well, i gave it a trial in my driveway for a week..works great.
I put in a n Engel with some beers, set it to pretty cold, not freezing, and left an old Iphone on the USB charger that I would deplete each night as my son and I were tinkering around and listening to Pandora. That way it would want to charge it at night.
Battery was better than I remember it in a long time.
the controls said it was fully charged at 13.6 and above the whole time.
there is even a way to over charge to 14.8 V Temperature compensated. I'll get into that later on. For now i'm leaving it default settings.
it's not a water proof control, or suit case.
it's slightly padded, but has a big hole on top for your hand to grab the handles. So leaving it on the the roof rack while driving in the rain isn't an option.
it's a bit large, but only a few inches thick. I can find a place for it inside, but would've been nice to really make the travel case weather resistant.
I read some blog posts about charging and the RV Puzzle, but the
grumpy guy that wrote it was just a bit too wordy for me.
He said the controller needs to be at the battery, not on the panels. I see his point, but i'm not boondocking with a huge draw. he has lots of info, kudos to that.
I really wanted to get the flexible thin panel and mount it on top of the RTT, but running the wires and sealing them was going to be a project, and I'd also like to take it when we use the trailer, or if I go on a trip with someone else.
it works as stated, it's easy, seems sturdy enough.
I plan on drilling a hole in the frame for a cable lock to go thru and maybe silicone some of the edges and maybe find a plastic bag for the controller in case it gets rained on. A few edges are pretty sharp, but a rat tail file made quick work of that.
it's a budget solution to maintaining a battery for me, not a life support electrical device that I need to rely on 24/7. But it looks as if it would be up to that challenge for a good bit before giving up the ghost.
