Solar power for your caravan or motor home

There are very few caravans, motor homes or campsites left that don't have solar power of some sort.

A typical system would work like this:

  • You should fit solar panels to the roof of the vehicle
  • These would feed to a solar regulator
  • This would connect to a deep cycle battery separate from the vehicle starting battery
  • The battery would also be charged by the vehicle when the vehicle engine was running

The size and number of the solar panels would be determined by how often the vehicle was driven. if you say drove every day then only stopped overnight, no solar panels would be required. The battery would simply be charged by the vehicle.

Vehicle battery charging requires a bit of consideration and may require the replacement of the vehicles alternator regulator. Most vehicles have an alternator designed not to overcharge the starting battery on a long road trip. Unfortunately this can be a limitation when you connect to a deep cycle battery because the deep cycle battery does not get charged to a sufficiently high voltage to ensure it is full. This can be overcome by occasional charging with a quality battery charger or fitting a solar panel to maintain the battery when the vehicle is not in use.

Solar panels fitted toa motor home

The problems I see with mobile power is only in a lack of understanding about how it works and how much power can be used. Nothing like a bit of education to fix things here. If you want a decent solar system for your caravan or motor home or whatever then you really should understand how it all works and goes together. Troubleshooting on the road will then be easy!

Our book "Renewable Energy" provides information suited to mobile solar applications.

Click here for more info on this book!