Day 18, 19, 20 - More Solar - Bisbee - Benson, AZ - TT

Thursday (18) - 84°F today!

With the charge controller in the passenger-side rearmost compartment, I need to re-think the placement of the solar panels. Instead of placing them towards the front of the RV, I will locate them all on the driver-side between the two A/C units. Hopefully, this will avoid shading from the A/C units. This will result in 55 ft of 10AWG wire between the panels and the charge controller. This includes both the positive and negative cables. From the chart and ohms law, we get a voltage drop of 0.515 volts or 0.76% loss with the panels wired in series. If I connect the panels in parallel, the resistance would be 3x higher but the loss would be almost 12% due to the lower voltage. This would require much heavier gauge wire from the roof to the charge controller. This is why I’m wiring the panels in series. 

After the morning test session, I put 4” wide Eternabond tape over the Dicor on both of the vent installations. Next week, I’ll put more Dicor on the edges of the tape. 

This picture also shows where I’m planning to install the solar panels. Since I try to have the driver's side of the RV facing south, putting the panels on this side minimizes the possibility of shadows on the panels. A shadow on even one panel could pretty much shut down all the panels in that series connection. But, that’s the trade-off between serial and parallel connection for your panels. The benefit is a higher voltage and lower current. I.e. cheaper wiring and you aren't so constrained by the distance between the panels and the charge controller.

Friday (19) - Today, we spent the day at Bisbee, AZ, an artsy town southeast of here. We went down with Rich and Hope who are staying at the Escapee park about a quarter of a mile down the road. We had met them last Thanksgiving near Lake Whitney, Texas. He is a fellow ham radio operator and they are full-time RV travelers. 

Lots of shops such as this honey store. It was not much wider than their front door. We had a tasty lunch at the Bisbee Coffee Company right on the main street. 

Saturday (20) - This morning, I went with Rich to another RV park in Benson and helped finish a handicap ramp up to a 5th wheel RV. Another couple, Garrett and Carolyn had started and finished much of the framing and most of the decking. We finished the decking, finished the handrail, and primed the raw wood on the handrail. 

Afterwards, Bridget and I headed into Tucson to color Easter eggs with Garrett and Carolyn’s three kids while they were doing their livestream. Their YouTube channel is Diary of a Family.