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06-25-2020, 12:19 AM
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#1
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Hurricane 29M
State: British Columbia
Posts: 22
THOR #10751
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Thor Hurricane (or Windsport) Solar Panel add
Hello all, I have a 2018 29M Thor Hurricane (Windsport same unit different name) it says it is prewired for Solar Panels. Has anyone added any? What does prewired actually mean? Is it a plug and play add on? Any help would be greatly appreciated! Love the idea of adding a trickle more power to the batteries for those week long dry camping moments!
Happy trials!
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06-29-2020, 11:26 PM
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#2
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: Nevada
Posts: 625
THOR #12329
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06-30-2020, 01:25 AM
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#3
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: Nevada
Posts: 625
THOR #12329
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here's what Ive done so far... pulled the controller off the wall,it's a go power model GP PWM-10-SQ...10 amp controller...
there are 4 wires hooked up a + & - from battery, and + &- from solar charger...( 2 orange, and 2 white...both orange hooked to positive... and whites neg....with a test light, on the battery side... shows power.... on the solar side nothing....but,... if you use the ground from the battery side... the orange lights up... and if you use the battey ground.... the neg lights up...???
my first thought is that the solar panel needs to be grounded??? or the controller need to be programmed or something else???
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06-30-2020, 01:47 PM
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#4
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: Nevada
Posts: 625
THOR #12329
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ok,...just checking in,...still no replies... ...
today I will fix this controller....or toss it in the trash...
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06-30-2020, 02:49 PM
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#5
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: 2020 Magnitude SV34
State: Florida
Posts: 4,139
THOR #12751
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vegasruv24.1
ok,...just checking in,...still no replies... ...
today I will fix this controller....or toss it in the trash...
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I have the same Controller in my Magnitude SV34. You just need to add the panels and don't need to do anything else.... other than making sure it is configured for the right type of battery. Nothing should be connected to a chassis ground.
I would first check is to make sure you did not mix up the positive and negative connections on the roof. If you did, it will not function properly.
If that is not the issue, I would make sure you are getting voltage from the wires running from the roof to the controller when there is some light available to the panels. If everything is wired properly, the red and blue lights should be lit.
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06-30-2020, 02:52 PM
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#6
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: Nevada
Posts: 625
THOR #12329
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Judge
I have the same Controller in my Magnitude SV34. I just added the panels and didn't need to do anything else.
I would first check is tp make sure you did not mix up the positive and negative connections on the roof.
If that is not the issue, I would make sure you are getting voltage from the wires running from the roof to the controller when there is some light available to the panels. If everything is wired properly, the red and blue lights should be lit.
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thanks for the reply.....
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06-30-2020, 03:02 PM
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#7
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: Nevada
Posts: 625
THOR #12329
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OK folks... got this figured out...obvious , the controller.... 10a... pretty much worthless...I garage keep my rv so to use it as a trickle charger won't work for me...that and you would never get enough benefit with a 100 watt solar panel to do anything..but… here's where you can go wrong quick....these controllers only work with 12v solar panels...my 300 watt is 24 volts... so there's the problem...I need a new controller... which I knew as soon as I seen it was 10 amp.. for me... we boon dock or use camp shore power...when boon docking you have all day to recapture the AH you lost threw the night, watching tv and such..the goal is to not run the gen as much..when it's hot out,.. the only way is to run the gen for the ac.... but winter, you run the heater off batterys...we'll see...I might have to add more storage battery to make it work,
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06-30-2020, 03:07 PM
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#8
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: 2020 Magnitude SV34
State: Florida
Posts: 4,139
THOR #12751
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vegasruv24.1
OK folks... got this figured out...obvious , the controller.... 10a... pretty much worthless...I garage keep my rv so to use it as a trickle charger won't work for me...that and you would never get enough benefit with a 100 watt solar panel to do anything..but… here's where you can go wrong quick....these controllers only work with 12v solar panels...my 300 watt is 24 volts... so there's the problem...I need a new controller... which I knew as soon as I seen it was 10 amp.. for me... we boon dock or use camp shore power...when boon docking you have all day to recapture the AH you lost threw the night, watching tv and such..the goal is to not run the gen as much..when it's hot out,.. the only way is to run the gen for the ac.... but winter, you run the heater off batterys...we'll see...I might have to add more storage battery to make it work,
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You are correct..... you need an MPPT Controller for those voltages.
I have two 160W flexible Renogy panels connected to my GoPower 10A Controller and it is serving me well. I could only install them in parallel and not series for that reason. When / if my GoPower controller dies, I will probably go to a 30A Renogy PWM or MPPT Controller. Leaning towards the PWM because the MPPT Controller is so big and bulky.
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06-30-2020, 06:36 PM
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#9
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: Nevada
Posts: 625
THOR #12329
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Judge
You are correct..... you need an MPPT Controller for those voltages.
I have two 160W flexible Renogy panels connected to my GoPower 10A Controller and it is serving me well. I could only install them in parallel and not series for that reason. When / if my GoPower controller dies, I will probably go to a 30A Renogy PWM or MPPT Controller. Leaning towards the PWM because the MPPT Controller is so big and bulky.
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thanks for the post
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06-30-2020, 06:38 PM
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#10
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: Nevada
Posts: 625
THOR #12329
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OK< got r done...put in a 30amp 12/24 v controller...I now have 30amp/ 300 watt solar...all is well in vegas...
