Rooted Off Grid
Rooted Off Grid
- 2
- 165 833
Hi. We are Joshua and Elizabeth, and we're on a journey to weave together our desire to be more self-sufficient like our pioneer ancestors, with our love of modern technology, building our online businesses, all while living off grid. Join us as we live boondocking in our RV while we build our Colorado Mountain Homestead.
Пікірлер
Very disappointed in Battle Born batteries. I bought 6 of these and used them for 4 1/2 years. Each battery has gone back for repair. Up until recently, they determined the BMS had failed. They cut open the case, replaced the BMS, tested the capacity as good and sent them back to me. When I recently sent two more in, they said that all my repairs were caused by bad wiring and all the cells were unbalanced. I use a lithium profile charging system, but I could not guarantee all cable lengths were exactly equal between the units and they are saying user fault. They want about $1750 to replace the two batteries, claiming I made a mistake. I do not buy it based on what I was told before. I had previously discussed my system and they told me it should be OK. So I got 4 years, a lot of lost vacation time, a lot of effort in packing and sending them back, making drawings, taking pictures, and over an hour in various phone calls and E-Mails. They do a huge amount of advertising, but in the end, their batteries just don't hold up.
Battle born fired every employee that refused the covid vaccine. They are garbage.
Exactly you under purchased the need and blame Battle Born? Dude cost per watt is your problem to solve and they have better solutions to provide. Your lack of education on the subject is your fault alone, as the information is readily available. Battle Born is the best in business and best in class and cheaper than any lead acid, wet, AGM or Lithium solution out there. I get it, You're looking to make $ off this infomertial
Because they put a battle born name on it makes it great!! Hell no they are junk
With that big of a system why wouldn't you have gone 48 volt. At a minimum 24 volt. The price savings in cable alone would have bought at least one battery. If not two!
What did you do with the old batteries and were you compensated for this video by your new best choice?
Those poor slides tubby is going to kill that poor rv
I live at 10,000ft looking at him I seriously doubt he would survive in the Mountains of Colorado. He needs to review his medical condition not his batteries.
Five years ago, we retired, sold everything and went FT. It was the best decision we ever made. We discovered we love boondocking and quickly learned the advantages of solar. We decided to build our solar/battery system in 2 phases, a 12v system for our basic 12v DC needs and a 48v system for our 110v A/C needs. We started by building a 620-watt liftable solar array on the side of our motorhome. We lift it to the optimal angle to boost its output 20-30% vs flat mounted panels, especially in the winter. It makes a nice bedroom window awning too, practically lifting itself with a couple gas struts, and it's easy to clean, standing safely on the ground. We finished the 12v part of our build last January, with the addition of a 560ah LiFePo-4 battery that we built with 8, 280ah "A" grade prismatic cells. We use a Heltec 330amp (1,200a surge) BMS with a 5a active balancer to keep the cells synched up. It cost us less than $1,500 to build this 560ah 12v, 7.1Kwh battery, (the equivalent of 2 Battleborn Game Changers) including the high amp BMS. We chose these cells rather than a pre-built battery because they fit perfectly under the steps of our MH where our old pair of GC-2 golf cart batteries used to reside. We insulated the battery compartment, cut a 1" hole in our step risers and installed a tiny computer CPU fan to keep this space at close to room temperature, so we don't have to worry about the BMS shutting down charging if they get too cold - or their life reduced from getting too hot. We use an 80A Progressive Dynamics LFP converter/charger, a 1,000w Renogy inverter, an Epever 50a MPPT charge controller and a Lnex battery monitor. This entire 12v system cost us under $3,500 to build and takes care of all of our basic off-grid needs except for air conditioning and microwave use. By mounting our solar array on the side of our coach, we left the roof free to rack 8, 550w solar panels (4,400 watts) down the length of our 35ft Class A, 15" off our roof, above our AC, fan shrouds, etc. We're in the middle of this build now. The front two panels angle down to where they meet the roof at a 9.5-degree angle to prevent air getting under them and lifting them. The rack is finished, and I just coated the roof with Henry's Tropicool yesterday to encapsulate all the mounting brackets, ensuring its watertight again. This huge array will cover our entire roof, providing some nice shade with plenty of cooling air underneath, further increasing solar output and reducing the heat load on the air conditioners too. They were only 51 cents/watt shipped to our door. Our solar panels, wiring, breakers, etc. arrived a few weeks ago, but we're taking our time to install everything over the winter, as at 67 yrs. old, we're moving much slower these days. We mounted our Sungold Power all-in-one 48V, 5,000W Inverter/100A charge controller/battery charger on the wall in our bedroom as it's close to our under-bed batteries and we're tight on space. Our 48v battery bank uses 16, 320ah prismatic cells for about the same capacity as your battery bank. These cells only cost us $1,726 from EEL batteries. The 200amp Heltec 16s BMS we're using was only $143 w/shipping. Together with our 560ah 12v bank, we will have a total of 23.5 kwh of batteries onboard - kept charged by over 5,000 watts of solar. We removed the 13.5k btu rooftop Dometic AC we had in the bedroom and are replacing it with an EG4 28.5 seer-2, 12k btu mini-split heat pump on the upper rear of our motorhome. The mounting brackets arrived yesterday, but the heat pump itself is still in transit. This second phase will provide 24/7 off-grid air conditioning, supplemental heat from the heat pump and allow occasional usage of our rooftop mounted, soft start equipped Furrion AC in the front of our MH during peak afternoon hours. We'll have a total of 6,000 watts of 120v ac power on hand. We'll soon have total off-grid electrical independence for a total budget of around $11,500, (including the $1,450 high-efficiency heat pump) reserving our onboard 5,500w generator for back-up use only. Take care, we hope to see you down the road!
