5v lighting.. NiCd power, small solar panels, and LED's.. anyone else doing this?

[Itsavanman]

so with the market flooded with NiCd reserve cell phone charging power packs, and usb powered lights and gizmos. I've decided to light my camper with LED's and 2 8200 mah ni-cd power packs, they take roughly 2 hrs to charge with a 1a charge, and about 5 hrs to discharge depending on the load. plan is to main charge with a 5-10w solar panel and an emergency charger hooked to the tow rig when / if needed. the reasoning is, these power packs are light, and small, so for a little expo camper, these things would work great.. so, anyone else doing anything like that? hows it workin out for ya?

 

[calicamper]

I sorta did a similar idea last summer. Though I used a 18amp hour deep cycle sealed lead acid battery, $28. Cheap Solar Controller $28, cheap 6 fuse fuse box $5. I have two 10watt panels I keep boxed up and just set them out when were camping.

I sewed strip LED lighting into our tent Privacy walls and put a switch / dimmer on them. I also added some lighting in various places on the trailer. LED lighting runs on 12volts any more voltage and you cook the LEDs. 20ft of strip LED ligting draws just over an amp. My total load with everything turned on and a 12volt charging station with Ipad and phone charging is about 6amps. Though typical use would be one or two 5ft LED strips turned on which is about .4 amps.

My whole power kit is built into a 50cal ammo box, which is bolted to the front plate on the trailer. I think wire and switches all the parts I have about $180 into it.

Your issue is voltage regulation to 12volts using the batteries your talking about.

 

[calicamper]

My two Renogy 10watt panels generate about 1amp in good conditions. So far its worked great. But winter / shorter days charging would need more like a 40watt set up.

 

[Itsavanman]

I'm not using 12v its staying at 5v the two storage batteries are going to be wired in parallel to double their mah discharge rate (16.4 AH, 16400 Mah).. all the leds im using are wired for 5v as 5v USB string lights etc are abundant and cheap on ebay. I'm still working out the math to see what my 3 lighting circuits will draw wattage wise..

 

[Hnoroian]

I think you will have more of a selection with 12v led's. I know there are 5v led's but it is slim pickings.

 

[calicamper]

I think you will have more of a selection with 12v led's. I know there are 5v led's but it is slim pickings.

Agreed. 12v LED options are abundant and dirt cheap. 5v LED makes no sense especially given you have lots of 12v LED switches and such you can use. And if your going through the trouble of setting that up, other 12v stuff can be added as needed.

 

[Itsavanman]

I think there is tons of 5v crap you can plug into your computer, that's why I decided 5v was the way to go. Far from slim pickings, however, there are more premade gizmos setup for 12v. but since nothing I have found fits what i want anyways this isn't a problem, its a from scratch build. aside from the mood lights, which are the easiest to find on ebay. I've got everything I need to finish this. the whole idea was to save weight and space, and get a supply voltage that was as close as possible to native to be more efficient. what got me stuck on 5v is everything electronic uses 5v. from the sensor feed voltage on cars, to computers, as the heart of all this stuff is transistors and diodes, which is what LED's are, So, I'm hopefully banking on the fact that 5v was decided on because its the most efficient. but it might not be for lighting. so that will wait to be proved. at the very least, using 5v will still conserve on weight, and space, so that's still a win in my book. not to mention cheap. So I guess I'll be the guinea pig on this one, and see how well it works in application. can anyone with some electronic background shed some light on why computers use 5v?

 

[pugslyyy]

can anyone with some electronic background shed some light on why computers use 5v?

That's just what they used for the early motherboards because the early (Pentium and before) CPUs ran on it. Today it is actually 3.3V so if you were going to standardize on something other than 12V (and I don't know why you would), 3.3V is more future-proof.

 

[Happy Joe]

I have been using a 35 (or thereabouts) amp hour lead acid & small solar (5 to 8 watts) system, Jeep camping, for decades... works well, even better once LED light bulbs became relatively inexpensive, but probably way undersized for powering a fridge.

