More Questions for Full Time Riverstone owners

[Fishrsafe]

Ok folks,

Here’s a couple more questions. Again we will be living full time in our new unit.

Do you have the residential fridge and inverter? If so how well does it do when running on batteries only? We plan on a good bit of boondocking.

Which cooktop is best, gas or induction? Again plan on boondocking

We plan on having a generator and solar panels so these together may make my questions moot.

How many batteries are you using? Looks like 4 6 volt are discussed in RV circles.

Thanks,

Pete

[Cypressloser]

The residential fridge is standard and highly recommended, for boondocking you probably want a setup like ours with 960 Watt solar, a 3000 Watt inverter and 6 6 Volt batteries to play it safe. Induction cooking with solar is not an option IMO.

[Fishrsafe]

Originally Posted by Cypressloser

The residential fridge is standard and highly recommended, for boondocking you probably want a setup like ours with 960 Watt solar, a 3000 Watt inverter and 6 6 Volt batteries to play it safe. Induction cooking with solar is not an option IMO.

Thanks again for your help with my questions. I have another, what is your feeling on the tankless water heater? Go with it or swap out to a standard 12 gal quick recovery unit?

Pete

[dblr]

So far we have been very happy with our tank less system plus it runs only on propane so better for boondocking, only needs 12 volt to ignite.

[Cypressloser]

Forest River is replacing ours free of charge with a conventional hot water tank once the winter is over and we can get to the dealer.

We can't hook up to water during the winter months because of the cold and we have to depend on the freshwater tank (call it boondocking), every time we turn the shower on, or any other faucet, we lose a full gallon of water before it's hot enough to step in and when we turn it off to conserve water it starts all over again when we turn the hot water back on.
The other issue is that our cold water temperature is so low that the water heater has a hard time getting it hot enough while maintaining sufficient flow.
Then there is the time delay between turning the hot water on and the water heater firing up which is more than annoying when we do our laundry.
I've read there are some folks who installed a bypass hose from the shower to the intake side of the water pump to keep the water cycling and the water heater on when the shower is turned off as a workaround.

There was a lengthy thread on the forum not long ago, you may want to try to find it using the search function.

[Fishrsafe]

Originally Posted by Cypressloser

Forest River is replacing ours free of charge with a conventional hot water tank once the winter is over and we can get to the dealer.

We can't hook up to water during the winter months because of the cold and we have to depend on the freshwater tank (call it boondocking), every time we turn the shower on, or any other faucet, we lose a full gallon of water before it's hot enough to step in and when we turn it off to conserve water it starts all over again when we turn the hot water back on.
The other issue is that our cold water temperature is so low that the water heater has a hard time getting it hot enough while maintaining sufficient flow.
Then there is the time delay between turning the hot water on and the water heater firing up which is more than annoying when we do our laundry.
I've read there are some folks who installed a bypass hose from the shower to the intake side of the water pump to keep the water cycling and the water heater on when the shower is turned off as a workaround.

There was a lengthy thread on the forum not long ago, you may want to try to find it using the search function.

Thanks again for your help it’s greatly appreciated. We don’t plan on any extremely low temperature camping. We are Floridians so 50 is freezing to us LOL. Seems like the tankless works best in temperate climates. Keep the information coming, we may buy a 38 FB at the Tampa Show on Saturday.

Pete

[Fishrsafe]

We did it!! Bought a 38 FB2 today at the Tampa RV show. They had it display, just need to install the generator and solar panels. It should be ready to pick up in a couple of weeks. Really excited, thanks to everyone for your help. In the end we kept coming back to the Riverstone units, just quality and competitive pricing.

Pete

[LegacyFB38]

Originally Posted by Fishrsafe

We did it!! Bought a 38 FB2 today at the Tampa RV show.

Pete

Congratulations!

What is an FB2? (We have a 2017 38 FB)

UPDATE: I found the FB2 on the website...nice floorplan!

[mwdilday]

Originally Posted by Cypressloser

Forest River is replacing ours free of charge with a conventional hot water tank once the winter is over and we can get to the dealer.

