Portable second battery setup?

[Swarty]

Anyone see these new solar generators using Li-Ion? NMC tech is super stable and I think this would probably be more than enough to run a fridge and some extras like my Ham Radio.
Plus I could use it during power outages to keep the house fridge running.

Inergy Solar Kodiak

I feel like I could keep it in the back and it would save me from having to run heavy gauge to the rear for the fridge since this would load level to 10A max from the rear 12V. Only weakness is that I would have to still have my jumpbox since this doesn't run high current 12V out in case my starting battery failed. It would also let me take the fridge out of the back when I wanted to take it into a park or at some event.

Thought I'd see all your thoughts. Not usually an indiegogo supporter but Inergy Solar has been around the block a few times so I'm not worried about vaporware.
Compared to Goalzero Yeti. it's smaller, lighter, cheaper plus should last for more cycling and has about 30% more usable battery since Li-ion can be deep discharged and cycled more compared to Lead Acid.

Am I missing something? Is there another advantage to a dual battery setup that I'm missing? Especially considering the weight of Lead Acid? I guess if I got a winch it would make things more complicated. Do you need a second battery for winch duty?
[MENTION=68685]Ducmonsta[/MENTION]
you think this would make a decent power source for a trailer?
[MENTION=83083]rigtec[/MENTION] [MENTION=123786]Keith_PDX[/MENTION]
What are your thoughts dudes?

 

[Keith_PDX]

I looked long and hard at a few of these setups, including Goal Zero (which is currently at Costco's in Oregon for a nice price). For me it came down to I wanted all of my accessory loads hard wired to the auxiliary battery so I never wired anything to the stock battery or OEM wiring (hard to do with one of these) and for me space is at a premium inside the vehicle on longer trips so I didn't want one more thing in the car to load/unload. Moving between spots with minimal setup/tear down is something I am always trying to get better at. Lastly, I don't have to put ANY thought into my setup the way it is now. It always works and is always charged.

For a trailer it might not be a bad way to go. There is a section in ExpeditionPortal discussing these types of setups.

 

[flyinhawaiian01]

Its nice that the whole thing is packaged as one, neat, complete unit, but good god the price is redonkulous!

So, it has a 90ah lithium battery, a 1,000 watt inverter, and you get one 50watt panel for 1500 bucks. Oh yeah, a really nice case and all the peripherals for monitoring/charging/plugging in to.

I dunno, maybe its just my cheap-ass nature, but I could build 80% of that out of a toolbox or other case that will fit a power outlet, inverter and the 90ah battery, for probably about a third the cost. The solar panels aren't nearly as expensive any more, I have 2 100w panels on the back of my shop right now, and with a 1500 watt inverter and two car batteries, I run a few things off of it all the time.

Portability is key here, and I guess having a really nice encased system will cost ya, so if the price doesn't discourage you, then I'd say go for it! Everything listed in their documentation looks good to me, nothing is out of place or far-fetched, and it should perform as they state.

If you do get it, I'd love to hear your thoughts about it! A 90A lithium battery can still be a bit heavy (they list the box at 20lbs), but that's to be expected.

 

[Swarty]

Its nice that the whole thing is packaged as one, neat, complete unit, but good god the price is redonkulous!

So, it has a 90ah lithium battery, a 1,000 watt inverter, and you get one 50watt panel for 1500 bucks. Oh yeah, a really nice case and all the peripherals for monitoring/charging/plugging in to.

I dunno, maybe its just my cheap-ass nature, but I could build 80% of that out of a toolbox or other case that will fit a power outlet, inverter and the 90ah battery, for probably about a third the cost. The solar panels aren't nearly as expensive any more, I have 2 100w panels on the back of my shop right now, and with a 1500 watt inverter and two car batteries, I run a few things off of it all the time.

Portability is key here, and I guess having a really nice encased system will cost ya, so if the price doesn't discourage you, then I'd say go for it! Everything listed in their documentation looks good to me, nothing is out of place or far-fetched, and it should perform as they state.

If you do get it, I'd love to hear your thoughts about it! A 90A lithium battery can still be a bit heavy (they list the box at 20lbs), but that's to be expected.

