New to boondocking

[DannyLori]

Hello,
My wife and I are going to try boondocking for the first time in a couple of weeks. We will be camping in our 29' 5th wheel in the Arizona desert for three nights and I am concerned about heating. I have a portable 100 watt solar panel set up with one marine battery in the camper that I will be using for the first time. I will be bringing my incredibly loud generator as a back up. We plan to be as far away from any human beings as possible. We do not want to use our generator at night because we would like to sleep with as little noise as possible but we do want to use the heater. My question is, will my battery last long enough to run my heater all night along with my refrigerator that will be running on propane? We will not be using any 12 volt lighting to speak of. Any suggestions on portable propane heater options for inside my RV? Thank you in advance.

[robo44]

Depends n the other 12V items you plan to run.
If it's your you should be fine through the night, they don't take a lot of power However those things tend to be loud too. I would suggest bring plenty of blankets as well. if you do run low on juice you have layers of blankets until sun up when you can recharge your batteries.

[bikendan]

The furnace is the biggest battery power hog. If it's cold and it runs a lot through the night, you may wake up to a dead battery or in the middle of the night.

[Chance811]

We smoked our stock 80 amp hour battery on our 2nd night of boondocking. We have a 50 watt trickle charger solar panel and ran our generator about 9 hours during the 2nd day to charge the battery. We were in about 30 degree temps though and our fridge is 12 volt that pulls about 4 amps an hour while the generator was not running. Upgraded our batteries to 255 amp hours and made it through 3 nights at about 30 degree temps but were running our generator for a good chunk of time during the day. We basically ran our quiet Honda generator all day and ran the batteries at night. By the third night my batteries were at 11.9 volts, which is about as low as I wanted to run them. Not sure how cold it gets in the desert in the winter. Hope this helps

[boondocking]

To be on the safe side I would purchase another battery that matches the existing one. Hook them together in parallel.

[ppine]

You can't run a furnace for long on one battery, or even two batteries.
In the winter, 100 watts will not keep you charged up.

What elevation are planning to camp? I like down sleeping bags. I use a propane portable heater sometimes to take the chill off. I never sleep with it on. I use the furnace mostly in the morning to warm up the rig. Usually just making coffee with the stove warms it up a lot.

[NMWildcat]

Get another battery. The heater fan uses a huge amount of energy. Recharge in the morning with the generator and let the solar top it off. Just ensure they are charged up before the next night.
When it's really cold out your batteries will last through the night by turning the furnace down to the lowest you can stand it, limiting the run time. We usually set it at 55 or 60, lower if it's well below freezing. It's mainly to keep the underbelly from freezing in our rig.
In the morning, start the generator, crank up the heat, make coffee We use 2 series 27 marine deep cells and generators to recharge and have no problems even in single digit temps for weeks at a time.
Refrigerators running on propane use very little battery. No worries there unless you drain the batteries with other usage.

[5picker]

Originally Posted by NMWildcat

Get another battery. The heater fan uses a huge amount of energy. Recharge in the morning with the generator and let the solar top it off. Just ensure they are charged up before the next night.
When it's really cold out your batteries will last through the night by turning the furnace down to the lowest you can stand it, limiting the run time. We usually set it at 55 or 60, lower if it's well below freezing. It's mainly to keep the underbelly from freezing in our rig.
In the morning, start the generator, crank up the heat, make coffee We use 2 series 27 marine deep cells and generators to recharge and have no problems even in single digit temps for weeks at a time.
Refrigerators running on propane use very little battery. No worries there unless you drain the batteries with other usage.

X2
This is our MO to a tee when boondocking.

In really cold weather, we've supplemented our heat with a propane catalytic heater. Ventilation is mandatory.

[DannyLori]

UPDATE:
Hello everyone,
Thank you so much for all your recommendations and advice. I just returned from my 4 day 4 night boondocking adventure. I went alone, my DW decided not to join me on this first trial run. I took the advice of purchasing a second Marine & RV 27DC battery. Turned out I really needed it.
I began with loading my supplies,: gasoline/propane powered Generator, Full fresh water in the RV tank and 10 gallons extra water in jugs, 10 lbs dry ice and 30 lbs of regular ice in extra ice chest, BBQ, food and everything else I could think of.
I headed out to my destination (Arizona desert, 17 miles N/E of Quartzsite) in the middle of nowhere. About 100 miles into the trip I got a flat tire on my fifth wheel, changed it to the spare then I purchased a new tire in Quartzsite. South down hwy 95 and 5 miles outside of Quartzsite I checked in with the BLM camp host and he told me I did not need a pass for the 4 nights. I found a perfect spot way off the highway near a group of hills a lot of miles east of 95. I set up camp and for the next 4 days I enjoyed every bit of solitude I was hoping for. I used my 100 watt solar set up to charge up my batteries, i'm glad I had two of them. I never had to fire up my generator. I used small battery operated lights inside at night. Thank God it was not cold enough to worry about using my heater. My frig and freezer worked perfectly on propane. I never needed the extra ice (I ended up leaving with 30 lbs of frozen ice in the ice chest with dry ice). I had plenty of water to last 3 showers and dish washing, never ran out of water. I enjoyed shooting all my guns (responsibly at paper targets). I hiked up one of the tallest hills and saw no life signs of anything whatsoever. This place was dry, desolate, perfectly quiet, billions of stars at night, alone and unafraid. PARADISE!!
Thank you all again. I will definitely be boondocking more and more. If you have any questions I will be happy to answer them.

[boondocking]

Good to hear that you enjoyed your first boondocking experience. That means there should be many more in the future.
It really does beats camping in campgrounds with a bunch of other people.

[ppine]

The kind of stories I like to hear.

[Chance811]

Sounds perfect

[WanderMore]

Since you had an absolutely perfect experience, which we love to hear, will the next trip include the DW? If yes then let us know how that trip was. Hopefully just as good if not better.

[DannyLori]

Hello Wondermore,
Long ago I attempted to answer your question regarding my DW on our boondocking trip but for some reason my response didn't post. My DW did go with me the following month im March 2021 but she did not like it at all. She felt it was to isolated with nothing to do. She did not sleep well so we left after 24 hours. She does tolerate campground camping. I've been back at my boondocking spot several times and miss my wife on these outings but love the solitude.

[kfd82]

Your initial post asked about alternative heating. The propane powered Mr Buddy heaters can be used indoors. I have one that I used in the deer stand when my son was young and hunted with me.

They work great and will knock the chill out of the air in minutes.