With anything I carry in the RV, it’s nice when it can perform more than one function. Such is the case for my FoodSaver vacuum sealer–it gets used regularly preparing food for the freezer, and for cooking sous vide. But it also falls in the “tool” category as well. How’s that? Well, it’s actually a…
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Replacing PowerTech Generator Mounts
Last time, I briefly mentioned that the mounts on my generator were in need of replacement. You can see in the picture below that the rubber had deteriorated quite a bit, and was an oozy, greasy mess. PowerTech sells a replacement mount for my generator, but at over $60 each, plus shipping, I felt it…
More 12-volt Tweaks — Computer Power Supply
I mentioned last time that I wasn’t happy with the efficiency of the 12V power supply I installed for running the lights, water pump, furnace, and a few other smaller items. How bad was it? Well, putting out 2 amps at 12.3V, it was drawing 52W from the wall outlet. That’s less than 50% efficiency,…
More Electrical Changes
Last time I talked about this project, I left you hanging with the lead acid batteries from the old house power system gone, and the generator connected to the chassis batteries. But I didn’t have anything hooked up to power the remaining 12V house loads–things like the furnace, water heater, water pump, slide out motor,…
Which batteries should start the generator?
Ok–fair warning up front: this post is probably going to sound like a little bit of a rant. One of the high-current 12V loads I needed to figure out how to power as part of the 48V lithium-ion project was the generator, and if you’ve been following the lithium house battery project, you already know…
Windows Updates and Reducing Data Usage, Especially with Multiple Devices
Let’s face it–most full-time RVs have more than one electronic device running Windows. While there are certainly some that stick to Apple (pricey) or Linux operating systems (free!), this post will hopefully be useful to those of you wishing to squeeze the most out of your data plans.
Time to unload some dead weight!
And by that, I’m talking about the rest of the old 12V to its final resting place–getting rid of the 6V batteries, and re-purposing the spot they’ll leave behind. Sounds simple enough, doesn’t it?
Line Splitter to go with Clamp-On Meter
Last time, I forgot to mention one thing you’ll want to have to go with the clamp-on meter–a line splitter for plugging in to standard 15-amp outlets. What does this do? It breaks out the line wire to where you can clamp around it by itself. Without getting too far into the details, the clamp-on…
My New Favorite Multimeter, and Measuring Inverter and Charging Efficiency
A little while back, I posted a short writeup on a plug-in ammeter I’ve used to measure current on circuits with standard ATO blade-style fuses. When running through trying to find out which circuits have loads on them, it’s still as easy as it gets, especially when you don’t have good access to the wiring….
Having a Little Fun with Lithium Batteries
This amounts to a bit of a side project, but provides a platform for really testing what the Volt lithium ion batteries are capable of. You can tell by the image above that I’m talking about putting lithium ion batteries, from a Chevy Volt, into a golf cart. Why not just replace the lead acid…