Gasless motorhomes

Bailey made an all electric Orion caravan a few years back (i think it was a silver colour) only made for a couple of years as it did not sell (too radical?)

My 2-way compressor fridge states in the specs a draw of 5 Amps!  Although I assume this is only when the compressor kicks in (obviously dependant upon ambient temperature and number of times door opens). Nevertheless, my 100 Watt SP and 2 x 120amp FLA batteries struggle to last more than 24hrs!

I think a good rule of thumb is that solar capacity should equal battery capacity. i.e. 100w for each 100A although that probably only applies in the summer months. Shoulder season, the ratio should be 2 to 1 and winter - don't even think about it.

Many off-grid folks will move frequently so adding a 2nd leisure battery can be very beneficial charging batteries at about 9Ah via the alternator - combined with additional solar gain it significantly increases your options.

I would imaging these days that 'off grid folk' might be charging their lithium batteries with a 30 amp (or more) battery to battery charger for a super quick refill...

similarly, regarding the fridge fuel, it's certainly possible now to have excess solar power where batteries are topped up by mid morning....then what happens to all that juice?

with some regulators, a signal (similar to the D+ signal from an alternator) can be sent to the 3-way fridge to switch over automatically to 12v...

should batteries reduce to a specified level, the switching signal is removed and the fridge switches back to gas...best of both?

Lithium systems are eye wateringly expensive….I’m not sure how common they are at the moment, but that will obviously change over time as applications expand. For my current circumstances it wouldn’t make economic sense unless money was no object. There can also be some potential issues with charging voltages from alternators and mains chargers that need to be addressed before getting your credit card out.

Yes, I can't get the enthusiasm for those prices (yet) and am sticking to my pretty darn faithful AGMs....although I have added two extra 100w panels to my roof and now have 300w (and flashy new regulator) ...relatively small cost compared to a 'serious' battery upgrade..

the thing is, once you get those lithiums you simply 'must have' a B2B charger and a new, larger inverter and a switchover module which will power all the 230v sockets..