Inverter and Surge Protector

[ttrott712]

Looking for recommendations for getting a surge protector. The dealer recommended the:
Hughes Power Dog 30 Amp Smart Surge Protector + EPO

Also, need ideas for an inverter. I believe I can install that myself.

Thanks

[sahively]

Nothing wrong with the Hughes. Good value in that unit for certain. Regarding the inverter though, that's not a simple "buy this one, not that one" answer. First, why do you want an inverter (what do you plan to power?)? Have you already determined location and researched the wiring requirements? We can toss out respected brand names but a little more info would get you a lot better recommendations.

[jasin1]

Originally Posted by ttrott712

Looking for recommendations for getting a surge protector. The dealer recommended the:
Hughes Power Dog 30 Amp Smart Surge Protector + EPO

Also, need ideas for an inverter. I believe I can install that myself.

Thanks

I like the progressive industries ems..I have the 50 amp version….here is the 30 amp ..some people get the hardwired version

I’d check on the Don Rowe website for inverters…I have the xantrex 2000x
I like to stick with reputable brands…they can answer any questions and have all the supplies to go with it

[ttrott712]

Thanks for the feedback about the surge protector.
As far as an inverter goes, I'm mainly concerned about having the 110 outlets functioning.
We won't need the air conditioner or microwave so much as I would need to have my wife's CPap working if we weren't at a full hookup site. What would be the minimum watt unit that I could get away with? As long as I'm asking, how big would I need to go to run the A/C and/or microwave? Is that even possible? Are you sensing any level of obliviousness?

[pasayten]

Originally Posted by ttrott712

As long as I'm asking, how big would I need to go to run the A/C and/or microwave? Is that even possible? Are you sensing any level of obliviousness?

We have a 2021 Cougar that came with the 2000 watt Xantrex... Plenty big enough to handle a CPAP... I would forget thinking about the inverter running a microwave or a/c... Too much for standard battery pack confogurations to support.

[JRTJH]

Originally Posted by ttrott712

Thanks for the feedback about the surge protector.
As far as an inverter goes, I'm mainly concerned about having the 110 outlets functioning.
We won't need the air conditioner or microwave so much as I would need to have my wife's CPap working if we weren't at a full hookup site. What would be the minimum watt unit that I could get away with? As long as I'm asking, how big would I need to go to run the A/C and/or microwave? Is that even possible? Are you sensing any level of obliviousness?

I posted this in another thread a few days ago:

TimC brings up a valid point. You simply can't rely on "inverted battery power" to operate any RV with the same level of power use that you enjoy while connected to shore power. I suppose you "can" if your wallet is so thick you need a separate trailer to drag that cash behind your trailer, but for most people, that's not only impractical, it's foolish....

Battleborn addressed one aspect of "battery power vs shore power" this way"

For example, a 100 Ah lithium battery will power a typical 15,000 BTU RV AC unit for about 30 minutes. If you’re RVing in hot weather, running your AC for 30 minutes likely won’t do much to increase your comfort. However, if you had a bank of eight 100 Ah batteries, it would run for about four hours.

https://battlebornbatteries.com/run-...20four%20hours.

When you consider that a single battery costs around $1000, then the cost of battery power to run an RV air conditioner for 4 hours would be around $8000. To run it for 8 hours, $16,000. And that doesn't include the cost of the solar system to recharge those batteries....

So, attempting to run a trailer on battery power, for almost everyone, will require some significant "soul searching" to determine exactly what is required, what can be turned off when on battery power and just how hot it can get before we break out the generator to run the air conditioner because we can't justify $30K for a "DC power system and solar system to operate it full time"...

Most people "compromise on resources" when dry camping. Fewer showers (limited water and limited gray tank space), fewer lights, more cooked meals rather than microwaved meals, less TV, no A/C and no fireplace/electric heaters"....

