Some of you may realize it but I am a lazy poster of progress. Most of my stuff is about 5-6 months behind. I am slow in the process and slower on the posting. However, these next few electrical plan posts are hot off the production line. I am ready to start wiring, but unfortunately, my total practical knowledge of electrical wiring could fit into a thimble. Oh, I am indeed familiar with the principles of circuits, polarity, resistance, voltage, amperage, etc., but the gulf between that limited abstract knowledge and practical knowledge may as well be the Grand Canyon. I have been reading a few books including Mueller’s RV Electrical Systems and others.
In the spirit of just cracking on and muddling through figuring all this out, I have tried to capture some of what I have learned and what I have been able to scour from the interwebs and put them into an initial plan. One thing I find interesting about that web search is that a lot of people are searching for wiring diagrams for Airstreams. Two things happen: 1) they find one of the scanned versions that Airstream used to put in some of their manuals in the 60s and 70s, or 2) they put in an initial version for feedback and never update it with the final version.
12V Layout.jpg
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12V Diagram.jpg
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My hope is that some generous souls with the right knowledge will help steer me to a good plan. My plan is then to use that to run wire myself based upon that plan, and then use a master electrician acquaintance to check everything and do the final hook ups, ensuring it is to code, etc.
Some questions and notes:
1) Need to know if I am missing anything for items to plan for, loads-wise. I am planning on dropping in a few spare lines, but these are not shown.
2) I don’t have a clue on fuses, breakers, shunts and the like outside of the panel boxes. Need to know where and what to put in additional to the stuff shown.
3) Need to know where else I will need to put in dedicated grounds, and whether these need to go to the chassis or the shell/frame.
4) Ultimately, I need to figure out where every single piece of wiring goes. Which circuits need to come back to a negative bus bar (which is connected to the negative terminal on the battery, but not shown) and which can simply go to ground?
5) The solar and inverter will not be installed right away, but I do want to have all the runs in place.
6) I am adding some
12V outlets in addition to the 110V ones shown, although I am not entirely sure how many total yet for each.
7) I am also adding some additional LED lighting strips under the counter edges and along the floor for accent lighting or night-time assistance. There will also be one, or a hookup for one under the belly of the trailer. My wife thinks these are cool, so…they are cool.
8) I would also like to wire the trailer up front to allow me to run shore power to the running and tail lights with the flip of a switch.
9) The batteries and panels will be under the seats up front, with dividers in as necessary to keep things separated. The solar controller and some of the control switches and monitors will be under the seats up front on the other side as well.
10) I don’t know if I need both a dedicated surge protector and an autoformer, but I have had a number of close calls with my 2012, and definitely want an autoformer up front. That said, they are expensive, and I would rather have and electrical issue kill a fuse or the less expensive surge protector rather than the autoformer.
11) Need to know what type of wire to buy, and whether it is worth it to go for more expensive marine, tinned, wet resistant, etc. I plan at this point for the 12V system is just to buy a combination of 12/14 stranded auto wire with some temperature resistance, and a little 8/10 for the heavier needs, in addition to short lengths of heavy cable where needed. Can I use the same wire for the 110V stuff? I bought some solid Romex and one point and I really don’t want to fight it.
12) For connections, I was planning on using the little crimped end connects where it was easier than going directly from the strand. I am going to avoid any other splicing, but will use shrink tube if absolutely necessary. If there are better options, I am open to them.
So there you go dear readers, thanks in advance for the help.
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