YOUR OFF-GRID OPTIONS

The freedom of touring is even greater when you go off-grid, but you need to secure a good power supply beforehand

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IF THE RECENT power outage in Spain, Portugal and parts of France has taught us anything, it’s just how dependent we have become on electricity.

It’s exactly the same with a modern caravan — from the toilet flush to the LED lights and the heating, not much will work without electrical power. Although gas hobs can be lit manually, gas heating won’t work without electricity to ignite the flame and power the blown-air fan.

But what if you are one of the many caravanners who don’t want to be limited by being tethered to a cable? What if you want the freedom of having unlimited battery and mains power, anywhere?

Happily, there are lots of great products on the market to help you do just that. Here’s everything you need to know about ensuring your power supply for those tours when you venture beyond the hookup.

Going off-grid

If you want to heat or air-condition your caravan, or cook meals, using only the batteries, you’re going to need a great deal of power. This is often going to involve increasing the size of your battery bank, or installing a more powerful charging system, an inverter and solar panels.

Or any combination of the above.

There are various online calculators that allow you to work out how long your battery bank will last with your usage. Although that usage can vary, generally speaking, anything in your van that heats, cools or operates with a motor is going to be a heavy consumer of power.

Microwave ovens, for example, can be particularly troublesome, because they demand high voltage, heat up and have a powered turntable.

Battery bank

If you are still using a single battery, you’re going to be limited if you ever overnight without a mains hookup. The easy way to add more power is simply to add an extra leisure battery (we would recommend two identical ones in terms of brand, capacity, age and chemistry - don’t just bolt a new battery next to an old one).