Charging   

                                                                          

There are 4 main ways of charging your van batteries, Solar, Generator, mains supply, and from your vehicle.

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Vehicle charging

In today’s world, car charging systems use "alternators" to charge the car battery. A car battery is made up differently internally to the common AGM battery found in caravan’s and alternators charge a cars lead acid battery  by putting amps back into them but for fuel economy reasons they are designed to reduce the amps going back into the batteries the more charged they get. As a result car batteries are never %100 charged and at most they only ever get %80 charged. So trying to charge a caravan battery back to %100 using just a alternator would never work which is why when towing a caravan and wanting to charge a battery we use DC DC chargers which work by taking a reduced supply of amps from the alternator (say a variable 10 -20amps or less amps) and turning that into a constant 30amps.

That constant 30 amps allows 30 amps of electricity to go back into the battery per hour until it reaches %100 charged not %80 charged like a alternator on its own would do. %80 charge of a set of 240ah batteries = roughly 50amps short which is a lot when relying on power from batteries to be off grid to keep the beer cold.

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Charge time

                                                     

Charging batteries takes time, the more amps you can put back into it the quicker it charges (but not too much that you overheat the batteries).

 

Example: Our caravan down to %50 flat means its 180amps short.

 

180a / 15a = 12 hours to charge at 15amps or 6 hours @30amps.

 

This could mean the difference between running a generator for 12 hours to charge batteries or 6 hours to achieve the same thing dependent on the charger. Now’s a good time to mention you’ll read a lot about people complaining about other travelers that use generators in public areas. I agree with those that complain to a certain extent but everyone's situation is different so some may use a generator for medical reasons others may use them purely cause they can't afford a solar set up, each to their own but end of the day it's all about doing what you have to but be considerate.

 The peace and quiet of a solar panel by far makes for a relaxing time away rather than listening to noisy generators chewing fuel in the background and it costs nothing to turn the sun on.

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