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07-08-2020, 08:17 PM
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#11
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: British Columbia
Posts: 1
THOR #18752
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solar charging
I have a similar problem on my 23a 2013 model year, the trickle charge solar panel for the house battery when stored it is not working . I am getting voltage (I installed a meter to check but still not working ) seems diagram of the system is not available or a big secret.Original panel was trashed so I replaced it with a similar panel to re charge the house battery when stored.
Any one hhave a helpful suggestion???
Thanks
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07-09-2020, 02:40 PM
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#12
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
State: Virginia
Posts: 12
THOR #8138
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Solar charging
I had the same issue with my 2017 26B. I had installed 5 165 watt solar panels , with a 3000 watt pure sine inverter and added 2 more batteries to the battery bank for a total of 4 (later upgraded all batteries to AGM) and had to upgrade the controller as well. Now everything works great and I can power a small city.
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07-10-2020, 04:21 AM
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#13
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Chateau 22E
State: Massachusetts
Posts: 13
THOR #19104
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vegasruv24.1
OK folks... got this figured out...obvious , the controller.... 10a... pretty much worthless...I garage keep my rv so to use it as a trickle charger won't work for me...that and you would never get enough benefit with a 100 watt solar panel to do anything..but… here's where you can go wrong quick....these controllers only work with 12v solar panels...my 300 watt is 24 volts... so there's the problem...I need a new controller... which I knew as soon as I seen it was 10 amp.. for me... we boon dock or use camp shore power...when boon docking you have all day to recapture the AH you lost threw the night, watching tv and such..the goal is to not run the gen as much..when it's hot out,.. the only way is to run the gen for the ac.... but winter, you run the heater off batterys...we'll see...I might have to add more storage battery to make it work,
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Duh, of course! The panel I installed is a 190W 24V panel so the 10A 12V controller can't handle it ... Thanks for making me realize my mistake!
Going to update the controller to MPPT 20A and that should solve my problems.
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03-25-2021, 11:01 PM
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#14
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Senior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Hurricane 34J
State: Florida
Posts: 159
THOR #15745
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mckro05
Hello all, I have a 2018 29M Thor Hurricane (Windsport same unit different name) it says it is prewired for Solar Panels. Has anyone added any? What does prewired actually mean? Is it a plug and play add on? Any help would be greatly appreciated! Love the idea of adding a trickle more power to the batteries for those week long dry camping moments!
Happy trials!
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We have a 2019 Thor Hurricane34j. It came pre wired for solar with a Go Power 10 amp solar controller. That is good for only about one 100 watt solar panel.
I installed a 30 amp Go power dual battery Bluetooth controller and 2- Newpowa 12v 210 watt solar panels on the roof. I connected the house batteries as battery number one and the chassis battery as battery number 2.
System works great. We have a 2000 watt Xantrex inverter and it runs both refrigerators and all 12v dc and 110v accessories with no problem. TVs run on the 110v inverter. No air conditioning on the solar but the 12v ceiling fans work great.
Hope this info helps.
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03-25-2021, 11:24 PM
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#15
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Hurricane 29M
State: British Columbia
Posts: 22
THOR #10751
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Thanks for the information!!!
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05-19-2021, 06:35 PM
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#16
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Hurricane 29M
State: British Columbia
Posts: 22
THOR #10751
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Made the plunge
Well, I made the plunge and couldn’t be happier… I added 2 X 200 Watt Renogy panels and a 40 amp Renogy MPPT Controller. Camped off grid for 4 days and fired up the generator only once. Batteries stayed full during the day, mostly sun and shade, and didn’t drop much overnight. Ran a 12v fridge, TV’s (for a couple movie nights), etc…
I will probably add better or more batteries but the Costco Deep Cycle 12V X 2 are doing alright.
Maybe upgrade the inverter as well. Would be nice to be able to run the coffee maker and microwave for a few minutes off grid w/o generator.
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06-04-2021, 04:47 AM
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#17
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Hurricane 35M
State: Ohio
Posts: 24
THOR #23681
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Hey guys, that is all good stuff. I bought a 2018 35M prewired for Solar. I found the plugs easy enough on the roof, but I can't find any wires in the battery compartment to wire the controller.
I got a wiring schematic form Thor, which is useless to me.
Where would the wires be to connect my purchased controller, and where would the wires be to connect the controller to the batteries?
I should probably have it all professionally installed, they would know the where and how, but I'm trying to save some $$ and DIY.
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06-04-2021, 05:01 AM
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#18
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Hurricane 29M
State: British Columbia
Posts: 22
THOR #10751
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There are two wires, In the birds nest of wires under your bed. I think a white and yellow, cannot recall. Those are your solar connections. Go to your roof, look at the wires in the prewire setup, confirm colours and find the same under the bed. Those are the ones…. You can run a volt meter to confirm but not needed. Easy install, Pam me with any questions!
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06-04-2021, 06:07 AM
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#19
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Hurricane 35M
State: Ohio
Posts: 24
THOR #23681
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The roof is red and white. Under the bed I found a dead end orange and white, the ends taped off with black electrical tape.
There is a white and red wire going into a dangling loose little black box, and it also has 2 black wires going in as well.
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06-04-2021, 01:01 PM
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#20
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Junior Member
Brand: Thor Motor Coach
Model: Hurricane 29M
State: British Columbia
Posts: 22
THOR #10751
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Ah yes, I think my roof top wires were orange and white… they should also be 8gauge or 10gauge. They definitely were the same colour on the roof as they were under the bed.
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