RE: Refrigerator, battery, and a long trip?

[CoronaCamper]

 
We are traveling from southern California to Yellowstone in late June. I will be charging the battery with a charger before we go. We will be stopping the first nite in Utah at a motel. If we buy the groceries in So. California before we leave, the refrigerator will be running the first night on the battery. To conserve power would it be better to buy our cold supplies in Idaho before we enter Yellowstone. I want to arive in Yellowstone with a fully charged battery, since we will be in the park for 6 days with no hookups. We will need the battery to run the refrigerator and the heater. What advice can anyone offer?

[Honeybee]

 CoronaCamper
Use your refrigerator while its set on propane, no need to drain the battery at all. Just use the battery to cool it while you are in route.

[Red neff Barchetta]

 CoronaCamper
If I m understanding you correctly, you only have 1 battery and will be dry camping (no hook-up s) for 6 days, right?  If I m wrong, then you can stop reading now, ha.
 Your battery will never last that long if you will use the heater and lights much at all.  Are you staying at a campground with bathroom s with electricity?  If so, buy a battery charger (do a search here on PUT) and charge your battery in the bathroom while you are at the campground during the day and can make sure nobody takes it.  Make sure you set it out of a childs reach while it is charging btw.  Even better would be to buy a second battery also so you always have power to the PU.
 Your furnace blower will not run once your voltage drops in the battery.
 While camping, use the fridge on propane.  While towing, use the 12 volt option, but turn it off if stopping for more than 45 minutes as it will drain your TV battery really quickly.
 Sorry I have to run, but I m sure others will explain this stuff to you more.  If your dealer gave you the idea that your battery would work that long without a charge, sorry to hear that.
 Finally, your PU will never fully charge your battery up to 13 volts btw.  You need a charger.
 I just realized that you might not have a fridge that can run on propane as you don t list your PU in your signature.  In this case, you will definitely need a second battery and somewhere to charge them while in Yellowstone.

[mike4947]

 CoronaCamper
I can tell you from experience if you try and get 9-11 hours of fridge running out of a battery you ll have a dead battery by morning.
 5-6 days of even JUST heater operation at nights is pushing it for the normal PU battery. The fridge is OUT of the question. 12 volt is only intended for towing applications and then powered by the TV s alternator not a PU battery. Remember it s a propane fridge with 110 voltAC and 12 voltDC heaters added on. When stopped for over an hour fire it up on propane. Besides it cools best on propane.
 
 An example 3 way fridge averages 8-12 amps/hour. Ten hours needs 80-120 amps. Now you might think that 134 amp hour battery would run all night but as you use amps the voltage drops and as the voltage drops the amperage draw increases. See formular [ watts = amps x volts]
 Not to mention to get a USEFUL amount of amperage for a battery take the reserve amp capacity and divide by 2.4  That s the amount of amps you can draw before the voltage drops to the point it won t run things anymore and the battery is discharged to the point you are then actually damaging it.
 
 Here s a site where you can really learn about batteries and the 12 volt side of your PU.
 http://bart.ccis.com/home/mnemeth/12volt/12volt.htm
 http://bart.ccis.com/home/mnemeth/12volt/12volta.htm
 
 These are must reading for any one dry camping with a battery.
 
 PS: take along that battery charger and an extension cord to recharge where ever you can. The TV s alternator won t fully charge up the PU no matter how far you drive and the converter s (if available) built in charger is even worse.

[Red neff Barchetta]

 CoronaCamper
Thanks for the links Mike!  I just book-marked them.
 I ve been looking for those for a while now with no luck.

[Opie431]

 CoronaCamper
Not about batteries but take extra blankets for campging in Yellowstone, nights can be cold any time of the year.  If you use sleeping bags just layer blankets on top.  When we were there we found othat our new Coleman sleeping bags did not keep us warm at 27 degrees much less the ten they were rated for.  
 Take a good ice chest and keep drinks and things in that so you are not opeing the refrigerator all of the time.  Last time we camped I put an insulated " blanket"  over ours and the ice stayed even longer then it usually did.

[AustinBoston]

 CoronaCamper

ORIGINAL:  CoronaCamper
 
 If we buy the groceries in So. California before we leave, the refrigerator will be running the first night on the battery.

 RED ALERT!  The battery will only run your fridge for about 2-4 hours.  You will awaken to a dead battery if you do this.  If you leave the camper connected to the tow vehicle, you could end up with a dead battery there too (depending on how the charge line is wired).  The only time you should use 12V to run the fridge is while the engine of the tow vehicle is running, or quick (15 minute) rest stops.  Anything longer than that, and you need to turn it off (should be OK for 1-2 hours) or switch to propane or 120V electric.
 
 Austin
 

[wynot]

 AustinBoston

The only time you should use 12V to run the fridge is while the engine of the tow vehicle is running, or quick (15 minute) rest stops.

 Unless your Tow Vehicle doesn t provide 12 V when shut off.  Some harnesses are configured to only provide aux power when running.
 
 As I m sure you have figured out by now, your 12 V charge (aux) circuit from the TV is doing little more than maintaining the power, it won t ever recharge your battery fully no matter how long you run it - and that is with the fridge OFF.

[forestwalker]

 CoronaCamper
We dont have a rack that accomodates a second battery-but do carry a second, fully charged, battery on any trip longer than a weekend.It only takes seconds to change them,and is worth the time and effort to do so.

[don]

 forestwalker
How are you charging it?
 

