Blog

Dometic Refrigerators - CRX vs. the new NRX Line

In this video, Kevin tries to explain just what the heck is the difference between the new NRX and old CRX fridge lines from Dometic, and whether or not the NRX fridges are the upgrades they claim to be.

Starlink Gen 3 Roof Mounting & Using 12VDC Power

In this post, I’ll dive into how I’m using a Starlink system in my Promaster camper van including mounting it to the van’s roof using a Speedmount and powering the system directly from my 12-volt battery bank without needing 120-volt AC power from either my inverter or shore power using a 12/24-volt DC power adapter! The dish I’m using is the so-called Gen 3 which doesn’t have the motors to adjust the positioning of the dish like the older, Gen 2 models. Instead, it has a sort of “kickstand” that is supposed to position the dish at a useful angle to the sky. But, I’m not using this kickstand – instead, I’m mounting it flat on on my roof using a Speedmount which is basically a “frame” for the Gen 3 dishy that has feet to be mounted to something like a vehicle. The feet can be through-bolted to a roof or a roof rack or you can choose to configure the product to ship with very strong magnets which are bolted onto the feet of the Speedmount so that the entire assembly can be mounted to a metal roof (like a van) magnetically. If your rig’s roof isn’t metal (like many RVs), you can also configure the Speedmount to include metal discs that are the right size for the magnetic feet that can be stuck to your roof using the included VHB tape. So, I’m not using the “high performance” dish which is considerably more expensive. Even mounted flat (without the kickstand) my initial testing with the Gen 3 dish is impressive! Parked in an area with reasonable (but not completely wide open) sky views, next to a building with trees and such in the parking lot that are not too far away, the network performance is really good. Check out the 12-hour report below with only 28 seconds of “obstructions”. This is way better than the Gen 2 Starlink in similar conditions. The Speedmount is made of waterproof and UV thermoplastic that will not warp and not only mounts the dish but also provides some protection to the edge. It’s extremely low profile at only 1.85” in height (1.9” with magnets). AssemblyThe Speedmount ships in 4x pieces that are labeled one through four. Assembly is super simple and quick. Since I am using the magnetic feet, I bolted on those magnets to each piece. Then I assembled pieces 3 and 4 then slipped dishy into that side of the frame and then continued wrapping dishy on the other side by assembling pieces 1 and 2. Finally I completed the “frame” by bolting the two sides to each other. All this is with supplied stainless steel bolts and nylon locknuts. The video below shows the assembly with some snappy music.   Through BoltingIf you’re through bolting the Speedmount feet either through a roof or to a roof rack, we recommend that you assemble the frame by bolting the 4x pieces together without the dishy inside the frame. Then… If you’re bolting through your roof, determine the position of the Speedmount on the roof taking into consideration any “obstacles” or important things that might be on the inside of the rig at that location. Then mark the hole locations that are in the center of each “foot” of the mount (each corner). Then you can drill those holes (the 65mm bolts included with the Speedmount are M6 size). After drilling be sure to clean the holes and protect them with paint to prevent corrosion. Next, insert a bolt through the mounting hole in each foot and disassemble the Speedmount enough to be able to insert the dish while keeping the mounting bolts in place. Some painters tape can make this a lot easier! Once the dishy is inside the frame of the Speedmount you can apply some sealant on each foot – using unbroken rings outside the mounting hole so that the Speedmount will be sealed to the roof and water will not get into the area where the bolt hole is located. We recommend something like 3M 5200 or Loctite PL Marine. Finally drop the Speedmount, with the bolts through the drilled holes and use the supplied washers and nylon locking nuts on the interior of the rig to secure the Speedmount to the roof. If you’re bolting to a roof rack, you’ll go through a similar process as above, but without the need for the sealant. If you have a roof rack constructed from 8020, you can position your t-nuts in the locations of each foot’s mounting hole. To Seal or Not to SealNote, I used some of the Loctite PL Marine sealant where the Starlink-provided Ethernet cable plugs into the bottom of the dish as shown in the photo below. This is either a really great idea or a really terrible one – time will tell 🙂 The “weatherproof” RJ45 plug that is at both ends of the Starlink dish-to-router connection cable is supposed to keep water out but, with this thing up on my van roof with the potential for driving rain and such, I wanted to ensure that no water would get in there. Because of the weatherproofing, the Starlink RJ45 plugs don’t have the locking latch normally found on those types of connectors and they sit pretty snug into the dish and, on the other side, the router. Typically you can simply pull on the cable to remove it since there is no latch. If I ever have to remove the cable from the dishy, it’s going to be, well, more difficult. I also used some velcro to keep the kickstand from flopping around. I hope. Stick To ItBecause my van rocks a secondary alternator power system, I don’t need permanently mounted solar panels. So, I use that roof space for an awesome roof deck. I do have some portable, folding panels that I can put up there when I’m going to be stationary but I don’t use them very often. Behind the deck is a Maxxfan over my bed area but there was an open space behind the deck, on the driver side rear, where I put dishy. The magnetic feet location line up pretty well with the high points of the corrugations on the roof of the Promaster as you can see in the photo below. If you want to check how the “feet” of the Speedmount land on your roof, check out this dimensional drawing. When I build out vans, I try to anticipate changes – particularly those in systems and technology – since I’m a nerd. For instance, I over-gauged the wire running from my Promaster battery to the 30 amp Orion DC-DC charger because there were “rumors” of a 50 amp version of that coming out. The rumors were right and the 50 amp Orion XS is here! I also ran a cat6 network cable from the roof all the way to the storage bin above the cab in a Promaster which is where I put my older, Gen 2 Starlink router. This made the Gen 3 Starlink installation much easier. So, I suppose that’s a tip – consider running additional wires and/or adding conduit during your builds for future upgrades What you see in the photo below is dishy in the Speedmount magnetically attached to the roof on the driver side, the Ethernet cable that comes with the Starlink system is attached (and sealed) to the dish and then runs over to a waterproof box on the passenger side where it’s connected to a weatherproof, female RJ45 female jack. I used the same Loctite PL Marine adhesive here to seal the connection. From there, the cable I pre-ran is used to connect the dishy to the router inside the van. I have the excess cable to dishy on the roof coiled up and velcroed to a crossbar. The idea here is that if the van is parked in an area with limited sky view (forested campsite, etc.), I can pull dishy off the roof and use that excess cable to position it in another spot with more sky. Powering Starlink Gen 3 with 12-Volt DC Power The Starlink system comes with the dish, a router and a fairly large AC adapter box that you would normally plug into an outlet at your house. In a camper van, this would require you to either have shore power or have your inverter turned on whenever you were using Starlink service. But, we sell a power adapter for 12 or 24-volt systems that allow you to power the Starlink system directly off DC power from your battery bank which is more energy efficient! This adapter replaces the Starlink AC adapter. It comes with red/black bare wires that you connect to a DC branch circuit and a plug that goes into the back of the Starlink router to power the system. Below you can see the Starlink router (highlighted in green) and the 12/24-volt power adapter (highlighted in red) installed into the storage area above the cab in the Promaster van. The router is held down with Velcro and the power adapter is tucked into the corner. Note, both the router and power adapter get pretty warm. I also added this remote controlled switch that allows me to turn off the Starlink system when I don’t need it since it does consume a fair amount of power. Running the system from the 12-volt DC power, I’m seeing around 60-70 watts of power consumption on average. It typically hovers around 62 watts. This is of course, in Florida with no need to melt snow! Below is a screenshot from the newer UI for GX devices showing a moment of 81 watts consumption but there is about 16 watts of other “idle loads”.   PS: if you want your mind completely blown and to have the proper appreciation of the miracle of Starlink, check out this video!

