dms1

Has anyone installed a Solar Panel on their truck\shell? I have a 2018 XLT Supercab and I am planning to remove the rear seat behind the drivers seat and install an 80 Qt Engle Fridge (12 Volt). I will install a 100 Watt Flexible solar panel on my shell when it comes in and connect it to the battery so the fridge wont drain my battery. I was wondering if anyone has done this and had any advice running cables from the solar charge controller mounted in the bed of the truck to the battery under the hood. I did a search but nothing came up.

Thanks

RLXXI

Obviously this won't be big enough for your needs, I installed this in the tray on the dash of my truck a few years ago to maintain battery charge before I knew how to disable the bms. https://www.pulsetech.net/store/sola...tainer-2w.html

Check out some of their other units they sell, fairly expensive but the military uses them so there must be something to them.


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dms1

I will be using a Sunpower 100 Watt Flexible Solar Panel and a Victron SmartSolar MPPT 100/15 Charge controller. I was hoping to get advise how to route the cables from the charge controller to the engine bay battery and if there would be any issues with the new truck. I have done this modification to older vehicles (15+ Years Old) but not a new modern vehicle.

I am going to browse the truck build and car audio section of the forum to see if I can learn anything.

Thanks

artsr2002

There are two large grommets on the firewall for routing wires. The one on the drivers side is far easier to get to. On my 2018, I was able to route a large 4GA amp power wire as well as a thick 9-conductor 1/2 inch thick Audiopipe audio cable.

The one of the passenger side is trickier to get to but I believe also has enough room for large wires, its just harder to get too since it's behind the glovebox area.

F175

My guess is you will need a bit more than a 100 watt solar setup.

Kingofwylietx

The OP would need to confirm, but the one I found on Cabela's website said 1-2 amps per hour.
They didn't say if that was at 12vdc or 24vdc....so even if it was 4 amps at 12 volts, he'd only be at 48 watts.
This is the one I found: https://www.cabelas.com/product/Enge...er/1579350.uts

The bigger question for me would be if that panel outputs 100 watts for most of the day on a cloudy day...or only in direct sunlight at noon.
Either way, hopefuly the OP has already researched all this?

F175

A 100 watt panel rarely produces 100 watts. And if it is not adjusted a few times during the day, that goes double. Here is a pretty decent group that knows a lot about this stuff: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2589581644599315/

Bottom line, I doubt a single 100 watt panel will make it work. It can supplement, but to run a cooler nonstop, no. Just my opinion....

RLXXI

Agreed, I have 24 panels on my roof that make up the 6kW and that's at full blown sunny day so each panel is producing 250W. Here's a production chart for the month of Dec 2018 and July 2018, each day output divide by 24 to get what one panel produces. This should give some understanding how even a cloudy day will still produce just not as much.



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Kingofwylietx

That is exactly what I was wondering about in my post. It sounds like my hunch was right.
Rnlcomp, your numbers are very disappointing (I'm not saying they are not typical, just disappointing to someone like me who thought it would have been much better). Even with the higher of the two months you posted, you only got on average 22kW a day from a 6kW system. That's an eye opener!

RLXXI

Yeah it's not the be all end of paying a power bill, they do guarantee a certain amount of production each year or they send me a check for the difference and I haven't received a check yet in the 5 years it's been up there.

It does however make enough per year to pay for itself and about $50 per month off the power bill. I'm not going to complain about any free electricity lol.
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