[forestwalker]

 don
Have not had to yet.Group 27 batteries help.We usually bring along lanterns to cut power consumption,and an additional small air compressor/cordless power supply(really another battery-purchased at Sears).Trips over 5 days ? We would probably try to stay at a park with hook-ups, once in a while, to recharge.Either that,or plan to " rough it"  a bit.Try to reduce power consumption by using an ice chest for most of the trip.

[Ab Diver]

 CoronaCamper
Hi Mark, and Welcome to the forum! Ok, so you ve got some good advice so far. Without knowing what your TV and pop-up are, you still have different ways to approach the problem. Most expensive: Buy a (gasp!) generator. One of those little 1000 watt Honda s will forever eliminate any problems with not having enough battery power. Cheaper: A solar charging set-up. This will allow you to extend your dry-camping time. Not so good an option for cloudy trips or shady sites.  Cheaper still : A " power pack" , portable battery. Extra juice when you need it, and easy to re-charge. Still cheaper: An extra battery. And still cheaper yet: Judicious use of lanterns instead of interior 12V lights, good sleeping bags, and lots of quality time around the campfire.[]  
 
 The problem is, that pop-up s heater can suck a single battery dry over the course of a 6 day stay. If you ve got the room, and extra battery will be the simplest way to deal with the problem. Just remember, lots of folks camp in tents with no heater at all (our first pop-up didn t have one either), so don t let that stop you from having a good trip. Just make sure you re prepared for cool temps *without* the heater, and you ll be fine.
 
 Of course, there s always a final option: A secondary heater like the Mr. Heater " Buddy" . It runs on propane all by itself, uses no electricity, costs about 70-90 bucks depending on where you buy it, and will warm up your pop-up very nicely. Do a search for " Buddy"  on this site and you ll get LOTS of info on them. We love ours, and use it in the pop-up and around the home as well.

[SactoCampers]

 CoronaCamper
Hi Mark,
 
 As others have indicated, you re going to have to rethink your strategy for this trip.
 
 1.) If you buy a Coleman Extreme cooler ($20.00 at Wal-mart right now for a 32 quart), your food should stay nice and cold for a few days. So you don t need to worry about your food during your drive up.
 
 2.) Forget about running the fridge on battery. As others have said, you ll kill your battery in no time and it runs better on propane and uses very little propane.
 
 3.) If you re in Yellowstone with no hookups and plan to use the heater, make sure you have dual propane tanks or a place close to refill. It will be cold in Yellowstone at night even in late June and the heater uses a lot of propane.
 
 4.) The temperature at which you set your heater will have a profound impact on your propane and battery consumption. We can t get two nights of heater usage out of one group 24 battery. But then again, we set our thermostat in the 65-68 range. The lower the thermostat setting, the more you conserve propane and battery.
 
 5.) Buy yourself more battery power. We don t know what you have now, but for six days running the heater and lights even judiciously, I would add at least a group 27 battery if all you have now is a group 24. Lead-acid batteries just do not store much energy compared with their weight.
 
 6.) Red neff s advice is good too. Buy a battery charger (~$30 at Wal-mart) and charge your batteries in the bathroom if it s safe to do so. With this setup you will never have to worry about running out of electricity when you can recharge your batteries on site when they run low. Total cost of a new group 27 battery and battery charger is ~$100-110. Or you could just buy the battery charger and charge your single battery each day.
 
 7.) As Ab Diver said your other option is a generator, but Yellowstone may have policies against their usage (I m speculating) so you want to check before you invest. I don t think you will make many friends in Yellowstone using a generator so if you must, get the Honda EU1000. It s actually a very light generator....lighter than a new battery. But then you have to carry gasoline around with you.
 
 8.) For portable power to run AC or DC appliances (such as a CD player, tv, or whatever), you might want to try a portable battery power pack instead of a second battery:
 
 http://www.xantrex.com/products/product.asp?did=126&p=1
 
 I also think this setup is particularly cool:
 
 http://www.altapower.tv/z_power/Portables/Storefront_nomad300.htm
 
 In a worst case scenario, you could plug your popup into the Powerpack 1500 should your battery die in the middle of the night to get you through the night. Nice thing about the portable power packs is that you can recharge them while driving around Yellowstone sightseeing. They have a 12volt charger include. Only drawback is they are rather expensive (~$325 for the 1500, $250 for the 600 IIRC ~$110 for the 300).
 
 So there s more of what you have already read. You might also want to consider a voltmeter to roughly monitor your battery s energy supply during your stay. There s nothing worse than unexpectedly running out of electricity in the middle of a cold night or while dry camping. Being prepared and heeding the good advice given here will ensure you have a wonderful, comfortable stay in Yellowstone. I m jealous!

[oldmoose]

 CoronaCamper
Ditto to all the previous comments. When you use the propane on the refrigerator, just remember that if the weather is cool, don t have your frig set to the coldest temp. Everything will freeze. I ve set my temp to just under the half way point and been ok, unless the temps drop under 50 degrees. Then you may need to readjust the temp setting.
 Have a great trip.

[GeneF]

 CoronaCamper
Corona
 
 We did Yellowstone about 12 years ago.  We were there the first week of July and it can get darn cold.
 
 I strongly suggest you bring along some winter coats and extra blankets in case the temp goes down below 30 degrees.  
 
 Our little Jayco did not have a fridge or heater so I can t help you out with the battery.
 
 We did dry camp 6 days last year and our battery was only used for lighting at night and we had plenty of power left.  Of course, in July, in New brunswick, the days are long and we didn t make much use of the lights.   Fridge ran on propane.
 
 If I remember correctly, you will be limited as to which campgrounds you will be able to camp in with the popup.  I hope you have or will shortly be making your reservations.