How to Choose the Right Roof Rack for Your Camper Van

Overview of the Cerbo GX / Ekrano Products from Victron Energy

Update December 2024 For a period in 2024 Victron was offering three versions of the Cerbo GX as we detailed in this video (Cerbo GX, Cerbo-S GX and the MK2 model). Now, starting in early 2025, they are eliminating the Cerbo GX and the Cerbo-S GX so that there will, once again, be only one single model which is the MK2 version. In other words. the Cerbo GX MK2 replaces the original Cerbo GX and the Cerbo-S GX is no longer available. Victron also offers an “all-in-one” model called the Ekrano with integrated screen but, since all the connections are on the back of the screen, it only makes sense if this screen is located near your power system which is often under the bed/garage area of a camper van. We also recommend reading our blog post about configuring a Cerbo GX device in a mobile power system like a camper van or RV.

Interior Shower or No Interior Shower?  An Experienced Vanlifer's Opinion

EcoFlow vs. Victron Energy Electrical System Comparison

Like many, we were excited about these “future of electrical system” kits. We bought a 5kWh kit and, initially, we were quite smitten indeed. What a beauty! A few months later the honeymoon period ended. Alas, after much testing and, trying to kindle the love, our cupid never showed. In this post, we’ll do our best to compare an EcoFlow Power Kit (specifically the 5kWh “Independence” Power Kit) to a “traditional” system using high-quality, value-priced 12-volt lithium batteries and a bunch of top-quality Victron Energy components and explain why we’re sticking with the Blue Power. But, You’re Biased! Yeah, that’s a bit true, but not exactly what you think. It’s worth pointing out that selling EcoFlow products is very profitable (notice how many ads there are for these things). In fact, we’d actually earn more money selling you an EcoFlow kit vs. the Victron bundles we discuss in this post. We did sell the Power Kits for a few months but decided to stop selling them recently after considering the limitations. We take our pledge to only sell the very best, road-tested products – the stuff we’d use in our vans very seriously. What follows are the reasons we wouldn’t use an EcoFlow kit in our vans – even if we were DIY’ers who were not experienced with electrical systems. Changes with V2 Power Kits – Update Late 2024 In late 2024, EcoFlow began promoting their new “v2” Power Kits and changed the naming convention to refer to the Power Hub’s output capacity instead of the battery capacity. The new 5kVA model can support 120VAC loads up to around 4000 watts (5000 watts surge). This is neat but we find that AC loads tend to be pretty minimal in camper vans. Apparently the inverter is quieter as well. On the AC side they also added charging from and passthrough of 240VAC to loads when that higher voltage shore power is available. The new kits have a dedicated port for direct connection to the 48VDC battery power so you don’t need to sacrifice a battery connection port to run something like a 48-volt DC air conditioner. In my view the most practical upgrade for a van/RV is the increase to 100 amps of 12VDC power (or 60 amps at 24-volt). EcoFlow also has a new Power Link accessory/add-on that adds some extra connectivity to the outside world like RV-C/NMEA2000 CAN and resistive tank sensors which is a nice upgrade path. When it comes to alternator charging, the specs state that you can have three inputs (13V-60V, 60A/30A/30A, up to 4800W total) but I don’t know of any way to actually provide that from a factory vehicle alternator or secondary alternator with an external regulator such as the Wakespeed. If someone figures this out, please let us know! The Short Version The EcoFlow products are beautifully designed and generally work well if you don’t need advanced features. By far, the biggest advantage of an EcoFlow Power Kit over a professionally installed Victron system is how simple it is for a non-experienced DIY’er to install and configure the system. This benefit does not disappoint and we were duly impressed. Overall, it’s actually a great system and ideal in certain situations. If the limitations we present in this post are not relevant to you, then EcoFlow is a great option. However, as you’ll see later in this post, at today’s prices, you can get everything you need for a comparable (arguably better) Victron system for about $1,900 less than the EcoFlow kit which is about the cost of having an experienced professional installer wire up your Victron system. That is what we’d recommend to most people so that you’re not subject to the limitations we detail in this post and you can have true confidence in your system – both that it will work well and that it will be maintainable and upgradable for the life of your rig. We even have a directory of installers you can browse and, if you’re in our area (Florida) we have some trusted installers we can recommend if you reach out. Ugh, Math Let’s get some math stuff out of the way. If you don’t like math, ya can skip this part… Battery capacity is often measured in amp hours (Ah). But, power consumption is better measured in watts. So, many people refer to the capacity in a system with kilowatt watt hours (kWh) which takes into consideration of the system voltage. To convert between amp hours and kilowatt hours you multiply the amp hours by the voltage. To do the reverse (get amp hours from kilowatt hours) you divide the kilowatt hours by the volts. In our testing of our EcoFlow Power Kit the 12-volt option operates at 13.8 volts. In systems using 12-volt batteries, the voltage is going to be anywhere between 14.4 on the high end, to 12 on the low end, depending on the battery state of charge (SOC). So, when we do conversions, we’ll use the average of those – 13.2 – as the voltage value. For instance, to convert a 5kWh EcoFlow battery to amp hours for a 12-volt system, we’ll divide the specification of that Power Kit Battery of 5,120 by 13.2 to arrive at 387 amp hours. Or, to convert a 314 amp hour rated SOK battery to kilowatt hours we’d multiply 314 by 13.2 to arrive at 4,145. We think this is fair math but you can grab your calculator and adjust that voltage value for yourself if you want to see the impact of using something like 12.8 volts. If you’re not familiar with EcoFlow Power Kits, the most popular of them is a 5kWh “Independence” version. It comes with: One 5kWh battery (5,120 kilowatt hours) which is equivalent to a 387 amp hour battery (at 13.2 volts). Up to 2x additional 5kWh batteries can be added to the system. At today’s prices, they are about $4,600. The Power Hub, which is where most of the components of the system connect to (batteries, shore power inlet, solar input, DC-DC charger input, and the output for all loads). Compared to a traditional/Victron system, it acts as the inverter/charger, DC-DC charger, solar charge controller, etc. A combination 120-volt AC and 12/24-volt DC load center. The EcoFlow batteries are natively 48-volt but this is converted for use with your DC loads (lights, fans, water pump, etc.). You can select between 12 or 24-volts. It can provide a maximum of 1,000 watts of DC power to the DC load center which is about 70-75 amps in a 12-volt configuration. A “console” which is the touchscreen that provides control and monitoring for the system. All the wiring needed to hook the system up – shore power inlet, wiring to your vehicle battery for DC-DC (alternator) charging, MC4 solar power cables, etc. The only wiring you need to provide are for the branch circuits that come from the combination AC/DC load center and power your actual loads