Finally cracking on with my off-grid cabin project after about two years of "I'll start it next spring." It's a 20m² timber frame structure on my smallholding in Shropshire, and I'm trying to nail down the electrical setup before I get too far into the build. I've got four 400W panels going on the roof (1.6kW peak), feeding into a 200Ah 48V lithium bank — a fairly modest setup but I reckon it'll cover lighting, a laptop, phone charging, and a small 12V compressor fridge.
Where I'm getting confused is inverter sizing. I've seen advice ranging from "just get a 1000W pure sine and be done with it" to "you'll regret anything under 3kW." The cabin won't have an electric shower or a kettle — I'm keeping it simple with a small woodburner and a gas hob. The only thing that might cause a spike is if I eventually add a small workshop tool like a jigsaw or a drill. I was looking at the Victron Phoenix 1200W or maybe stretching to the Multiplus 2000W which would also give me the option of hooking up a small generator for bulk charging.
Has anyone built something similar and wished they'd gone bigger — or gone big and felt it was overkill? Would love to hear what your actual daily loads worked out to be rather than the theoretical worst case.