very good info however the click on pic is a bit of a bait and switch. looks like your battle borns were bad for some reason when its more they didnt fit your set up
Good video with valid reasons but to be swayed away from Battle Born I need teardown/quality of construction information. As yet I haven't found that for Enduro Power 300AH units.
I'm fully remodeling my toy hauler would like to talk to you about your input on what I am doing i went with eg4 12000watt inverter 9900watts of solar 1120ah 48 volt lithium batteries
Great video I have a older camper 34 foot 5th wheel the people that bought it new did same thing you're doing I put solar on it and I get people ask where my generator taking it to big races
Why 100AHs? Battleborn makes a 270AH.
Just saw you only have 2 videos. Hope everything is ok.
great review. watched ETJ's video on Enduro the other day and was intrigued. Now yours, with ETJ as a guest.....must be a sign. We plan on upgrading to lithium at some point in the future and will consider Enduro strongly. My only concern is as a company grows, it often turns into something like Battle Born. I imagine Battle Born was a similar experience early on, but their huge success and growth does come at a cost. Enduro does sound like a great company. Like you, my biggest challenge is the design phase. I'm a former licensed electrician and pretty handy guy, so the install won't be as much of a challenge if I have some good guidance on the front end design portion.
So basically it isn't the battery it is "customer service and size." Battle born needs to listen the quality is there for battleborn.
I am not a Battle Born fan but your technical arguments make absolut zero sense. All these battery makers use standard cells, Enduro is no different! Plus Battle born batteries are made in the USA, Enduro Batteries are made in China and are therefore highly overpriced.
you sound like a favor of the month type of person, gun ho on Battle Born one month, dumping them the next.... who's going to take your advice, you need to do more research up front before you recommend any product to anyone else and have them waste hard earn money like you, when most don't have it to waste.
Very good video! I don't know much about lithium batteries but did just buy 3, 48v, 30amp Epoch batteries to replace the 300lbs of lead/acid batteries. The Lithium batteries only weigh about 100lbs and leave a lot more space in my little golf cart!! Like you, I didn't want to go cheap and have to do a replacement again. I'm retired and feel that at my age, (75) that the 11 year warranty will more than carry me to the end LOL
Where are they made? I can't seem to find it on the website. Prices seem pretty comparable, BB gives free ground shipping, but the Endurance is a little bit smaller. Then again this video was made a year ago. I am looking to go off grid, so doing a lot of research and this is a big decision. The hardest part is making a game plan on where to stay and travel to and what RV to get, wow there is a lot fo them! New RV's seem to have break in issues, any advice on that? Thanks for the video!
Fuking ridiculous anyone needs that much AC power and capacity. I dont give a crap what brand anyone needing 10 batteries worth of power isnt a typical or normal RV off grid user.
Battle born are the bomb!!!!!!!!!!!! they are great people!!!!!!!!!
How do you plan for battery location placement vis-a vis escape in the rare event there is a lithium battery overheat or fire . How do you manage low battery ambient temperature in cold weather?
How have the Enduro Power batteries performed since the change over? Have you had any failures or problems? How were they handled? Amazon has reports of customers having multiple failures and having a hard time getting a response from the company. What has your experience been? Thank you for the information.
Other than weight reasons, why couldn't they just add the Enduro Li batteries to their existing Battle Born Li setup? It seems like an extraordinary trade off to throw away $5,000 in batteries just to save 100 lbs.
Why 10ea 100ah Battleborns? Why not fewer, but higher ah Battleborns? That is a lot of wires that offer resistance over 10ea batteries. I don’t think you made the proper Battleborn application choices. 10ea batteries swapped out is a lot of money.
This is just an ad for Enduro Power.
I built my own from individual cells, way way cheaper and way less space. You could've got 3 times the storage in the space of 10 Battle Borns. I switched from BB also, twice the power in 2/3's the space.
No point in having a massive battery bank if your solar panels cant charge it! Its more important to have more solar panels then batteries but they wont tell you that cause they make more money by selling you batt you dont need.
