I’m on the road, new improvements have been made and the adventure is on.
Ambo by drone! 
Microwave and second inverter installed 
privacy curtains 
blackouts that connect by magnet 
Lagun rotating adjusting table
Tag Archives: solar
Making Changes
Winter is thawing and it was time to get some projects done on the Ambo. Up first is a proper swinging table, and getting the solar put in. I went with a victron mppt charge controller so I can get stats over bluetooth and a Canadian solar CS6P-250PX-ZEP 250watt panel to start. Future improvements will likely be more 100w renogy panels on a separate controller so I can utilize external panels when boondocking for a power boost. My first battery is a crappy deep cycle lead acid but I plan to upgrade to 100 ah lifepo4 lithium down the road. At this point I just need to get the rig up so I can hit the road.
The raw components out and getting ready to be wired 
Solar on the roof with super 3m 5200, its never coming off. 
New ladder is on so I can get to the roof! 
Bed deployed and wood wall is up 
bed stowed and interior shot
Solar panels!
Solar power is essential to me in a trailer. I went with 2 175 watt panels and four 6v deep cycle trojan 105 batteries. I added a distro box for the DC and the ac is ran independant with the ability to plug it into the xantrex 2000 watt inverter if needed.
wiring coming along (wasnt done yet)
inverter mount and trimetric meter
after insulation
2×4 mounts to the steel girder underneith
the exposed black struts are what the mounts attach to for reference. my wood slats are to attach the insulation
mounts have hinges for future angle tweaking
mounted and 3 way splitters installed for a future panel addition. panels are lag bolted into the 2x4s on custom aluminum L brackets
Solar!
Here is the preliminary rundown on my solar rig for the curious.
The gear I’ve got is
2 sunmodule mono 250 watt pv pannels (roughly 250 watts @ 31 volts each for a combined total of 500 watts @ 31 volts)
4 trojan t105 deep cycle golf cart batteries (6volt @ 225 amp/h in pairs for a total of 450 amp/hr @ 12 volts)
a xantrex C35 charge controller (upgrading to a mppt charge controller soon for better yields)
a prosine prowatt 2000 watt invertor for 110 ac in the rv
a trimetric meter to monitor the energy usage and battery levels
all LED lighting in the house (uses less than an amp when all the lights in the whole rv are on) and a holiday chest freezer with a fridgemate relay keeping it at fridge temps so it kicks on maybe 5 minutes every other hour or so (only uses about 14 amps when it does)
Here are some photos
This is the battery bank and charge controller area the trimetric meter is mounted on the wall
the prowatt invertor and the red switch is for switching to current from the alternator for charging the bank
the panels and ghetto mounting system (and former owner)
thats the basic rundown of my rig. once I upgrade to a mppt (maximum power point tracking) charge controller I’m going to output the log data up here so I can keep track of the solar yields.
New Project 1975 Dodge Sportsman Tioga
And the website is born.
1975 Dodge Sportsman chassis Tioga Motorhome
360 v8 engine
500 watts of sunmodule solar cells on top
450 amp hours worth of trojan deep cycle batteries in the house
Xantrex (soon to be a mppt) charge controller
Prosine 2000 watt invertor for my 110 needs.
It all starts as a dream. I’ve always wanted independence, it started by leaving home for california on pretty much a whim. I’ll find work, I’ll figure it out. And I did. 8 months of grinding at a 4 star hotel later, and I’m looking at my options. I can keep paying half my take home pay in rent, or I can figure out a way out. After searching craigslist endlessly, I find her, a old beast that needs a bunch of work but is already well on her way to being a boondockers dream. This is the story of fixing her up and the adventures that follow.