Great thread. One thing worth flagging that I haven't seen mentioned yet — keep a close eye on your alternator temperature if you're running sustained absorption on longer motorway runs.
@RustyTinker one thing nobody's mentioned yet — at -3°C your alternator charging on the drive up there would've been less effective too, so you may have arrived with less in the bank than you...
Great project @SparkySailor! One thing worth mentioning that I haven't seen covered yet — don't forget to register the installation with your local building control, or use a Part P registered...
Really looking forward to the full write-up @JakeMartin. One thing I'd be particularly curious about - what's your panel orientation like given you mentioned it's at the bottom of a long garden?
@Spider6 worth checking what your actual alternator output voltage is at idle with a multimeter — some modern Fords have smart alternators that drop voltage quite aggressively when the ECU decides...
Just finished wiring up a 175W panel on the roof of my Transit Custom and went with a Victron SmartSolar 75/15 because everyone on here seems to swear by Victron.
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