Hi all! I am from Austria and just started to build my Van’s (2). While i repair the one to sell it as soon as possible, i also refurbish the other one to live in it. Well - i actually live in it since 3 weeks.
I joined to read and talk about how things work and fit together. Electricity is one of my weak-point’s while furniture is my profession. I also plan to build a mobile-outdoor-expandable-carpentry-workspace into my actual car to build things for myself and for others too if needed. At any place.
I broke with common life to explore the unknown, looking for adventures, nice ppl, and much more - all the thing’s i did not found yet. Life 's to short to be sad - world 's to small to be mad.
Send me a message if you like so. - Have a good time everybody.
Welcome to the forum. Here is something I wrote to help people with installing a battery solar electrical system. It can be adapted to whatever you need. I hope it helps.
Yes this helps a lot for orientation. I will take a closer look and study when the night comes and evaluate the needed power for all the machines i wanna run. Some of them, like 2 raspberries and a cubietruck, a router, 2 monitors, a laptop, charging-devices i need to run at most 24/7.
My current car is a real Campingmobile Fiat Ducato LMC-build from 1989 with full accessible roof, built in shower and toilet, fridge and a stove to cook. It has an option to connect it to external power aswell there is a orange box to split the charging-order when driving or external supply. But all the other electronics where removed by the preowner. So the fridge does work but the orange box starts klicking after “random” time with random speed. Always less than a second. Sometimes 2 klicks per/s sometimes up to 4. Then i start running to pull the power-connector. And the fridge does not work on battery. I have one installed right under copilot-seat and one uuhmm… where the engine is. So how do i get started from this point? I wanna know what that orange box does when it starts klicking and if the thing is working. Is the problem bound to the fact there is no control-panel above the door? What should be in here? There is net even a water pump at the moment but a water tank is installed. If fits 120L.
There’s no telling what the previous owner/builder did in terms of electrical, so I cannot answer what the orange box is for, but it may be a switching device between shore and battery power - and/or a battery isolator. The clicking you describe is probably relays (or a relay) to switch between power sources. You’ll have to figure out what’s being powered (1) when the engine is running, (2) while running only on battery, and (3) while connected to shore power.
You’ll also have to calculate how much total power you need, so you can establish an electrical budget.
You can try to figure out what’s already there, but if it was not correctly installed, malfunctioning, or of low quality it might be better to start from new.
Ok. So what i can tell at the moment is that there is nothing running with or without shore power. ONLY the fridge is running at shore power only, not on battery and not on Gas - where i am glad because i have to build a new gas-connector 30/50mb and need to get gas acceptance test first before i would try things out. But no lights and so on are working at the moment. Not on battery aswell as on shore power. I will come up with pictures as soon as i removed all the furniture to open the walls and the floor. I am pretty sure to agree with you and get me a new power-supply in total. Because there is no control panel. So all the cables are coming out at that point. Nothing is connected but there is a lot inside. Some things i already know. But havent seen where all the cables connected to. And there is no stress. I will spend pretty much all the sunny days for the next 2 weeks to get my Transit done and after that my head is free for my actual home. Then i also have budget to get all the things which are needed. Main thing is: What is needed? I am doing pictures soon and do a calculation of electrical budget. Somewhere within the next 2 Weeks i need to know what to buy and then lets have an installation-party.
Thank you so much for your answers and help. I got me that pdf meanwhile and have to walk through it tonight.