Ka'a Nui - Mana (solar power and house batteries charging)

Ka'a Nui Solar power

Ka'a Nui has about 700 watts of 12-volt power on the roof.  How best to use and implement is what this blog will be about.

Six panels of three different types make up the 700 watts, 2-50 watts at the rear of the van, 2- 100 watts at the front and I think 2- 190 watts panels in the center of the van roof.  .

Issues to consider...

• Can I install and ship lithium batteries?  Not sure yet, having reached out to both Pasha and Matson, it is hard to tell what our options are.
• Running the 750w panels with a Renogy 50amp DC2DC with MPPT controller to the battery.  
• Renogy DC2DC setup to charge from cars alternator works well.
• How large of a house battery and what type, GMA or Lithium?. TBD
• Wire runs on the roof need to be cleaned up, and not be on the roof flapping in the wind.

Installed as follows

• 750W panels to a Renogy DC2DC 50 amp MPPT converter, also added into it the input from the high output alternator as a charging source.  
• seems to work, but software is wonky, hard to track solar, and there is no tracking unless you pay extra, really lame Renogy.
• Renogy 2000W Pure Sine Wave Inverter
• Stupid on my part, I thought I ordered with monitoring.  
• A myriad number of fuses, switches and isolators, and more fuses and switches between each device
• Batteries, for now, a single GMA H8 battery, but leave room (build) for 2-200 or 300ah batteries.
• Convert all wires from solar to 8awg.
• Battery cables are all /00 gauge

9/3/2024

I have a ton of stuff from Renogy and starting to lay out the electronics.  Used the inverter in our house during a 36-hour power outage.  That worked well, but would have been nice to charge from the solar panels.  Also, once the van ships, won't have that feature to use.  Hmm.

So we have

• 2k renogy inverter
• dc2dc charger 50Amp MPPT, solar and alternator charger.
• Renogy one core, monitors system and shows van slope.
• Shunt, 500amp to monitor batteries

10/20/24, Buss bars are a bit oversized and have been replaced.  Bottom is shut off to main battery..

10/20/24, Installing the Renogy DC2DC charger.  Seems to work, kinda cool and simpler than anticipated.

Nov 13, 2024 Upper control 

Inside of electrical control panel

Upper cabinet power layout.  Top right is water gauge, tied to water pump.  Inverter, bottom left, and Renogy one-core next to it.  One core is pretty lame, I would consider it to be a huge waste of money and the electrons it absorbs.  Next is 500amp Renogy shunt.  Works, but thinks I have a 7Ah battery installed, and blinks when charging, that is irritating.  Top left are the switches to turn on everything, such as lights, heater, fans, water pump, USB and other 12v things.  Each is on a breaker, not a fuse.