A couple of years ago I decided to try the USB stuff (13,000 mahr Li-ion USB power pack & 5 watt foldable panel, USB modified LED headlamp etc.) for backpacking; but the need for many cables made it too much of a hassle. I went back to NiMh AA batteries and a small solar charger.. less weight, less complex and more enjoyable, at least for me.

Enjoy!

 

[plh]

Here is my basic setup. I built a Li-ion battery pack instead of NiCd.

meter:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00J3JSEG6

batteries:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00C26OWGS

case:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/181622518660

Solar:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00TEQJEC6

USB hub

http://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-4-Port-Individual-Switches-HB-UMLS/dp/B00BWF5U0M

Lights:

http://www.amazon.com/Camping-Children-Portable-Emergency-warmwhite/dp/B00QX096L0

 

[calicamper]

My gear

Controller manages battery works great. But I shut down the 24/7 live out feed when not in use or it runs the battery down over a months time.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00N...aw/d/B00NCTST4U/ref=ya_aw_od_pi?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Output side has a 11.4v safety cut off so I run the output side to a 6 fuse fuse box
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00QMTAZ1W/ref=ya_aw_od_pi?ie=UTF8&psc=1
All pos feeds come of the fuse box
I have little ground bar tied to the neg out on the controller
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B005EHHLD8/ref=ya_aw_od_pi?ie=UTF8&psc=1
All the neg feeds from gear powered by the fuse box are tied in here at the ground bar.

My lights
In the tent with dimmer switches https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B005EHHLD8/ref=ya_aw_od_pi?ie=UTF8&psc=1
And the big boy 1amp draw that is my rear facing light for night arrivals. Great light!!!
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ya/ref...c=od&ii=&noi=&of=&oi=&oid=114-7472908-3665015

My dimmer switches
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ya/ref...c=od&ii=&noi=&of=&oi=&oid=002-6326604-9449042

Battery
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ya/ref...c=od&ii=&noi=&of=&oi=&oid=114-0247733-3057049

My usb / charging center snipped the plug off and added a automotive harness style plug to the fuse box
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ya/ref...c=od&ii=&noi=&of=&oi=&oid=114-7472908-3665015

The controller, battery, fuse box and battery are all mounted in a 50cal ammo box bolted tk the trailer.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ya/ref...c=od&ii=&noi=&of=&oi=&oid=114-7472908-3665015

I set 2 of these out on a chair to charge it
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ya/ref...c=od&ii=&noi=&of=&oi=&oid=114-7472908-3665015

Ran this set up all summer wife loved it. Worked great. All in wire, some switches and fittings I think I was at $230 total with all the little screws/retainers shrink covering, solder etc.

 

[plh]

My gear

Fix your links please, you must have been logged into you amazon account when you copied/pasted

 

[pugslyyy]

Fix your links please, you must have been logged into you amazon account when you copied/pasted

I get

"This order isn't owned by signed account. Please back to sign-in page and sign-in again. "

 

[calicamper]

Ill need to do it with my laptop. Its not happy with my phone.

 

[calicamper]

Controller
I have the 20amp version of this
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B013H...controller&dpPl=1&dpID=41cttizSdlL&ref=plSrch

Battery
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B001C...hr+battery&dpPl=1&dpID=31FCpEcszCL&ref=plSrch

Fuse box
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00QM...e+fuse+box&dpPl=1&dpID=41I7B97bgSL&ref=plSrch

Ground bar
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B002F...Ground+bar&dpPl=1&dpID=41hs2gi-aSL&ref=plSrch

All the above is in a single 50cal ammo box.

Lights
One ATV LED spot
Looks like this one but different brand 1amp load when on.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00DR...i=AC_SX118_SY170_QL70&keywords=Atv+spot+light

LED strip
Different brand but looks like the same cheap stuff
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B007S...ther+strip&dpPl=1&dpID=51cnPfgv6KL&ref=plSrch

Panels
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00J...ogy+10watt&dpPl=1&dpID=51BK1zfyvVL&ref=plSrch
Dimmer switches
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00HT...r+switches&dpPl=1&dpID=41-xfIi3kLL&ref=plSrch

12v charging hub 6usb and 2 cig sockets wired to a second cig plug / cut the plug off and rewired it with an auto style accessory plug.