Powering a catering caravan

[lucycritch]

Hello all,

I'm renovating a small caravan to be used for catering. I'll need to run a freezer, small fridge, coffee machine, Panini machine and lights etc. I'd really like to avoid running a noisy generator but won’t always be near a mains supply. Is there any way that these appliances could be run from a leisure battery? Maybe with the help of some solar panels? Cant seem to find freezer etc that run on 12v, is there any way around this?

Thanks for any advise.

Lucy

 

[rjm2k]

Some of those will probably run off of gas, like the freezer and fridge.

 

[bernardgreen]

Cant seem to find freezer etc that run on 12v,

Very unlikely you will, I went through this process for a client wanting to demostrate green ( ecofriendly ) ice cream production using bicycle power to run the freezer. No 12 or 24 freezers could be found. Freezers in ice cream vans very often use mechanical drive direct from the engine to a refrigeration compressor. ( in terms of power from several bikes with healthy cyclists it was possible but electrically it was not )

Dry ice ( aka card ice ) which is carbon dioxide frozen solid is a way to keep food frozen where there is no power to run a freezer. It requires care in how it is used and venting the carbon dioxide gas to atmosphere is essential. Transport in a car is I believe now prohibited as the gas can accumulate and adversely affect the driver.

 

[lucycritch]

Thank you for your replies, I have found one freezer with a built in battery, that runs on 12v but its over £1000 and quite small. Would really like to do this the green way but maybe thats not possible. Cant seem to find gas ones other than very small ones meant for caravans.

 

[kbdiy]

Hi Lucy,

You could take a look at these 12v fridges & freezers. Used extensively on inland waterways craft but ideal for your needs too I would have thought.

http://www.shoreline-marine.co.uk/freezers

 

[dhutch]

You can run it off batteies using an inverter, but thats a lot of power hungry kit, so to run it you will need a large inverter (few grand) and if for any lenght of time, a sizeable battery bank (large cost, and weight) so I would start be seeing if you can reduce the load with gas fridges/waterheates etc.

Consider a fairly small silenced gas generator, and using a supply combining inverter and a bank of batteries to smooth out peak demand.

Solar pannels will be next to useless for 'range extending' and an uneconmical method of recharging.

Look at Victron and Mastervolt for suitable inverters.


Daniel

 

[ericmark]

Many years ago 1980's I had a 12vdc freezer to carry snake bit serum in when working in Algeria worked on the same idea as the sunnycool boxes a French semi-conductor invention. So they are made.

However rather small and I would guess you need a larger unit.

Caravans have for years used gas fridges although the amount of gas they use is high. One bottle in my caravan empty in three weeks with fridge on gas but 6 months once fridge moved to electric.

Running motors from inverters has a problem with the start current. I bought a cheap 3kW with 6kW peak inverter for my son. 12V input but it did not last long. £140 sounds good but not when they fail so I would say you have to look at at least 24v to run inverters likely 48v would be better.

The inverter technology has jumped in leaps and bounds but mainly for the grid tie market and getting a standard one is not cheap. Here we run into the true sine wave and simulated sine wave the latter is three stage steps and although some stuff works OK not all stuff will work with this output.

Generators have also developed in leaps and bounds with inverter types allowing varying engine speeds so less fuel when on stand-by.

I really think you need to look at some of the modern generators including the Sterling engine wispergen.