in the rig. Compare the Specs Speaking of math, if you’re engineering-minded and want to dive into all the numbers, we’ve made a comparison sheet between the systems we’re discussing in this post in this Google Sheet. EcoFlow Power Kit Limitations Customer Service/Tech SupportIt’s no secret that EcoFlow has less than stellar customer and technical support. Some people describe it as “the worst” or “non-existent”. To be fair, others have had great luck. However, we put a lot of time and effort into having the very best customer service in the industry (don’t take it from us, read our customer reviews) and when the manufacturer doesn’t pull their weight in this regard it can reflect poorly on us. We don’t want to rely on “luck”. So, this was part of our decision to stop selling their products. Lack of ModularityOne of the awesome features of the EcoFlow is that it’s easy to install and there are only a few bits and pieces. But, this also means that there is no modularity. So it’s a bit of a double-edged sword and you’ll have to decide which side of that blade you’d like to fall on. The simplicity of the EcoFlow is great for sure but it creates single points of failure. It’s very handy to be able to swap out a single component if it fails while the rest of the system keeps working. For instance, if your Victron solar charge controller kicks the bucket, you can keep charging other ways such as DC-DC (alternator) charging or shore power. On an EcoFlow kit, these are all inside one box. A traditional system, with lots of individual blue boxes, allows you to stay on the road and limp to the next dealer. Also, any Victron component with the word “smart” in the name can be configured and monitored via Bluetooth with their VictronConnect app. It’s very helpful to be able to monitor and see historical data on each specific component in your system when troubleshooting any issues. Limited Parts Availability Speaking of dealers, Victron Energy has distributors and dealers literally around the world. So, if you’re in limp mode with your power system, you will be able to find the parts and the support and installation professionals you need just about everywhere you might find yourself. In our experience, getting parts for EcoFlow Power Kits is very much the opposite. There are very few stocking dealers of EcoFlow and they don’t have all the fiddly bits you might need. This is made worse by the proprietary nature of their connections. One example: we ordered a replacement battery cable for the Power Kits that has a proprietary connection on each side. We patiently waited for over 3-weeks for this cable and were eventually told that it would be many more before it would ship. Keep in mind this is the cable that connects the batteries to the Power Hub! So, if it fails or breaks or your dog chews through it, you have no power. For us, it was only inconvenient since we are just testing this stuff in our mad van laboratory, but if you were on the road, this would put you completely out of business for way too long. Closed EcosystemOne of the things we love about Victron Energy is that you can “use what you want” from their product lineup and not be locked into “everything” Victron. For instance, in the example Victron system we’re actually using SOK batteries because of their impressive price/performance. Of course, we also sell and recommend Victron batteries – particularly if you’re building out a system with a secondary alternator. In a EcoFlow system, pretty much everything but your solar panels are going to need to be from EcoFlow. Another example is Victron’s Venus OS which powers their GX devices like the Cerbo GX which is an absolutely brilliant device for controlling and monitoring Victron gear. But, it also works with 3rd-party stuff like SeeLevel tank monitor and Ruuvitag sensors. The open ecosystem allows you to add some super cool functionality to your rig and this ecosystem continually grows to become increasingly vibrant over time. Victron also regularly updates firmware for all their devices – generally through Bluetooth and their VictronConnect app. Some who use Victron equipment might say it’s too often! But, these upgrades often come with new features and functionality that are completely free! High Cost of Adding Battery StorageLater in the post, in the cost comparison section, you’ll see that the example Victron system starts with more battery storage capacity than the 5kWh EcoFlow kit (over 40% more) and if you wanted, you could quite easily add a third, 280Ah (3,696 kWh) SOK battery for $1,149 at today’s prices (even less than that if ordered in our bundle) which comes out to about $.31/kWh or storage. Compare that to an EcoFlow 5kWh (technically 5,120) battery that is selling for $4,600 today which is well over twice the cost per kWh of storage at around $.89. This goes back to the advantage of modularity and not being locked into a closed ecosystem of products. This is an example of how being “stuck” in a closed ecosystem can be expensive. DC Output Limits – Not Great for DC Air ConditionThe DC output to the AC/DC distribution panel is limited to 1,000 watts (75 amps when set to 12-volt mode). This isn’t much of a limitation in most cases. But, if you’re in Florida (or similar), and want to run a 12-volt DC air conditioner it becomes a major limitation. Many of these DC air conditioners use around 55-60 amps when running on high (check out our comparison sheet). So, if you are running your AC unit on high, you’re only left with around 15 amps for ALL of your 12-volt loads such as refrigerators, water pumps, Maxxfans, etc. which just isn’t enough leftover juice to use a few of those things simultaneously with a DC air conditioner. Also, there isn’t a simple way to wire up the heavy-gauge wire (like 4 AWG) from the AC unit to the EcoFlow AC/DC distribution panel. You can “hack” the wiring in a few ways but, at this time, you can’t get any more juice. The EcoFlow Power Kits have plenty of 120-volt AC power to run a more traditional rooftop unit but if you look closely at the specifications of those they typically use about twice as much power as a 12-volt DC air conditioners. So, if you want to stay cool off-grid, you’d likely need to pay for extra batteries which are, as we’ve already noted, very expensive. The workaround is to use a 48-volt air conditioner with the EcoFlow that connects directly to the 48-volt battery “bus” but you’ll still have to fight with the proprietary connectors on the EcoFlow Power Hub/battery. No Secondary Alternator for YouWe are big fans of getting the most out of your vehicle engine. Since you’re driving around anyway, why not get massive power from a dedicated secondary alternator or heat your water while you cruise down the road? With a Victron system, you can integrate secondary alternator charging into your system with ease and no limitations. EcoFlow Power Kits have an integrated DC-DC charger similar to the Victron Orion XS units. The input labeled for “alternator” is rated for up to 60 amps and allows for up to 1600 watts. In our example Victron system we show 2x Orion XS DC-DC chargers running in parallel for a maximum charge of 100 amps (1,320 watts). A Nations secondary alternator system with a Wakespeed regulator can charge at over 3,000 watts (!) at normal engine RPMs as you can see from the graphic below that compares Nations 12-volt alternator with their 48-volt version. That’s nearly double what you would get from the “standard” DC-DC charger setup charging from your vehicle alternator with either the EcoFlow or the Victron setup. By the way, the general guideline for charging from your vehicle alternator is to limit the charging current