Not really my question but I think you vastly underestimate the cost of Li-Ion and this makes no sense with Lead acid.

It's super light for batteries. Goal zero Yeti 1250 has less capacity costs $1600 and is 103 Lbs!!!

If you can get a 1000W true Sine converter and 90 Ah NMC (Li-ion) with BMS for a third of the cost I would be amazed. I looked at DIY and couldn't come close to this before I ever even thought about packaging. A 90Ah Li-ion is at least a grand and a true sine converter is about 100. Then you buy all the outlets, BMS, internal wiring, fuses and my time building and suddenly $1360 starts to look really reasonable.

If you know how to build something this powerful, small and light for 1/3 the price then quit your day job!

I don't think I'd get their panels just cause I don't think I'd ever need them with this much capacity but ruggedized panels are never the same price as the cheapest ones you can buy. Don't think these are the cheapest option but they seem in line with all the other ruggedized panels I've seen.

 

[Swarty]

I looked long and hard at a few of these setups, including Goal Zero (which is currently at Costco's in Oregon for a nice price). For me it came down to I wanted all of my accessory loads hard wired to the auxiliary battery so I never wired anything to the stock battery or OEM wiring (hard to do with one of these)

Goal zero is way heavier, larger, less power and more expensive usually. Not sure what the Costco price is but it's have to be really cheap. You see that in Tigard or in Wilsonville?

I agree on space. It's always a fight.
Do you think since it's only 7"X8" it would fit behind the rear seat in front of the fridge or maybe in that storage pocket by the door if I trimmed the plastic? I haven't bought a fridge yet so I'm not sure what space is right there.

My only real power concern is a winch. I can't think of any other aux loads I'd have above 15A individually and 30A combined so I wouldn't need to wire them to the stock wiring. I'd just wire them to the 12V outlets on this.

and for me space is at a premium inside the vehicle on longer trips so I didn't want one more thing in the car to load/unload. Lastly, I don't have to put ANY thought into my setup the way it is now. It always works and is always charged.

I wouldn't be constantly taking this out of the car so it would just stay connected and in place 95% of the time. The 12V turns off when the power is off so I wouldn't put any load on the system with the battery off.
Would this be unreliable in some way?

 

[Keith_PDX]

I don't think reliability would be a concern to me. That battery technology is as proven as anything these days. Something is not adding up though. As you say looking at a 90Ah battery like what they use, its considerably more expensive and they weigh more than what the manufacturer is stating. Perhaps I've had too much whiskey.

They had Goal Zero at the Tigard and Hillsboro ones. Unfortunately I didn't note the price.

Regarding wiring, all of my exterior LED's, various internal power outlets and inverter are all wired to my aux battery via a Blue Sea distribution. That would be awkward to do on one of these unless you ran a main with a plug to a distribution board. Could easily be done I guess.

 

[Jeremy556]

I'll run a 31M boat battery, spend a couple hours time, maybe $40 worth of wire and connectors to wire up the fridge in back. Spend the extra thousand on tires and gas.

 

[nglayton]

Confused

So I'm confused, this is an indiegogo fund raiser that funded in December of 2015. They raised almost $650,000 and they are still taking donations? Okay whatever, I think I must have that wrong, it seems odd to me. I'm not sure why a company that appears to be as big as ienergy is running an indiegogo.

Anyway,

I am far from an expert but.....

One thing I can say is I own a Goal Zero Yeti 1250. I never take it with me because it's too damn heavy to move. So weight is a huge issue that needs to be dealt with some how. Lead acid vs Li-ION could be a good thing, the one graphic shows 20lbs vs 103lbs for the same price basically. That would be awesome.

The second thing I can tell you is the solar panel makes a huge difference in how fast the system recharges. $169 for a 50watt panel (I assume Predator50 is a 50w panel) is outrageously over priced. You can buy a Grape Solar 100w panel for about $130 everyday of the week. If you watch you can buy them for $100 from Amazon and HomeDepot on sale.

At best most solar panels are only about 30% efficient and that's under excellent conditions (proper angle, temp, sun tracking, clear sky, etc.) By the time rookies in real life set them up you are lucky to get 20% of the rated wattage and you have to keep moving them to track the sun if you want to keep that high of output for more than about 30 minutes.