Paid advertisement
I'm puzzled why anyone would need the equivalent of 20 x 100ah of LFP to be off-grid in an RV. I built my own batteries with raw cells from China and an excellent BMS. Only 7.8 kwh of LFP via 16x 150ah cells in an 8S2P config for 24v 300ah, and this ran out fulltime rig for the 3 years we fulltime dry camped in it, including air conditioning 24x7x365, and air fryers, microwave, residential fridge, dual induction cooktop, Keurig coffee machine, juicers, instapot, hair dryers, iron, kettle, pumps, residential 120v fans, extractor fans, routers, laptop chargers, cellphone chargers, power tools, etc, etc, etc. I built the entire system for less than $6500 with two inverters, 1900w of PV and the LFP bank and BMS, controllers, switches, wiring, fuses, etc.
I have to agree. Unless you are running a good sized workshop and/ or want to leave the lights on 24/7 etc. 10 kWh in batteries should suffice. I do laundry with a well pump and 8 LED lights for my 1 acre property at night and the only thing I need is more reflective materials and more panels for long stretches of cloudy weather. I also don’t like the 4 minutes of “aren’t we and our friends so cool, smooch smooch smooch” at the beginning. It takes a lot of time to check out all the new solar gear and make comparisons from creator to creator looking for that one little extra bit of advice you might not get elsewhere. And I have me other things to do besides watch newbies do huggy kissy with a promotions guy.
The welder setup is awesome! Loved that! The welding on the tailgate and burning holes through the bedliner and setting it on fire was killing me though!!!
Is beyond me why some of these KZreadrs think people won't listen to all that nonsense at the beginning of the videos
Long story short on tech details. Not buying it.
nice job! im a rookie and my batteries are dead! i think i need a new converter. but i dont know if i need to upgrade it. and if so, to what. my rig had been down for a few years cuz i just dont know what to do and don't or cant afford to guess and and drain more batteries! lol
we use a composting toilet and i also put the urine into the black tank. i use TankTechsRx. it makes your black tank and all holding not smell, it also prevents struvite from forming inside the tank. that is the crystals that turn to a stone like structure that ruin your tanks. the formula for tanktecksrx was specifically made to dissolve struvite. i will not ever use anything else in my tanks any longer. one of the best things you can do for yourself. look up the product and order some. you will not regret it.
he got them for free to promote on his channel. a battery is a battery really, just get the cheap on and if you have issue you can replace it 3 times for the cost of one battle born. also really dial your use and charging specs for the battery. that make a huge difference on lasting
With all the hype from battle born, and the ripoff piece of gear I got was all I needed, especially after astronomical shipping and a snotty attitude from the sales rep and the inrush current limiter that is in most hybrid inverters not being usable in permitted system…..Amazon has Chinese batteries they ship anywhere with a 30 day return. I had a problem with a Lossigy battery, and did get one runaround email back, though within 24 hours (!) but one more email from me pointing out that two batteries with the same exact wiring in the same exact system right next to each other, one shouldn’t go out after 10 months and the other is still fine. They sent me a new battery, and with a $30 battery balancer from Amazon, they are humming along. Didn’t need to send pictures or have a receipt or even ship the old one back. Or pay additional shipping on the replacement. Now the Chins batteries that Amazon has are blue tooth, half or less the cost and have stellar reviews on Amazon and on the net and KZread. And likewise with Sungoldpower at a fraction of the other “high end” stuff that you have to get a lawyer to enforce the warranty. Little or no shipping on Amazon and 30 day return policy. Oh, and 48 volt is nice, but I run a chop-saw and washer and well pump at the same time, with a 24 volt system and zero problems. And 24 volt gear is now a lot cheaper also, and in stock and…..
No one needs a solar shade canopy. This is way over the top. 20 lith batts is ridiculous.... Ya, you know what you need but really?
I hope all is well with you two!! I really enjoyed learning about you lives and home on three axles.
Great intro!!!
Great video on what is possible! I sure hope you get the audio figured out. Amazing Mark can weld off of his battery and solar! Great update to the RV power system.
Missing you guys!, would like to see a update!
I am not convinced about the arguments. 1) He claims they saved weight and mentioned all the empty space in the other batteries. So they saved a little bit of weight on the battery casings? What would be the weight of the expanded, previous battery bank and what is the new one? He could easily lose some weight and get a few of these Battle Born bricks not to mention adjusting their lifestyle a bit and maybe they would need less AC, etc. 2) Extra padding is there for a reason, but if new batteries are indeed 25% smaller it is a reasonable argument. 3) I have heard only the best about Battle Born support. 4) I don't own and won't own Battle Born batteries, because they are too expensive for me. I purchased already the BlueTTI AC200MAX + B300 extension with the possibility of further extension, to 8 kWh of energy. 5) In my opinion the only valid argument is the volume, but I am curious what is the cost of it? They mentioned further optimization "didn't work", whatever it means. Maybe the connectors melted or there wasn't sufficient capacity or longevity? There is a cost to it. It is the same battery chemistry after all, so it is not like they can make easily huge improvements of 25% without compromising something else.
Enduro number has changed I get no answer
Your rig is amazing, keep doing more videos! I like this a lot!
I don’t see anything special about enduro.
The only problem here is that he has too much money, which is good for him i guess.
Are Enduro cells placed where they allow for expansion of the inside the housing?
Blasphemy! 😂😂😂😂😂😂