to less than 50% of the alternator’s rating – for instance, if the alternator is rated for 220 amps, you’d want to limit the DC-DC alternator charging to around 100 amps. This is to prevent the early demise of your alternator. So, a secondary alternator is like having a generator running anytime you’re driving at the cost of a small impact on your fuel efficiency – something similar to other belt-driven stuff in your engine like an AC. Importantly, if you price out our Victron-based secondary alternator power system bundle, at today’s pricing, it’s about $2,800 more than the internal BMS bundle we’re using for the price comparison in this post. This is primarily due to the premium Victron batteries and the accompanying external BMS (Lynx Smart BMS) PLUS the actual Nations alternator kit and Wakespeed regulator. On the EcoFlow Power Kits, it’s possible to wire additional alternators/output to “solar input 2” or “solar input 3” but those are limited to 30 amps each and only the first input (labeled for alternator charging) can have its input current adjusted in the app. Using all 3x inputs on the EcoFlow kit would yield around 120 amps or around 1600 watts at 12-volts. Of course, using all the solar inputs for DC charging would prevent you from having solar charging. If you happen to have higher voltage chargers, maybe the power could be increased up to 1600 watts per input at higher voltages since the inputs allow 13-60 volts. If this sounds complicated, we agree! It certainly starts to erode that easy-to-use simplicity of the EcoFlow system. So, what’s the issue with wiring up a Nations alternator to an EcoFlow Power Kit? Basically, there is no point/benefit! It’s an expensive, 280 amp alternator paired with a Wakespeed regulator that outputs over 200 amps at most RPMs but the EcoFlow Power Kit “inputs” are limited to 60 or 30 amps. So, you could, technically, configure the Wakespeed regulator as if it were charging a standard 12-volt lithium battery and limit the maximum charging current to 60 amps but it’s considerably cheaper and easier to just pull 60 amps from your vehicle batttery/alternator! Limiting the current output of a high-current alternator seems silly indeed. And, even if you were willing to forfeit solar charging, we don’t know of a way that we’re aware of to “split” the Nations alternator output across the 1x, 60 amp, and 2x, 30 amp inputs while respecting those current limitations to each port and what would happen if it didn’t work exactly right? Would your entire Power Hub be destroyed? There are other, even more technical issues such as what kind of charge profile would you configure on a Wakespeed regulator for something that is actually a DC-DC charger input and not a battery? Would it have to behave as if it’s in “bulk” phase always so that there is never a current drop? Here again, the Victron system that seems complicated on the surface is, in reality, a lot easier and massively more reliable in this context. We’ve done the work to figure it all out and published it on our blog. We’ve also installed many of these systems and have high confidence in them. As far as cost, our Victron/Nations/Wakespeed secondary alternator bundle with a lot more battery storage (8,712 kWh vs 5,120) and all the benefits of a proper secondary alternator system is “only” about $1,000 more expensive. Cost Comparison Keeping in mind, that we’re not comparing apples to apples. Well, maybe we’re comparing different kinds of apples? Anyway, fruit aside, we tried to come up with a comparable system using high-quality, value-priced batteries like 280Ah SOK batteries and a bunch of Victron Energy equipment. The best way to do this is through one of our many best price bundles where we can offer you the very best pricing and help you gather up compatible components. And, unlike buying from Amazon or elsewhere, we are here to help you through your installation journey. Trust us, many people learn the hard way that Alexa isn’t very helpful when it comes to electrical system troubleshooting. 1) Start with a Best Price Bundle for Primary ComponentsSo, we started with our “internal BMS bundle” which simply means that the batteries have a Battery Management System (BMS) integrated into each battery (internal). In some cases, externalizing the BMS which is then shared by ALL the batteries in your system makes sense. For instance, a secondary alternator system where the charging rates are massive. Here’s a video of how we configured it: By the way, we have free example wiring diagrams that pair up with all our best price bundles to help guide you, or a professional installer. We refer to them as example wiring diagrams quite intentionally. There are so many ways to accomplish the same thing, safely and effectively that there is no single way to approach a power system. However, they are a great, totally free, starting point. 2) Accessory BundleThe “best price bundles” are designed to get you the primary components needed but not things like shore power inlets, load centers, fusing, wires, etc. While the primary components tend to be pretty aligned by “architecture” (internal BMS vs. external, etc.), these “accessories” are more universal and vary much more based on the nature of your system and particular installation requirements. Thus, we cooked up an “accessory bundle” (welcome to better names, please help!). So, step two for our price comparison was to configure the “accessory bundle” to follow the example wiring diagram for our internal BMS bundle. Here’s a video of that configuration. 3) Fiddly BitsBetween these two bundles, you’ll have everything you need outside of the “expendables” like lugs, heat shrink, wire management, a few beers, etc. For that, we have this spreadsheet for some recommended stuff that is frankly, too small and fiddly to be in our store. TotalsThe total for those two bundles, at the time we’re writing this post is $5,281. You’re probably going to need about $100 in “fiddly bits” (lugs, heat shrink, wire management, etc.). So, let’s round the grand total up to $5,400. Lower Pricing for Victron Energy EquipmentOne pretty incredible thing to be aware of is that, at the time of this writing (early 2024), Victron Energy has had two consecutive quarterly price reductions across their product catalog. Yes, you read that right… their pricing went down – twice – in six months! Every single other vendor in our store has either held steady or increased prices. But, Victron is a special company that manages their supply chain incredibly well and has decided to pass on the savings they’ve earned with their efficiencies to their customers. Bottom Line on CostThe 5kWh EcoFlow “Independence” Power Kit, at the time of this writing, is selling for around $7,300. So, the Victron-based system would be about $1,900 less expensive which, as we point out earlier, is very likely enough to hire an experienced professional installer to wire up your Victron system to overcome the limitations of the EcoFlow in this post. You’ll also benefit from an additional 2,272 kWh (172Ah) of battery storage with the Victron system which is pretty substantial. What About the Future We fully expect the EcoFlow products to get better over time and we’ll certainly be keeping an eye on them. You never know, perhaps we’ll rekindle the flame one day assuming this honest hot-take doesn’t burn any bridges. We hope not! We’re always looking for the most awesome stuff for camper vans and RVs. So, if new stuff comes to light, we’ll keep ya posted. Interested in 48-Volt Power Systems If so, check out this blog post that details a Victron Energy-based 48-volt secondary alternator electrical system that is truly massive!

