Portable Generator Enclosure
We've got USB power here, a 5 volt 1 amp and a 5 volt 2.1
amp USB port, of course a 12-volt outlet here and on the AC side What I've
installed, you'll see how that works in a bit, is an AC voltmeter and ammeter
and that gives me an indication that power is on here and also is very
important because theammeter tells me how many amps I'm drawing out of the system
using various appliances and that's very importand when you're developing your
solar power budget for solar power generated during the day versus solar power
being utilized from the system.
I've installed some Leviton weatherproof covers
to my 110 AC outlets here and swinging back around to the back side. what I'll show you is that this is all turned
on using a master battery switch, that's been installed here. It is keyed. sp
we will install that key and power up the AC side of the system. You'll see
here that when you turn that switch on I does power up a digital thermometer.
There's a sensor inside that tells you what the internal temperature the case
is, so we can monitor whether or not we need to activate the fans. There's two
fans on the back that push air in and draw air out to the case to keep the AC
DC inverter cool. They are powered up if needed by this switch. And we'll turn
that off so that.
we can better hear each other. But I only use that if it is
absolutely necessary and that helps to conserve some power. So back to the
front of the case again...What you see is that now our AC voltmeter and ammeter
is powered up indicating that there is power again to these outlets, right now
showing 109 volts and 0 amps being drawn. Let's go to the inside of the case.
The case is pretty rugged, a nice top with some handles that latch it down.
We can remove this top completely and on the inside what
you're gonna see is a 400 watt pure sine wave inverter and a 30 amp solar
charge controller. On the the deck or on this tray the keeps these appliances
or these accessories up out of the battery compartment I've installed also an emergency
light that could be useful during camping if absolutely necessary. There are
handles here that allow you take this tray out....
allow air to circulate through the top portion of the case as well as through the bottom. I am going
to show you how this whole thing comes apart and what the inside looks like. We
simply the disconnect the AC power cord from the top tray and the whole thing
and be lifted out and put behind the unit. I've basically used two batteries,
they are wired in parallel. 2AWG wire cables here are to transfer power back
and forth between the batteries. I've installed a divider and something of a
deck underneath as well. there's some framing that will keep the batteries in
place and keep them from moving around. The wire gauges here range from smallest
18 gauge right up to the 2 gauge and quite a few different wire sizes
in-between.
I did consult with a friend who is an electrical engineer
for safety purposes, had to make sure things were wired properly and safe. And
to protect all the the components there's probably no lesson well five
different fuses in this system ranging from a ANL 50 amp fuse here between the
inverter and the the battery and a host of other inline fuses such as this one,
a 30 amp fuse between the solar charge controller and the batteries. There are
a number of other fuses running in the lines between power sources, AC, DC and
outlets. There is another way to charge the system up. I did buy a trickle
charger that had an SAE port and simply ran the cable that came with that
through the wall of this case and then out under the handle so that this is
protected from the elements.
An SAE 2-pin port mates up here to trickle charge this whole
system so that it's ready to go in the event of an emergency. Again, it
generates 110 amp hours, cost about $950 dollars and I'm gonna be really
excited to use this again with the 100 watt panel. This should allow it to
charge at a rate of about 5 amp hours. So that is my project. I hope everybody
enjoyed it and again I want to thank everybody who posted on their projects so
that we could benefit from their knowledge and build our own.
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