psneeld
Guru
Well, Flywright pretty well tongue in cheek hit the nail squarely.
Worrying about a few amps and how long they run is for only part of the crowd.
For some of us, who live aboard have more amp eaters to fry than living out of a shoebox size fridge and only opening it for lunch for 30 seconds, and not refilling it till the next trip with precooled goodies.
On any given day.....I may have the following drawing down the batteries while 400 watt solar tries to keep up.
1. Danfoss powerd fridge/freezer
2. Danfoss powered cooler for beverages (boondocking used sparingly)
3. Wall warts charging 2 cell phones, 2 tablets, 2 laptops, electric toothbrush, and multi use powerd speakers for radio or tv use.
4. 24 inch TV
5. Chartplotter for anchor alarm
6. LED anchor light
7. Misc. LED light usage
8. Toilet flushing
9. Water pumps
10. Microwave, and/or blender
11. Dingy hoist
12. Tiny but present drains, propane sniffer, battery monitor, electric panel meters and lights....
There are times when all those kicking in and on at the same time exceed 20A.
Plus most of the time, the solar is not any where close to putting out 400W due to environmental condituons or shadowing from boat swing, sun angle, etc....
So being a frugal but non-camper style cruiser, who has been a student of batteries and revalent tech since my first cruiser in the 70's, getting along with a reasonable cost liveaboard set up for 7 month snowbirding, electricity aint for lab rats....nothing ever works like it does on paper Like last year when my primary battery charger went out in the Keys and took awhile for an ordered one to show up.
You have to "get it" just to get through each day and all the boating books, magazines and product manuals aint gonna help that much.
Worrying about a few amps and how long they run is for only part of the crowd.
For some of us, who live aboard have more amp eaters to fry than living out of a shoebox size fridge and only opening it for lunch for 30 seconds, and not refilling it till the next trip with precooled goodies.
On any given day.....I may have the following drawing down the batteries while 400 watt solar tries to keep up.
1. Danfoss powerd fridge/freezer
2. Danfoss powered cooler for beverages (boondocking used sparingly)
3. Wall warts charging 2 cell phones, 2 tablets, 2 laptops, electric toothbrush, and multi use powerd speakers for radio or tv use.
4. 24 inch TV
5. Chartplotter for anchor alarm
6. LED anchor light
7. Misc. LED light usage
8. Toilet flushing
9. Water pumps
10. Microwave, and/or blender
11. Dingy hoist
12. Tiny but present drains, propane sniffer, battery monitor, electric panel meters and lights....
There are times when all those kicking in and on at the same time exceed 20A.
Plus most of the time, the solar is not any where close to putting out 400W due to environmental condituons or shadowing from boat swing, sun angle, etc....
So being a frugal but non-camper style cruiser, who has been a student of batteries and revalent tech since my first cruiser in the 70's, getting along with a reasonable cost liveaboard set up for 7 month snowbirding, electricity aint for lab rats....nothing ever works like it does on paper Like last year when my primary battery charger went out in the Keys and took awhile for an ordered one to show up.
You have to "get it" just to get through each day and all the boating books, magazines and product manuals aint gonna help that much.
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