Tips for Wiring the AC Terminals on a Victron Energy MultiPlus II

We get a lot of questions from our customers about this, so we’ve made a short video with some basic tips on how to wire up the 120-volt AC terminals (AC input 1, AC output 1) on a Victron Energy MultiPlus II inverter/charger including using ferrules and to NOT use the release button when inserting the wires! Ferrules are inexpensive and help out with most electrical installations. One great place to source them is Ferrules Direct. Here’s a link to the particular ferrules we recommend for the 6 AWG AC out 1 terminals. You would use the 10 AWG gauge version on the AC input terminals. We also have some other recommended tools and terminals you might need in this document.

Warehouse Tour Video

We thought it would be fun to share a little “behind the scenes” footage with our customers so we made this quick warehouse tour video. Sometimes we’re asked if we stock the stuff we sell in the store and the answer is, yes, literally tons of it! Of course, there are some things that are dropshipped but we have hundreds of the very best products for camper van or adventure rigs in stock every day! We’ve done the work of researching (and road testing) the best stuff so you don’t have to. Our catalog of products is carefully curated so you can have confidence you’re getting the best stuff for your van. Learn more here.

48-Volt Secondary Alternator Power System - Massive!

Build Your Own Electrical System Bundle We worked extensively with Victron Energy and Wakespeed to design a system that will work reliably and safely! However, electrical systems are complicated and we recommend that you either have your system installed by a professional or, if you do it yourself, have it inspected by a professional when it’s completed. Please use the information provided at your own risk. Follow this link to gain access to our library of FREE Camper Van Electrical System Wiring Diagrams. Use the PDF files to print/zoom in. After following the link, open the Vanlife Outfitters 48V Secondary Alternator Wiring Diagram for our example wiring corresponding with this blog post. In this blog post, we dive into a massive, 48-volt secondary alternator power system for mobile applications like a camper van or RV using the Nations 48-volt alternator kit, paired with a Wakespeed WS500 regulator and a bunch of Victron Energy components. You can buy all the components necessary in one best price bundle in our store. Update February 2024. We wrapped up the installation before our Peace Love & Vans event in early February 2024 (the one with the epic weather!). The system performed even better than our expectations producing over 5,000 watts of power and sometimes over 6,000 watts at typical “driving RPMS. Also, as expected, it doesn’t do anything at idle. So, this is a system that is amazing for anyone doing some driving – even if it’s just short distances between your campsite and sightseeing/grocery shopping! If you’re planning on using at idle, you should consider the “high idle kits” we discuss in the post! Jump down the results video and installation photos. Update January 2025. Victron has released their NG (new generation) Smart Lithium Batteries including a native 48-volt battery (51.2 nominal voltage). As a result, we’ve slightly redesigned this system to use those batteries instead of using 2x 24-volt batteries in series. The NG batteries have a bunch of new features you can learn about in this video. Please us the diagram link above or for the updated system example wiring diagram. If you’re looking for the older examples you can use the following for the 2-battery and the 4-battery example diagrams. We put a lot of time into developing, testing, and documenting these systems. The resources are all free but we can only afford to do this because folks support our store! A few years ago we introduced our 12-volt secondary alternator power system, along with all the same kind of resources that made installing an advanced power system like that accessible to tons of our customers.  Why a Secondary Alternator? Instead of huge battery banks, we like to focus on huge charging sources and “balancing” our battery bank size with the ability to get it recharged on a regular basis. We see a lot of customers with massive battery banks (think 1,000 amp hours or more) but try to rely on relatively tiny charging sources such as solar and DC-DC chargers. DC-DC charging is generally limited to about 50% of your vehicle’s factory alternator and solar is primarily limited by the small available space on a van roof – particularly when you have other things up there like Maxxfans or air conditioners. It just makes sense that, as you increase your battery storage capacity, you need to increase your charging capabilities. That’s where the secondary alternator comes in. These secondary alternators are designed specifically for high current charging, including external regulation from a device like the Wakespeed WS500 Pro for advanced charging in a way that keeps your batteries happy. That last point is pretty important since your batteries are one of the most expensive parts of your electrical system! The combo of the alternator and regulator is much like having a pretty big generator that is powered by your engine when you drive. It does put a load on the engine but it’s similar to other belt-driven stuff like your van’s air conditioner. Va Va Voltage – 12 vs. 24 vs. 48 Big picture, I think that most people should just stick with 12-volts unless they really need the benefits of a higher voltage system. 12-volts is very reliable and simple considering most “loads” running off a system are 12-volt or powered by an inverter supplying 120 volt AC. Our thoughts on 24 Volt systems have changed over time. You can read about why a 24 Volt system with secondary alternator or 24 Volt system (without secondary alternator) may be right for you. For those looking for massive alternator-based charging power, we still believe that a 48 Volt system is the best option. Take a look at the graphics below that compare Nations 12-volt, 280 amp alternator with the 24-volt, 140 amp alternator and the 48-volt, 100 amp alternator. The 48-volt alternator output is considerably higher which is one of the main reasons to consider a higher voltage system. At higher RPMs, it can produce about 70% more watts than the 12-volt alternator as you can see in the graphics below. So, if you need it, the jump from something like 3000 watts to something like 5000 watts of charging may be compelling enough to pay more for and deal with the extra complexity and other caveats (detailed below). In addition, the other advantages of a 24-volt system, like smaller wires, higher efficiency, and less heat are doubled with a 48-volt system. Native 48-Volt Loads – Air Conditioner Another advantage of a 48-volt system is the ability to run loads that are native to 48-volts like the impressive Nomadic Cooling X3 unit that we’ll be putting into our 48-volt test vehicle. Stay tuned for more blogs and videos about that! It’s the most powerful DC unit on the market and also very quiet and energy efficient – particularly compared to older, 120-volt AC rooftop options. The Benefit: Super Fast RechargingAs an example, let’s say you’re camping off-grid down here in Florida in the summer so you run your 48-volt air conditioner all night long and maybe have a fan running plus your refrigerator and other smaller loads. You might wake up in the morning, take a look at your Touch 50 screen connected to your Cerbo device, and see that the battery state of charge (SOC) of your batteries might be 60% or maybe even 50% meaning you’ve used something like 80 or 100 amp hours of stored power from your battery bank. Keep in mind that in this in this hypothetical story, you using one of the highest draw appliances – air conditioning – in a sort of worst-case scenario of Florida in the summertime. In other scenarios, you might use far less. With this 48-volt secondary alternator system, charging at around 100 amps, you would only need