Luis, Adding the second battery will give you more run time but it won't=20 solve your charging problem. If the solar panel is correctly installed=20 it can be isolated from vehicle vibration. Also flaring can be installed=20 so that the panel is not exposed to the wind and this will minimize the=20 drag. I would make the panel as large as the roof area so as to maximize=20 the amount of available power. Having the relay is exactly what I was=20 talking about and that is a good thing. Yep, money is always a problem.=20 You are going to have to have a mains charger. There is no way around it. Thanks, rich! On 9/3/2014 5:12 AM, Luis Moreira wrote: > Hi Richard, > The plan is to add a second battery pretty soon for sure. The solar panel > for me is just adding drag for not very much gain. I will look into it, b= ut > like I said it is not something very appealing for me, how big does the > panel need to be and will it take the vibration from the driving around? > At the moment I do have a durite split charge relay that connects the > vehicle battery to the deep cycle battery only when the van is running. M= y > inverter is a British made 1800W quasi from Sterling power which also do > some very nice DC to DC chargers. They are just a bit expensive for me at > the moment. > Thanks > Luis > On 3 Sep 2014 09:33, "Richard R. Pope" wrote: > >> Luis, >> Now I understand. I would recommend adding a second deep discharge >> battery in parallel with the first one. this will double your amp hours. >> I would also recommend that you seriously consider adding the solar >> cells. At least during the day they will add to the charge in the >> batteries. You can mount the solar panel on the roof of the van. >> Do you have a cut off device between this battery and the car >> battery? If not you want to add such a device so that the deep discharge >> battery is disconnected from the vehicle system except when the van is >> running. This is very important as the battery that runs the van is not >> designed to be run down. The cut off is wired so that when you start the >> van up and it is running the accessory battery as I will now call it is >> then connected to the alternator for charging purposes. Yes you will >> need some type of charging system running off of the mains as you aren't >> driving long enough to completely recharge your accessory battery under >> all circumstances. >> I hope that this helps. >> Thanks, >> rich! >> BTW: I did something like this for my motorhome many years ago. >> rich! >> --=20 http://www.piclist.com/techref/piclist PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist .