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Advice and Critique of the Zombie Apocalypse Trailer (ZAT)!

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  • Advice and Critique of the Zombie Apocalypse Trailer (ZAT)!

    Greetings,

    First time poster so take it easy on me.

    Anyway, I wish I found this website before I started putting things together in the Zombie Apocalypse Trailer (ZAT!) The ZAT! has historically been used as my mobile communications trailer and sleeping quarters while I'm out on Search and Rescue missions. The primary power use is to run the 2 mobile radios ICom F5021 and ICom F6021. I also used it to charge my laptop and HT Radios. I few months ago I began to kick around the idea of adding solar to the ZAT!. The objective was two fold, to learn more about off grid solar systems and to transition the ZAT! from comms trailer to more of a Holiday Inn.

    So as most of these things go the system is a mis-mash of components I either happened to have lying around or got for cheap.

    The Component list:

    ZAT!-Gichner S-250 w/EMI kit on a homemade trailer.

    2-320w Q Plus LG4.2 72 cell Panels Wired in Series. #10 awg 8ft length. No fuse
    2-Tracer 3215bn w/ remote temp 30a ANL fused to battery #6 awg 3ft length
    2-Vision 6fm200h 12v 200ah AGM wired in series 12v 200ah+12v 200ah=24v 200ah
    APC SmartUPS Sua1500rm2u #6 awg 2ft length. 60a ANL fuse to battery

    The journey so far...

    I picked up 2 72 cell panels. I chose the larger panels because they fit the roof of the ZAT! almost perfectly.

    The APC UPS I had lying around so I re-purposed it for inverter duty. It is a 24v 980ish watt pure sine wave inverter. This was a HUGE step up from the crappy 120w cigarette lighter inverter I had been using. Of course the UPS is also HUGE! As well as 24v. DOH! And hence a battery upgrade was in order.

    The ZAT! originally had 2 6v US Battery GC2 232ah batteries wired in series. I thought of adding 2 more Golf cart batteries wired in series to make a 24v pack. That would have been the smart thing to do. Instead I wired the US Batteries in series with a 12v Group 31 marine battery I had lying around to get a 24v bank. So now I had a 24v bank to feed into the APC UPS but I still needed 12v power to run the mobile radios in the ZAT! SO I tapped the US Batteries for the 12v. So I pretty much ensured that I would be drawing the batteries at different rates. NO problem I thought. I'll just use 2 charge controllers to charge each 12v battery separately. So I wired each panel to it's own charge controller feeding it's own battery in the 24v bank. And it actually worked. Well kinda. Turns out the dang mppt controllers produce so much RFI noise that it made the Icoms go nuts. So in the end I picked up 2 12v AGM batteries and simplified the system.

    The two AGM's are wired in series to produce 24v. The APC UPS is wired to the bank using #6 awg wire and protected with a 60a ANL fuse. The APC uses a Anderson SB50 connector on the UPS and #6 is the largest size the SB50 can accommodate. The UPS was fused using a 60a so I used the same size fuse for the larger batteries.

    The two panels are now wired in series and go into one Tracer 3215bn.
    The Tracer 3215bn settings are:
    Boost =29.4v
    Float=27.2v

    Boost is set to 180min. Longest time that the charge controller allows. I'm also assuming that boost is equivalent to Absorb in other charge controllers.

    My biggest power hogs are my laptop which I leave on 24/7 in order to monitor both the APC UPS and Tracer 3215bn for discharge and charge current respectively and my refrigerator which is a Waeco CF-80 which draws 1.3a at 120v. I leave the lights, 2 15w led, on 24/7 as well.

    According to APC Powerchute my daily power usage is 1.2-1.5kw.

    According to the Tracer my daily generation is 1.6-2.0kw.

    I'm pretty sure I'm not killing my batteries as the system has been running for a couple of months continuously. But any advice would be appreciated.

    Finally here are some questions I would like answered. Should I be fusing the + side of the array to the charge controller? if so what size fuse?
    The Negative terminal of the battery bank is grounded to the frame. I believe I read that 120v should be "floated" in RV systems. Am I correct in assuming that I shouldn't ground the 120V outlets to the trailer? For those that are Ham Sexy what 120v to 12v power supply would you recommend to power the mobile radios? I've heard Astrons are popular.

    It's been an interesting journey so far and I've learned a lot in the process. The ZAT! Will continue to evolve as I improve my knowledge of off grid solar. If you have any gear recommendations, advice or criticism I would love to hear it.

    Thanks in advance,

    Supra
    Last edited by Suprasoup; 10-25-2017, 04:41 AM.
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