to drive for about 45 minutes to completely restore the power you used! Take a little drive to get some groceries. Maybe a little less if it was a sunny day and your solar panels were pitching in. Incidentally, if you use one of our Isotemp water heaters, connected to your van’s coolant lines, you’d also produce hot water for the next day or so with no additional power use. You see, we like the make use of the vehicle we’re driving around anyway! Let’s contrast that to using “just” the solar panels. In pretty much perfect conditions, the 4x, 200-watt solar panels shown in our example wiring diagram for this system might produce something like 12-14 amps so you’re looking at over 6 hours of sitting in the sun to accomplish the same thing as the grocery run and there are plenty of times you either don’t have sun or don’t want to park in it! Also, it can be quite difficult to fit so many panels on a roof of a van if you also want Maxxfans, air conditioning, etc. Surprising Cost ComparisonAt the time we’re publishing this blog post (prices change, y’all), the best price product bundle for our example 48-volt power system with 200 amp hours of battery storage at a nominal 51.2 volts (10,240 watt hours) configured with the 150/35 charge controller is “only” about $1,500 more expensive than the equivalent (same battery storage) 12-volt secondary alternator system. Caveats and Safety Currently, 48-volt alternators – of all makes/brands – have lower charging output at idle compared to their 12/24-volt counterparts. I’m sure this is being worked on and hopefully, it will improve over time but, for now, this isn’t ideal. 48-volts is high voltage and, as such, requires a lot more skill and care to be installed correctly for a safe system. If you’re going to install a 48-volt system you really need to know what you’re doing because the consequences of mistakes are much higher than a 12-volt system. In particular, “load dumps” can be catastrophic in a 48-volt system. A load dump is when the alternator is charging and there is a sudden, unplanned disconnect between the charging output and the batteries absorbing the current such as a short circuit, blown fuse, or a disconnect switch being turned off thus causing a voltage spike. High-quality 12/24-volt charging alternators, like the ones from Nations, have “avalanche diodes” that are designed to suppress the voltage spikes to something like 32 volts which, while high, isn’t likely to destroy your system components. However, 48-volt alternators don’t have this feature which means that a load dump can result in a 400+ volt spike which is extremely dangerous and will certainly destroy your system. Super duper bad. It’s much harder to find components that are rated for 48-volt systems – so many of the things that are normally used in 12-volt systems have a max rating of 32-volts or even 48-volts. In our 48-volt system, we’re going to see the battery bank voltage somewhere between 51 and 57-volts depending on the state of charge. We’ve made this easier for our customers. In our example system (see wiring diagram at the top of this page), all the components are rated for 58-volts or higher. Also, we have an entire section of our store that is now dedicated to this higher voltage world of 48! A 48-volt power system allows you to really scale up your solar system if you have the space for it (let’s say on a skoolie build with a large roof) since the current produced at the same wattage is much lower. But, you also need to be sure that your solar panel array(s) are running at high enough voltage to charge the batteries. Victron Energy solar charge controllers require that the input voltage from your panels (PV input voltage) is at least 5 volts higher than the battery bank voltage. Most solar panels we see our customers output something around 20 volts in optimal conditions and less in suboptimal conditions (cloudy, dusk, dirty panels, etc.). Therefore in a 12-volt system, it’s pretty easy to have the PV input voltage above the battery voltage. In a 48-volt system, you’ll need to be sure to wire enough panels in series (or series, parallel) to get the input voltage up to at least 5 volts greater than the battery voltage. Aiming for the higher end of the solar controller rating is a good idea so that you get some charging from solar, even in suboptimal conditions. In our example system, we show 2x sets of 2x panels in series that are then wired in parallel for something around 110-113 volts coming into the Victron Energy 150/35 solar charge controller.   System Overview If you download the wiring diagram as a PDF (link at top of the post), you can zoom in/out to see all the details presented there. In addition to the Nations/Wakespeed combo, this example system is full of brilliant blue boxes from Victron Energy!  We offer the system with 2x (or more) Victron 100 amp hour, 48-volt (51.2 nominal voltage) Smart Lithium NG batteries wired in parallel using the Victron Lynx Class-T Power In (M10). That is roughly equivalent to an 800 amp hour battery bank at 12-volts. These are “external-BMS” batteries which means that the Battery Management System is not inside each battery like many lithium batteries such as Battleborn or SOK, etc. Instead, this system uses the Lynx Smart BMS NG for both batteries (or more if you were to add additional in the future). The Lynx Smart BMS is a combination of a BMS, a system-wide battery monitoring shunt/monitor, and a giant disconnect switch (more on that later) that is integrated into the Lynx system from Victron including the single Lynx Distributor (M10) we have in this system. You can read more about internal vs. external BMS batteries in this post. The rest of the system is fairly typical for a van/RV/mobile power system (MultiPlus inverter/charger, solar controller, etc.) except that things are running at 48-volt instead of a more traditional 12-volt. We also need a pair of Orion 48/12/30 DC-DC converters running in parallel to convert the 48-volts DC to 12-volts DC to supply power to all the normal 12-volt stuff (lights, refrigerator, etc.). Battery Notes The example system and best price product bundle use 2x (or more) Victron 100 amp hour, 48-volt (51.2 nominal voltage) Smart Lithium NG batteries. When it comes to batteries, most people are pretty focused and familiar with two key specifications: voltage (48-volts in this case) and the storage capacity, typically expressed in amp hours (100Ah per battery in this case resulting in 200+ amp hours when wired into a bank in parallel). The other key specifications are the “recommended charge current” (≤100A for these batteries) and the “recommended discharge current” (≤100 amps for these batteries). Those last two are basically how quickly you can refill the batteries when charging or how quickly you can discharge them for your loads. If your chargers or loads are higher than those ratings, you can damage the batteries or create excessive heat. External BMS batteries like these typically have much better specifications since, often, an internal BMS is the limiting factor. You can see all the specifications of the batteries here. So, if there is any limitation at all in the example system, which is a strange thing to write in the context of this massive beast of a power system, it’s that you might find yourself in a rare and unusual situation where the combination of your off-grid charging sources (secondary alternator and solar) may actually exceed the recommended charge current rating of the battery bank. In the example system (with two batteries), this is 200 amps (100 amps per battery) which at the nominal voltage of 51.2 volts is 10,240 watts! So, that’s a lot of juice for being a “limitation”. Another great feature of this system is that it will automatically coordinate the maximum allowed charging current across all the charging sources using something called DVCC (Distributed Voltage and Current Control). This is possible because every charger in this system has digital connectivity to the Cerbo GX (Wakespeed regulating the Nations alternator via VE.Can, solar