More Projects

Monday - Another warm day today. After two days with the Multiplus powered on plus whatever other parasitic loads, the battery was down to 81% SOC (state of charge) or about 11% per day. I plugged in shore power to recharge the battery, and the temperature of the Multiplus was 111°F. Not unreasonable, but I really do need to get some sort of ventilation for the underseat compartment. I'm thinking of an air intake vent near the Multiplus and an exhaust fan next to the battery. I should have another temperature controller lying around to control the 12V fan. 

While being used as a rental, the roof vents had covers over them. They were removed, but the mounting hardware was still installed, making it simple to install new vent covers. Now, the vents can be left open even when it is raining. There is one more vent in the front, but I'm considering replacing that vent with a MaxxAir fan.

Tuesday - I drove the Jeep with the trailer to Uvalde to the large hardware store to pick up some half-height strut channel, aka as Unistrut. I needed to bring the trailer as each piece is 10' long.  The high strength outdoor VHB tape will be used to attach it to the roof as well as several screws into the aluminum channel roof joists. At least, I'm pretty sure that they are aluminum. The nuts with the blue plastic slide into the strut channel will be used to mount the solar panels. The slots in the channel will have Dicor self-leveling sealant to keep water from the back of the VHB tape.

The heat and humidity prevent much work from being done in the afternoon. The mornings are pleasant.

Wednesday - Two ten-foot sections of the strut channel are stuck to the roof after cleaning the roof and the metal strut channel with acetone. I used high-strength outdoor-rated VHB tape. I then sealed the inside of the strut channel with 1” wide strips of Eternabond tape. Then, I ran some Dicor along the sides of the channel to protect the edges of the VHB tape. I still want to run screws into the roof joists but their location is somewhat elusive. 

I started working on this at ~7:30am, and by noon, it was way too hot. I’ll start on the roof penetration for the wiring tomorrow morning. And I’m still waiting for a cooling fan. The Magnum inverter complained about temperatures as well. The transformer hit 250°F when the unit shut down. I have a fan blowing into the compartment right now. I think a cooling fan is needed to help reduce the temperature in that compartment. 

Thursday - I finally got the roof entry fitting installed. The roof looks to be only about 2" total. I'm thinking that for the unistrut along the roof edge, I may try using ¼" bolts through the roof. It'll be cooler in a couple of days. The 10AWG wire is currently run into the compartment and I did manage to find some latch duct at the local Ace Hardware to kind of protect the wire in the vertical run from the upper cabinet to the dinette bench where the rest of the electrical upgrade is located. The 12V fan and vents arrived from Amazon this evening. Tomorrow's project.

It was 94°F, and I didn't really feel like cooking anything. I decided to try out one of the Chinese buffets in Hondo. I wasn't expecting much. It really wasn't that bad. Not great, but not as bad as I was led to believe. 

More Class C Mods

Friday - It looks like we dodged another one. The storm is moving northeast. Harlingen got hammered with over a foot of rain in this one storm. 

Saturday - The receiver on the class C is a couple of inches higher than the class A so I picked up a 2” drop receiver extension from Amazon. The tow bar is almost perfectly level and the additional distance from the rear bumper should help on sharp turns. The extension is solid steel (not a tube) and rated at 10k pounds which is more than the hitch or the tow bar. Plus, we could add a bike rack and still tow the Jeep.

I tried the setup down Hwy 90 and you can definitely feel the additional weight when accelerating or braking. On the class A, you can’t tell anything is back there. I ended up disassembling the Ready Brake mechanism as it was pretty filthy from the 25k miles of use behind the oil spewing RV. 

I turned on the Multiplus to see how much power it uses with nothing running as this would be the norm. I initially noticed that it was drawing 15amps. This was the converter charging the AGM battery. I turned off the breaker for the converter.

It was a hot, humid day today and we ended up having dinner at Cowboys in D’Hanis. I was too tired to cook tonight.

Generator Charging Test

Thursday - After watching a YouTube video last night where some friends upgraded the electrical system in their RV and while on their shakedown trip,they discovered that their house batteries weren’t being charged from their generator, I figured that I should test try this out.

I started the generator on the class C and turned on the Multiplus (inverter/charger). From the screen shot, you can see the generator was putting out 868watts and 54.3amps were charging the house battery (SOK LiFePO4). The AC out was the converter which was charging the original AGM house battery. 

There was 5.02amps going into the AGM battery which is around 68 watts. A few minutes later, it jumped up to around 15amps. I turned off the generator after around 5 minutes of run time. 

One surprise to me was that the Multiplus needs to be running to allow any AC power into the RV. Not really an issue as it will probably be running all the time while the RV is being used. 

This is the SmartShunt showing the battery voltage and current. The AGM battery voltage is shown at the bottom labeled as “Starter battery”. As I mentioned before, the AGM battery is used to start and run the generator only. 

Spring Storms

Monday - Around 9pm yesterday, there was a severe storm advisory and the radar showed a storm to the north. High winds, hail to 1.25” possible, and moving southeast at ~25mph. I moved things into our shed and watch the Texas Storm Chasers YouTube channel for the next hour and a half. The northern sky was lit up by the lightning. Around 10:30, the radar showed that we would be spared. 

The news this morning showed the damage in Kerrville, a larger town about an hour north and a little east of here. Damaged roofs, vehicles, glass. Other parts of Texas were hit by the storms. They also got up to an inch and a half of rain resulting in flash flooding. 

My only activity today was my annual visit to the clinic to get my prescriptions renewed. 

Tuesday - I didn’t get much done today. I tried using the stud finder on the roof of the class C and it was very inconsistent. Maybe the battery needs to be replaced. The new mattress from Brooklyn Bedding finally arrived today. We had ordered it from the store in Casa Grande to be delivered here. It took almost 3½ weeks to get here. 

The 2/0 cable for chassis ground arrived today. I may install it this afternoon. This will finish up the wiring on the inverter/charger. One other task is moving the positive cable on the stock converter to the original house battery. This will allow the converter to charge the original battery whenever we are plugged into shore power or running the generator. 

Wednesday - Today, I rerouted the positive wire from the stock converter to the original AGM house battery. I also connected the alternate battery wire from the Victron SmartShunt to this battery. The only function this battery performs is starting and running the 4.5KW generator. It can also be used to jump start the engine using the dash mounted switch.