LI battery. I understand most of the diagram, but am wondering about the diode in the Victron 712 start battery voltage from the 12v power supplys/inverter bus ? See a different battery charger, (not a PD converter) any comment there ?

 

[dreadlocks]

that provides 12v power to for the switch panel, the diode is there to keep flow in one direction..

my switch panel is lit up, and the output from the BMV when power is off makes the switch really dim because its not outputting much current.. that diode allows those switch lights to be powered by 12v mains when the battery is on so they are not so dim.. the effect is: when the power is cut off, I flip the reserve switch, the light comes on dim.. after a few seconds the LVD reconnects and everything comes on and the light is normal brightness.. without that diode, the 12v out from the BMV would be sucked up by the rest of the system and I cant send any of it to the LVD, so system would be stuck off and reserve switch wouldn't do anything.

mostly because the switch lights not being full bright was annoying me and I knew how to fix it.

 

[RandyP]

The Smart Battery Protect 240A is in the lithium mode, the Smart Battery Protect 60 A is in the LVD mode.
-I figure LVD is Low Voltage Disconnect, so the 60A BP disconnects the dc loads at a low voltage setpoint, maybe 12v dc for LI battery.
-The 240A BP must perform the high voltage isolation of the battery at 14.2-14.6 volts.
Did I get that right ?