So one 50 watt panel will take well over 40+ hours of direct daylight to fully charge that 1100 Whr unit. At 100% efficiency, 1100/50 = 22 hours
At 30% efficiency 1100/15 = 73 hours, you get the idea.

The "Bronze System" that claims 24 hour recharge time with one panel is just flat wrong.....(Keep in mind that's going to be daylight hours only)

Also, these type of units have a max input because the batteries can only take a recharge so fast. The max input is probably around 300w. At 300w in put the battery could charge in 3-4 hours, but to get that 300 watts in you would need about 1000-1200 watts worth of solar panels

In the end, that indiegogo site, really doesn't give enough technical info on any of the products. I can't tell if a Predator 50 is 50 watts, 12v or what?? A quick google search says it is 50w, but even the ienergy website doesn't list the voltage, amperage or what type of connectors it has......

 

[nglayton]

A google search shows that the max input for the Kodiak is 600watts! That's more than double the Goal Zero Yeti1250 which is only 240w. If you could get that much solar power it would recharge in less than 2 hours. But you would need about 2000 watts worth of panels to get that.

No longer portable that this point.....

Also keep in mind, no one in their right would recommend attaching 2000w solar panels to get the 600 watt max.
The max Goal zero recommends is 270 (3 x 90w) just in case by some fluke you actually got 100% it wouldn't blow your system up. (max 240)

 

[rigtec]

"...you think this would make a decent power source for a trailer?
[MENTION=83083]rigtec[/MENTION] [MENTION=123786]Keith_PDX[/MENTION]
What are your thoughts dudes?"

Hi Swarty,

I have no opinion or thoughts wrt this topic as I am Completely ill advised and under equipped on this subject. I, however, find this to be a very interesting read and so have been following all the expert's insights and contributions here in this thread... "I have yet much to learn here on this forum which I love!"

Best to you, rig

 

[e60ral]

I'd go with an ArkPak and a good battery

I also own a yeti 1250 and agree that its not practical, we use ours in construction to run lights and stuff in locations where we can't run a generator. (we've even had electric chipping hammers running off of it!) but i wouldn't want to travel with it.

the arkpak is basically a case for a real battery with the charging equipment and inverter on top. the thing i like about having a real battery is that you can use the battery to jump your vehicle if you needed to or even rig it up to replace a battery if you needed

 

[flyinhawaiian01]

Not really my question but I think you vastly underestimate the cost of Li-Ion and this makes no sense with Lead acid.

It's super light for batteries. Goal zero Yeti 1250 has less capacity costs $1600 and is 103 Lbs!!!

If you can get a 1000W true Sine converter and 90 Ah NMC (Li-ion) with BMS for a third of the cost I would be amazed. I looked at DIY and couldn't come close to this before I ever even thought about packaging. A 90Ah Li-ion is at least a grand and a true sine converter is about 100. Then you buy all the outlets, BMS, internal wiring, fuses and my time building and suddenly $1360 starts to look really reasonable.

If you know how to build something this powerful, small and light for 1/3 the price then quit your day job!

I don't think I'd get their panels just cause I don't think I'd ever need them with this much capacity but ruggedized panels are never the same price as the cheapest ones you can buy. Don't think these are the cheapest option but they seem in line with all the other ruggedized panels I've seen.

1,000 watt sine wave inverter, $159.00

100 watt solar panel, $150.00


As for battery, you are absolutely correct, I was not really thinking of the cost of a li-ion battery and thought to use an agm battery that would hold up power for several hours and be a good match for solar recharging. Slightly lower in amperage, but this was one I thought would work well as an alternative:

70ah AGM battery

I also figured I'd add another 100 bucks on for a case, jacks, plugs and wiring, as well as a small solar charging controller, cost would be around 600 bucks for everything all-told.

Of course, your enthusiasm seems to revolve around the fact that its a li-ion battery, and those are generally around a grand for a 90ah unit, so the numbers seem to work out almost right for their listing.

I say go out and get on that indiegogo list and report back on it when it arrives!