You multiply the combined wattage of the solar panels by the number of hours sunlight.
How many solar panels needed for rv a x.
Solar shingles are smaller than panels and their wattage is lower as a result.
On the other hand if they are 330w panels only 21 are needed.
5 hours of direct sunlight x 6 amps generated hour 30 amp hours day.
Clearly this kind of setup can get pricey pretty quickly.
However you can use the same procedure to estimate how many are needed.
Tips for estimating rv solar panel needs although actual output may vary based on the factors mentioned above you can get yourself to a ballpark figure using a couple of tips.
This is also assuming of course you have a lot of battery power too.
By this estimate we ll need about 2 500 watts of solar panels just to break even on the ac unit s consumption.
100 watt portable solar panel.
The more ah you have the more solar panels you ll need if you have a single 12 volt battery at about 100 ah you should have 300 watts of solar panels minimum.
The general rule of thumb is that a 100 watt solar panel can produce about 30 amp hours per day so you can use this guideline to determine about how many panels you need.
To generate the stored electricity needed to run our rv air conditioner all day you d need over 340 square feet of solar panels ish plus 3600 amp hours of battery capacity and guaranteed perfect sunshine.
We ll need about twelve 200 amp hour solar panels and one 100 amp hour panel to run the ac.
How did i come up with 300.
The number of solar panels needed for rv boondocking depends on how many batteries you have to keep charged.
Reality is you only need as many panels as your batteries are able to store and your usage warrants.
Most boondockers have between 200 to 400 amp hour battery banks.
It doesn t matter how many panels you have if you don t have the battery bank to store the energy your panels are pulling in.
A big misconception with rv solar is that you need 500 600 or 900 watts of solar for it to be worth it.
This doesn t include the solar power needed to run anything else in the rv.
This equals thirty amp hours a day meaning you would need two one hundred watt panels to fully recharge your rv.
So you are going to need a total wattage of 300 combined solar panels.
For this example if you are using 404 kwh per year that is 1 11 kwh per day.
100 watt solar panel approximately 6 amps hour in direct summer sun no clouds here s an example of our calculation of how much the solar panels are generating to recharge our rv batteries.
We suggest a battery bank of 800 amp hours.
If you have a rough idea of your power needs you need to check a solar panel s spec sheet and look for the watt rating the peak power amps and peak power volts.
You will need at least 1 800 watts of solar panels to run your rv air conditioner.
You ll need to add up the total amp hours ah your batteries are capable of holding.