Supplying Power To Your Recreational Vehicle

We bet you can’t wait to get out on the road, but is your vehicle power-ready? Whether you’re gone for days, weeks or months, you probably want to have access to some sort of power supply so that you can enjoy some home comforts out on the wide open road. There are a few power options for your recreational vehicle, which I’ll describe more below:

Auxiliary Battery System

A dual battery or auxiliary battery system in your car or caravan is simply an additional battery to supply power to whatever 12 volt accessories you may have. This battery is linked to you vehicles main start battery but in between their link is an automatic isolating device. Whilst the vehicle is in motion, the car’s existing alternator charging system will charge it. When you stop the car and set up for camping, the link disconnects automatically. This then allows you to start using up the power from the auxiliary battery with all your 12 volt gadgets. Pretty neat, huh!? The car’s main battery will not be discharged whilst this is all happening, therefore there’s absolutely no chance of it losing its voltage. Whenever you’re ready to go home, the car will start without a problem. The isolating can be made possible using a variety of electric or electronic devices but the vast majority of vehicles will require one called a ‘dc-dc’ charger which is designed to be most suitable for modern vehicles. It also operates far more effectively than most other styles.

Solar Panel

Just like at home, a vehicle or caravan solar panel will supply and/or replace power consumed from your battery system. This will allow your batteries to stay fully charged whilst not being used and top them up if there is an appliance drawing off the battery.

Inverter

An inverter is a device that converts voltage from 12v to 240v. This will allow you to use a variety of 240v devices without being connected to outside mains power as the inverter is supplied by the auxiliary batteries.

There are many variants to the above descriptions. Solar panels, batteries, chargers and inverters are all manufactured in a variety of physical sizes and performance ratings. What may be suitable for one application may be totally under or over rated for a different vehicle or customers requirements. If you’re interested in learning more about what’s right for your vehicle, get in touch today.