charge controller via VE.Direct and the MultiPlus inverter/charger via VE.Bus) and the Cerbo GX is communicating with the BMS and its current monitoring shunt via VE.Can as well. In the Cerbo GX we can set a “maximum charge current” and have it intelligently manage this for us. So, in those “perfect” conditions you’re going to keep the batteries happy but in some cases, forfeit some of potential power available at that moment by throttling down one or more charging source. Below is this setting in the Cerbo GX (Menu -> Settings -> DVCC). Since you have plenty of “headroom” on the maximum charge current, it’s even possible to charge from the standard, vehicle alternator with this 12-volt to 48-volt battery to battery (DC-DC charger) from Sterling Power that could be added to the system so that you could charge from BOTH your Nations secondary alternator as well as your factory vehicle/alternator or use that unit as a sort of backup. Victron recommends that you update the firmware of new batteries (using VictronConnect and Bluetooth) and pre-charge your batteries individually before wiring them up into a system. Full details in the manual. And, if you’re wondering, you don’t feel like you’re getting shocked if you touch the 48-volt terminals of the battery. Here I am demonstrating this and I feel fine 🙂 But, Where Is The Main Disconnect? Missing the bulky red disconnect/battery switch you’re probably used to seeing bolted onto a Lynx Distributor? This system uses the Victron Energy Lynx Smart BMS NG which has one of those massive switches built into it. It’s a 500 amp rated “contactor” that can open or close to act as a switch being “on” or “off” respectively. As the name suggests, it’s also the BMS (Battery Management System) for our Victron Smart Batteries so, if the batteries are distressed (too hot, too cold, over or under voltage), they can trigger this contactor to “open” which will electrically disconnect all the “loads and chargers” connected downstream from the Lynx Smart BMS electrically. Finally, there is also a battery monitoring shunt inside the Lynx Smart BMS that communicates with the Cerbo GX to show the same kind of battery status information that the popular BMV-712 does. All this in one single box! But that’s not all! If you look closely at the example wiring diagram, you’ll see that we have a toggle switch wired into the “remote” terminals on the Lynx Smart BMS. This allows you to open/close the contactor (turn off/on the system) with that switch in the same way you would a big, bulky main disconnect switch with one HUGE advantage. Anytime the contactor in the Lynx Smart BMS is about to open – whether triggered by the batteries to protect themselves – or by you manually – the BMS will communicate this to the Wakespeed WS500 regulator before this happens so that the alternator can stop producing charging current thus preventing an extremely dangerous voltage spike that would occur if someone flipped off a manual disconnect switch while the alternator was charging! More about so-called “load dumps” earlier in this post. Field Drive in 48-Volt Alternator Systems First, what is the field drive? It’s the wire that supplies voltage to the alternator’s rotating field coil. In this example system, it’s the blue wire on the Wakespeed wiring harness “alternator leg”. You can think of the field drive as the sort of gas pedal – the more field voltage, the more current the alternator will produce. If you want to dive deeper into how alternators work, this is a pretty good video. We often get asked if you can install a secondary alternator onto an engine before you finish the rest of the electrical system and wire it up to that system. The answer is yes! Even though the alternator will be spinning after the mechanical installation, it won’t be producing any current until the Wakespeed regulator gets installed and provides the field voltage to the alternator. In 12-volt and 24-volt systems it’s common for the “field” to be specified to operate at the same voltage as the connected battery. This is not always the case with 48-volt alternators. In fact, many 48-volt alternators, the field is actually specified at 12-volt. In such cases, there are a couple of ways the Wakespeed WS500 can be deployed. This is what we recommend… Apply a derate value using the $SCA command when configuring your Wakespeed. The $SCA command has three ‘”derate” values which can be set to “normal”, “small alt”, and “half-power”. These are typically used to reduce the output of an alternator to account for system cooling concerns and prevent overheating and/or to reduce the load on the driving engine. But they can also be used to effectively reduce the “field voltage” from 48-volt to allow direct driving of a 12-volt field alternator even when the red, power supply wire on the Wakespeed harness (ALT+) is attached to a 48-volt battery system. To do this simply start with a “normal’ derate value of 0.25 (25%) which will reduce the average field voltage to an acceptable operation range. Due to the prevalence of 12-volt fields in 48-volt alternators, beginning with version 2.5.0 of the Wakespeed firmware, it will default to this 25% derate values if those have not been explicitly defined using the $SCO command detailed above. If your alternator has a true 48-volt field (the Nations alternator we show in this example system uses a 12-volt field), you will want to explicitly issue a $SCO command to restore the 100% field drive (r max field drive is otherwise appropriate). Connect the red, power supply wire on the Wakespeed harness (ALT+) to a 12-volt source such as the vehicle battery. Importantly, if you take this approach, you need to be sure to wire the red/yellow wire (VBAT+) from the Wakespeed harness to the 48-volt battery for proper voltage sensing. This does not work with the “van harness” which is a simplified version of the “standard” Wakespeed harness that does not include the VBAT+ wire. Circuit Protection In our example wiring diagram (zoom in on the PDF), we’re using the Lynx Smart BMS with a Lynx Distributor downstream as the main bus bar. From left to right, we show the following connections and fusing: 125A (80V) mega fuse for the Nations alternator charging output 125A (80V) mega fuse for the MultiPlus inverter/charger 80A (80V) mega fuse to feed the Littelfuse secondary bus bar that accepts lower current rated, MIDI fuses (see below) 60A (80V) mega fuse for the charging output of the solar charge controller. Note that this fuse size is larger than it needs to be (max of 35 amps from the charge controller multiplied by 1.25 (25% additional) is around 44 amps. However, the 10 AWG wire we show can accept 60 amps at 48-volts, so we can have this additional headroom. Remember that circuit protection is to ensure your wires are not exceeding their maximum ampacity. The example wiring diagram uses a very compact, Littelfuse bus bar with MIDI fuses. as a secondary bus bar. It’s kind of like a miniature Lynx Distributor in the sense that it combines a bus bar with fusing. However, it does not have a negative bus bar so any required negative wiring is run to the main bus bar (Lynx Distributor). Ideally, you keep your wire lengths for the positive and negative wires close to the same lengths. There are the following three connection points inside the secondary bus bar. 30A (58V) MIDI fuse for one of the two Orion 48/12/30 converters. Similar to the 60 amp fuse above, this is larger than the load requires but the lowest amp-rated MIDI fuse from Victron. The Orions will pull about 6-8 amps to create the 360 watts at 12 volts. But, here again, the 10 AWG wire is more than capable of carrying up to 60 amps if there was something like a short circuit. 