Hi,
I am currently converting a van to a campervan and I am currently designing the electrical system. My estimation for a full day consumption is around 250Ah @12V. I was considering installing 640W of solar panels with 320Ah of battery. But to ease the initial investment I want to be able to initially install only 320W of solar panel and a 160Ah battery.
My requirements are in line with the general requirements for this kind of application, batteries to be charger by solar power, shore power and alternator.
After some research on Victron website I got this list of critical items:
Initial setup:
- 2x 160W-12V Mono 1480x673×35mm series 3a
- 1x LiFePO4 battery 12,8V/160Ah - Smart
- 1x SmartSolar MPPT 150/45
- 1x MultiPlus 12/3000/120-16
- 1x VE.Bus BMS
- 1x Smart BatteryProtect 12/24V 65A
- 1x Cyrix-Li-ct 12/24V-120A combiner
- 1x BMV-712 Smart
Upgrade:
- 2x 160W-12V Mono 1480x673×35mm series 3a
- 1x LiFePO4 battery 12,8V/160Ah – Smart (in parallel with the first one)
Any advice regarding my setup?
- I considered the use of a Multiplus instead of a charger + inverter, is it the recommended approach for this kind of builds?
- Are the monocrystalline solar panels recomended for this kind of application instead of the polycrystalline?
- Is there any component on this list that is optional for this kind of setup? Or any critical component that I missed out?
- Can I mount to lithium batteries in parallel, considering that they will have different characteristics? The second one could be bought years after the first one.
- Is this setup valid if I use AGM batteries instead of lithium batteries?
- The use of only one smart battery defeats the purpose of a BMV-712 Smart? Is the same information available is a connect to the Bluetooth of the battery?
- How can I extract the raw information of all these devices to a server running in the van?
Thank you.