Solar installation

So after much planning and many questions, I finally have my solar installation underway.
I have the panels installed and am working on routing the cables from roof to controller to batteries.

I've got the locations figured out and the conduit installed from the roof to the controller, Now the issue is routing from the controller to the batteries.
I have tried to avoid drilling holes and so far only needed one to get the conduit from the roof to the controller and hole was behind the refrigerator.

The issue I am having is I need to try to keep the cables short from the controller to the batteries and was attempting to use existing holes but the one in the floor adds an extra 4 feet to the route and may be blocked by the fresh water tank.

I figure I can drill through the floor as there is nothing directly under the floor in the underbelly where I want to drill. The contruction of the floor is a foam and OSB laminated with Aluminum frame. Are there hidden crossbeams in the floor (not the trusses in the underbelly) , How would be the best (easiest) way to find the location of these crossbeams so I can avoid drilling into them?

Your NT may be different than our BH. The floor is made with 2 different sheets of OBS with 2X2" lumber between the sheets. In other words...a double floor.

Bob&Patty said:

Your NT may be different than our BH. The floor is made with 2 different sheets of OBS with 2X2" lumber between the sheets. In other words...a double floor.

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The bighorn sounds like it has the same construction as the North trail. Looking at the brochures on the heartland website for both show the same description and partial image of the floor to be the same. When drilling through the floor, I would like to avoid drilling through the 2x2 lumber if that is what is used. Any advice or information would be appreciated.

After much time designing and planning a solar install on my NT, I have finally completed the project and is now successfully powered up the system. I will say, the NT did not offer many locations for installing this system but I did find panels that allowed me a flexible installation and a bonus seems to be slightly quieter interior due to the adhesive I used on the solar panels. Thank you to everyone that provided guidance, advice or even just let me look at their installation in person.

How did you wire the system? Series or parallel? (or combo of both)

Which controller are you using?

three strings of panels. each string is three panels wired in series, then I used a circuit breaker/combiner box each string has its own circuit breaker and then the three strings are wired in parallel to the charge controller.
I used a Morningstar tristar mppt 60 charge controller

Looks great David - thanks for sharing.

How did you route the wires from the roof to the battery compartment? Where did you install the controller? I'm planning a solar install in a Cyclone 3010, and the wire run from the roof to the battery compartment is my biggest unknown.
Thanks

Dennyha said:

How did you route the wires from the roof to the battery compartment? Where did you install the controller? I'm planning a solar install in a Cyclone 3010, and the wire run from the roof to the battery compartment is my biggest unknown.
Thanks

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On our 3010, when I put the SAT dish on the roof I ran the wires and coax down the void between the bathroom and living room. Easy to find on the roof, two vents pipes alongside each other. The void goes straight to the basement.

Look at this post for the location I used.

https://heartlandowners.org/showthr...t-disappointed?p=429440&viewfull=1#post429440

To add to this, at least on our Cyclone 3010.
I have run wires from my battery compartment up through the bundle on the top near the propane compartment, along the top of the DS basement door (drop down panel) and into the area behind the rear basement wall.

Duane,
That is very helpful. I knew that dead space between the bathroom and the living room is where I wanted to drop the wire from the roof, and from there I could run it up to the storage area. I didn't know what to expect in front of the storage area.

On my Big Country I ran 4 awg welding wire from the roof between the bathroom and kitchen cabinets. This follow two vent pipes into the basement. From the basement I went straight thru to the front storage area on the roof of the basement. This provided me the shortest run to the PV control panel. In the front basement is where I have mounted the controller, Invert and 4 lithium battery banks. I am just about ready to turn it all on. I have 6 160 watt panels wired in a series parallel step up 2 panels in series and 3 in parallel.

Steve

sjandbj said:

On my Big Country I ran 4 awg welding wire from the roof between the bathroom and kitchen cabinets. This follow two vent pipes into the basement. From the basement I went straight thru to the front storage area on the roof of the basement. This provided me the shortest run to the PV control panel. In the front basement is where I have mounted the controller, Invert and 4 lithium battery banks. I am just about ready to turn it all on. I have 6 160 watt panels wired in a series parallel step up 2 panels in series and 3 in parallel.

Steve

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This sounds a lot like what I'm planning to do. I have a generator in the front storage compartment, behind the kingpin. In the compartment, next to the genny, I plan to mount 4 6v batteries. I'd like to mount the charge controller on the wall behind the batteries, and run 4 gauge wire from there, back to the basement area behind the bathroom, and then up to the roof, terminating in a combiner box on top of the roof. I can picture it all in my mind, except for the area in front of the basement storage area (door side), and behind the battery box compartment. I've never looked in there, so I don't know what to expect.

I routed the solar power cables under the refrigerator vent, down though conduit installed behind the refrigerator, this conduit is routed though the space along the wall where other wiring is present above the furnace and under the stove over to the cabinet that houses the water heater and sink. Here I installed the charge controller and PV circuit breaker box. Solar cables go into the PV CB box first is combined from three strings parallel strings into one and the resulting combined solar power ran over to the charge controller using #2 wire. From the charge controller I ran cables down through the floor (in conduit) and under the trailer out the front to the battery box. This wiring was 2/0 cable due to the long run and recommendation by Morningstar charge controller manual charts. I also ran a battery voltage sense and battery temperature sense cables in the same conduit as the positive 2/0 cable. If I did this again, I would use separate conduit for the sense cables as 2/0 cable is a pain to pull through conduit. I used watertight flex conduit for the runs under the RV and used blue flex indoor conduit for the PV cables from the roof down to the PV CB/combiner box.

Where did you drop the cable from the panel to the charge controller? Also, where did you put the charge controller. I just called my Renogy Solar company and they said you should not place the Charge Controller inside a sealed compartment. The only other possibility would be inside the trailer, the charge controller is pretty big and not that nice to look at. Any help would be appreciated. Jim

Current Trailer, 2015 Heartland North Trail 32RLTS

I ran conduit from the roof down through the refrigerator vent and under the refrigerator and range to a location under the sink area.

There was tons of unused space in the wedge corner under the sink and the cabinet itself is vented in multiple locations.

I used conduit because I ran three strings of panels and had 6 cables to run to the Circuit breaker/combiner box. I can then switch the individual strings off if I desire or easily reset a breaker if tripped for some odd reason.

I found a plastic container that would hold three batteries and placed that on the tongue. I drilled two holes in the floor and ran conduit for the large cables I ran from the charge controller to the batteries.

I used conduit for the large cables because of the length of run and the 60+ amps of power these could have running. Due to two power sources, I wanted to make it easy to identify the solar cables since at this time only the cables used for solar are run in conduit.

I have a 2016 NT 32BUDS.