So, take stock on what you "can't live without" and what you "don't need to be comfortable" and make a list of the amount of power you'll use, the amount of money you can spend and then "mesh the two to reach your desired system"... If you can justify that expense, great, but for most, there's a significant cost that can't be justified to even attempt to "dry camp on the weekends with all the electrical equipment we have at home."

So, to run the air for 8 hours is $16K, then 24 hours is 16x3 or $48K and that doesn't include the microwave..... So, for most, running the air is not only "out of the question" it's "generator time or just sweat"...

As for your wife's CPAP, if it's a ResMed system, and she can do without the heated hose and humidity option, you can get a DC to DC converter to plug into a 12 volt battery system that will run the CPAP 2 or 3 days on a single charge on a "standard wet cell battery", so significantly longer on a larger battery or on a lithium option... It all comes down to just doing the math on watts required for items desired and watts available from the battery choice.

[ttrott712]

Thanks everybody for the input. Honestly. if this unit didn't have A/C, microwave or even an awning, I would have bought it. The layout is exactly what we wanted. Naturally, when you see all the toys that came with it, you want to explore. An inverter that runs the outlets is all I want and I don't necessarily need that. Finding the exact model will be my next project. That and finding one I can install myself.

[sahively]

I'd look for a "pure sine wave" inverter in the 2000-2500 watt range. As others mentioned, don't bother trying an air conditioner but know that I do run my microwave for a couple minutes each night with mine (I gotta warm some corn or beans, man!). Mainly we use ours so we can have family movie night though. Pure sine wave inverters will cost you more but anything electronic you plug in will thank you. TV's are iffy on modified sine wave and microwaves run like pure garbage.

The tricky thing you'll need to consider though is "how" to wire it in. Many of us use a transfer switch either auto switches to inverter power when shore power isn't active or (as in my case) auto switches to inverter power whenever the inverter is turned on. Your comfort with electrical will dictate how crazy you want to get. Some folks simply wire the inverter to the battery and then plug their cpaps, etc right into the inverter. That's far simpler but then you're not powering any of your RV outlets (and you probably don't need 2000 watts then either).

[MarkEHansen]

You may do better to just determine what you really need to run. If you don't need to run the microwave, no sense in powering it's outlet using an inverter. Same for the air conditioning. Now, just go down the rest of the list and see what you really need.

The only think in our trailer that wanted 120v power were the CPAPs and the TV. I purchased DC power cords for the CPAPs and a small 300watt inverter for the TV.

Everything else runs from battery and/or propane.

In those rare cases where I need to run something at 120v, I have a portable generator - but so far, I've not needed it.

[TimC]

How much money are you willing to spend? If the main goal is just to run a cpap maybe just get a small inverter, wire it up to the batteries, and run an extension cord? Another thing I used to do was put my inverter in the pass through when I needed it, have wires run outside to plug into the battery, and then plug the shore power into the inverter. That’ll power all outlets, but you’ll still be limited by the size of the inverter and battery power you have. But could be an easy-ish way to do it if you only occasionally need it (you’ll still want to fuse the DC side even if you’re not going to have it permanently installed).

But, if you want to be able to run high draw appliances like a microwave and AC that can be done fairly easily. It’ll just take some money. I wanted my rig to cool down today while I loaded it up for this weekends trip so I ran my ac off my batteries for a few hours tonight. Brought it from 95 to 75 so I wouldn’t be sweating like crazy while putting things away in there. But, my setup has a lot of lithium battery power and a 3,000 watt inverter hardwired into my entire system. It was pretty expensive and a lot more involved than I think it would be worth for occasional cpap use. But, just know it is possible to run ac and microwaves off of battery power. Microwave quite easily to be honest, but even with my larger system I’m still quite limited on how long I could run the ac (9 to 10 hrs).

Maybe another option if it’s just about the cpap would be to get a 12v unit. I know nothing about cpaps but I thought I’ve seen something like that mentioned in a few posts here.

[Javi]

My inverter is pure sine wave and auto pass through 1000 watt with 2000 watt surge

[solv3nt]

I just installed a hardwired Progressive Industries 30A EMS. I haven't fired it up yet, but I've read positive reviews.

[ttrott712]

Thanks Tim. As my father always said "convenience costs money". Really, I would like to be able to just have the 110 outlets working. Originally, I thought I could do this myself. But it seems a little to complex for my truck driver mentality. I could have the dealer install but they want like $1,100 for a 1,000 watt unit, installed. I can afford it I just don't want to afford it. We'll be fine at campgrounds with power and maybe I can feed off fellow campers.

[jxnbbl]

We just came back from a long trip where we occasionally stay at Harvest Host sites and don't like running the generator when we don't need AC. Im presently installing a 2000W inverter but we took a 800/1000W surge that we use for tailgating wired to jumper cables....this worked fine for this trip as didn't have time to wire up the other inverter (and I have some open questions that I'm going through).


I've used the Progressive 30A ems that I'm going to sell on craiglist. It was fine/worked perfectly. We have a 50A trailer now with the watchdog. I only got this due to the bluetooth capabilities. This too has worked fine.

[TimC]

Originally Posted by ttrott712

Thanks Tim. As my father always said "convenience costs money". Really, I would like to be able to just have the 110 outlets working. Originally, I thought I could do this myself. But it seems a little to complex for my truck driver mentality. I could have the dealer install but they want like $1,100 for a 1,000 watt unit, installed. I can afford it I just don't want to afford it. We'll be fine at campgrounds with power and maybe I can feed off fellow campers.

Yup, it definitely does cost money.

Another thing to point out is that the inverter is only part of the equation. No point in installing a big inverter if you don’t have battery power to run it. So, sounds to me that a system like this isn’t for you.

I’m curious, do you (or anyone here) know the amount of power a cpap takes? Maybe another solution to that is getting a small inverter that plugs into a 12v outlet. That could be an easy solution IF you have 12v outlets in the right spot and if the draw of a cpap is relatively low.

[wrvond]

Originally Posted by ttrott712

Thanks everybody for the input. Honestly. if this unit didn't have A/C, microwave or even an awning, I would have bought it. The layout is exactly what we wanted. Naturally, when you see all the toys that came with it, you want to explore. An inverter that runs the outlets is all I want and I don't necessarily need that. Finding the exact model will be my next project. That and finding one I can install myself.

The absolute easiest way to approach this and achieve what you are looking for is to just upgrade your existing SolarFlex 200 to the SolarFlex 400i or even 600i.
Neither of these are going to run your air conditioner because the wiring for the A/C isn't installed unless the camper is factory equipped with the SolarFlex 400i.

If you look at Keystone's information pages on the various SolarFlex packages available, they identify the components by manufacturer and even model number. Your SolarFlex 200 is "prewired" for an inverter, which means a loop of Nomex is available near the MPPT in the pass through. But you're right, it really isn't too difficult to upgrade your system once you've identified how far you want to go.

Here you will find links to troubleshooting guides, quick start guides and FAQs for all the SolarFlex systems.
https://www.keystonerv.com/owners-manuals

Edit: Here is a link to the Xantrex Freedom XC 2000 which Keystone uses in the 400i SolarFlex system. On this page you'll find all kinds of information, including additional parts required and optional:
https://xantrex.com/power-products/i...reedom-xc.aspx

[rlh1957]

Hughes Power Dog
30A or 50A models are both good. Our RV is 50A

If we use a dogbone connector and plug in to a 20A 110V receptacle it will keep the batteries charged and we can run TV, coffee maker, etc. No AC, no Electric HW heater. Might be able to run fridge on Electric.

The inverter depends on what all you want to power.
The length or duration of DC power coming to inverter depends on your battery Amp Hour Capacity.
A 1500W or 3000W inverter doesn’t do much good for very long if you only have 50 - 100 Amp Hours from your batteries.

It’s more involved than just saying get this snd that.
More information is needed, ie: what you already have and what you hope to accomplish.