30A (58V) MIDI fuse for the second of the two Orion 48/12/30 converters 50A (58V) MIDI fuse for an additional 48-volt appliance such as an air conditioner. In our example, we’d be using a Nomadic Cooling X3 which calls for a 50 amp fuse (see specifications chart). Configuration With everything wired up, let’s dive into configuring the system! Given the nature of this post, we’re only going to focus on the configuration steps for enabling the secondary alternator and Wakespeed regulator. One awesome feature of this system provided with the Lynx Smart BMS is that the charge profile for the other Victron Energy chargers in our example system (MultiPlus inverter/charger and solar charge controller) is managed intelligently by the Cerbo GX using DVCC. This is possible because all of these devices are “talking” to each other digitally through the Cerbo GX. If you want to learn more about this DVCC magic you can read this section of the Cerbo GX manual. One benefit of this is that it’s quite easy to configure the system for charging. But, If your system has other chargers/devices that don’t have a data connection on them (no VE.Bus, VE.Direct, VE.Can, etc.), such as an older (pre-Orion XS) Orion DC-DC charger, and therefore cannot be managed by DVCC, you’ll have to configure that device the “old fashioned” way with VictronConnect which is beyond the scope of this post. We also won’t discuss all the setup possibilities of the Cerbo GX – you can check out this other post about that. Instead, we’ll only focus on what’s necessary to make it work with the Wakespeed regulator. However, we’ll be dedicating another post to the Cerbo GX including connecting it to VRM so “stay tuned” for that, or consider signing up for our email newsletter which is available at the bottom of all of our pages. Victron Lynx Smart BMS Configuration with Victron ConnectRemember that any Victron product with the word Smart in the name means that you can configure, monitor, and control it via Bluetooth using the VictronConnect app. So, if you haven’t done so already, you’ll want to install VictronConnect. Links to download the app are available for iOS, Android, Windows, or MacOS on the VictronConnect page. Most folks find the app simple to use but you can read through the manual if you need it. To use it, you’ll need Bluetooth enabled on your mobile device or computer so that it can communicate with the various Victron products. Once you open the app, you’ll see a list of all the Victron products that are within Bluetooth range -all with their factory default names. You can easily rename each device to make it unique to your install if you’d like. To configure (or monitor/control) a device simply click on its name from the list in VictronConnect. The first time you connect you’ll be asked to pair with that device. The default pairing PIN is 000000. We recommend you change the PIN on all your devices so that other users of VictronConnect don’t mess with your system! Keep in mind that if you find yourself in a place with other camper vans/RVs that have Victron components you might see a bunch of other devices listed in VictronConnect – basically anything that’s within Bluetooth range. By the way, if you don’t have any of this equipment yet but are curious how it all works, you can actually use VictronConnect with “virtual” (demo) devices. In other words, you can go through the settings and screens available in VictronConnect for any Victron Smart product by using the demo library available in VictronConnect. This is a great feature to use when planning a system. Let’s start with the Lynx Smart BMS NG. Connect to this device in VictronConnect. The first screen you’ll see is the “status” tab that displays the same kind of information as other battery monitors from Victron including the calculated state of charge (SOC) as a percentage and if you scroll down, a bunch of other information about the battery including voltage, current, etc. Below is a screenshot of this screen. Since the Lynx BMS is configured for 12-volt batteries by default, the first thing you’ll notice is an error reading “battery voltage not allowed”. You are likely to be prompted for a firmware update as well. If so, proceed with that firmware upgrade. Next, enter the settings of the Lynx Smart BMS NG by tapping on the “gear icon” in the very top right part of the screen. Here you’ll want to change the system voltage to 48 and tell the BMS about your batteries. In our base system with the 2x, 100Ah batteries in parallel you would enter 2x for batteries and 200 amp hours for campacity. You’ll also want to change the “relay mode” setting to “alternator ATC”. This is how the “white wire” (feature in wire) that we wired from the Wakespeed harness into terminal #9 on the multi-connector of the Lynx SmartBMS is interpreted by the BMS. It enables the ATC (allow to charge) relay to disable charging from the Wakespeed/Nations if the battery triggers that state. Note: if you’ve ever configured another Victron Energy battery monitor such as the BMV-712 or SmartShunt you may notice that the settings presented here are different and, in some ways, more simple than you’d see on the other products. That’s because, in this example system, you can literally only use one single type of battery – a Victron Smart lithium battery. The batteries may have different capacities (200 vs. 300Ah, etc.) but they are the same baseline so many of the settings about the battery that you have to change/set in other systems are already known/assumed in this case. Wakespeed WS500 ConfigurationIf you buy your Wakespeed regulator from us as part of our best price product bundle for this system it will ship pre-configured based on the information we collect when you add the stuff to your cart. However, configuring a Wakespeed WS500 regulator is pretty simple when using the Wakespeed Android app – particularly with the latest Wakespeed Pro that we stock that has a Bluetooth connection.   Configuring the Orion 48/12/30 DC-DC ConvertersThese are the devices that convert the 48-volt system voltage to 12-volts for your main DC load center for your common 12-volt stuff like lights, fans, appliances, etc. They are not “Smart” so there is no Bluetooth connection for configuration/monitoring. But they’re quite simple devices. All you’re going to do with these is get a tiny screwdriver and turn the potentiometer (how often do you get to use that word!) to adjust the output voltage (-15% to +25% of the default output voltage). Turn counterclockwise to decrease the output voltage. Turn clockwise to increase the output voltage. In our system, we’re setting this to right around 13.5 volts which is a typical “float voltage” in a 12-volt system. Charts! Nations Alternator Charging Output Comparisons (12V / 24 / 48V)Click On Images To Open Larger Other Recommend Reading/Resources This video details every connection on the Wakespeed WS500 van harness. There is a lot of relevant additional information in our blog post about the 12-volt version of this system that we didn’t want to repeat here. We’ve always used the Blue Sea Circuit Wizard for sizing wires in 12-volts but it doesn’t work for 48-volt systems. However, we found this 48-volt wire size calculator to be very useful. There are quite a few configuration options.  Blog post about configuring a Cerbo GX and Lynx Shunt for battery monitoring. If you have a Sprinter and want to remotely start it at a specified battery state of charge (SOC) and/or have it idle up to produce more RPMs/alternator charging current check out this kit from Mid City Engineering. A quick note on Mercedes Sprinter N62 bracket: The general consensus (Nations, our installers, reports from the internet) is that the 3-belt system that is used by Nations in their kits for Sprinters without the N62 “factory secondary alternator bracket” are better than the N62 version. In fact, we’ve heard of reports from Nations that some people who paid at the dealership for the N62 bracket have taken it off in favor of the 3-belt option. Installation Photos and Testing Results Note, these tests were were done with the older/original configuration of this system using 2x, 24-volt batteries wired in series as we detail at the beginning of this blog post. However, what we’re testing is really the performance of the Nations alternator with the Wakespeed regulator which will be the same with the newer, 48-volt Smart Lithium NG batteries.