We can't hook up to water during the winter months because of the cold and we have to depend on the freshwater tank (call it boondocking), every time we turn the shower on, or any other faucet, we lose a full gallon of water before it's hot enough to step in and when we turn it off to conserve water it starts all over again when we turn the hot water back on.
The other issue is that our cold water temperature is so low that the water heater has a hard time getting it hot enough while maintaining sufficient flow.
Then there is the time delay between turning the hot water on and the water heater firing up which is more than annoying when we do our laundry.
I've read there are some folks who installed a bypass hose from the shower to the intake side of the water pump to keep the water cycling and the water heater on when the shower is turned off as a workaround.

There was a lengthy thread on the forum not long ago, you may want to try to find it using the search function.

Do you know if they are putting in a 6 or 12 gallon?

[mwdilday]

We have the induction cooktop and love it. We are connected to power most of the time and have a generator for the overnight Wal-Mart stops so we can cook and make coffee.

I struggled over the refrigerator decision and decided with the traditional gas/electric refrigerator and love it. I didn't like the residential because of the power issue when not connected to power and I did not like the fit and finish of the installation. The RV fridge is made for an RV and it just works and looks great. No temp issues and freezer works great.

We have the tankless hot water heater and hopefully we can work the bugs out. Kind of wish I got the 12 gallon tank heater.

[Cypressloser]

Originally Posted by mwdilday

Do you know if they are putting in a 6 or 12 gallon?

It's been a while, either 10gal or 12gal .
Unfortunately they have to cut a larger opening to fit the new water heater.

[FordHauler]

I looked up Riverstones on RVTrader and see that several dealers still have NEW 2016 models for as little as $69K. That surprised me.
Travel safe

[jlsr]

Congratulations on your new Riverstone! We also like the FB2 plan, my hubby really likes the large front bath. Please let us know how you like it and if there are any kinks you have to work out etc. Very happy for you!

[Fishrsafe]

Originally Posted by Cypressloser

The residential fridge is standard and highly recommended, for boondocking you probably want a setup like ours with 960 Watt solar, a 3000 Watt inverter and 6 6 Volt batteries to play it safe. Induction cooking with solar is not an option IMO.

Would you post some pics of your solar, batteries, inverter set up when you can?
Curious to know what else you can run in addition to your fridge. Thinking I want to add another 480 watts of panels. Guess I will need another 30amp Zamp controller or did you go with a different unit?

Thanks,

Pete

[Cypressloser]

Originally Posted by Fishrsafe

Would you post some pics of your solar, batteries, inverter set up when you can?
Curious to know what else you can run in addition to your fridge. Thinking I want to add another 480 watts of panels. Guess I will need another 30amp Zamp controller or did you go with a different unit?

Thanks,

Pete

I'm unable to post meaningful pictures at the moment because we are still in the dead of winter, yes -29C yesterday morning and over a foot of snow late last week and we live in our Legacy.

When we 1st started with a res. fridge and solar we found that 480 Watt and 4 batteries were just borderline and it couldn't always keep up with the demand but this all depends on the amount of sun hours you get on an average day. Anyway, more is always better. On a good summer day we run the the washer and dryer in the morning and still go to bed at night with the full batteries.
I can't see why a 2nd charge controller wouldn't work but the cost is low enough that I personally wouldn't worry too much and just upgrade the existing one.

We have six 160 Watt panels on the roof connected to a 60 Amp PMMV charge controller that is mounted out of sight, the readout and battery monitor are mounted inside the cabinet with all the other monitoring and control stuff. Two 6 Volt AGM batteries are installed on the battery trays while the other four live in the generator box, in hindsight we should have put them all there.
The Xantrex Freedom SW 3012 inverter/charger (in for repair on the automatic transfer switch at the moment) is mounted right on the other side of the dividing wall in the storage bay - again in hindsight, we should have been mounted it in the generator box to keep the storage bay free. FYI, AGM batteries do not require venting and will not cause corrosion.
The stand alone WFCO charger that came with the RV is normally unplugged and the dealer should have, when they transferred the setup from our old trailer, isolated the converter from the solar setup so we wouldn't have to manually turn it off when we run on solar.
In a nutshell: 3x the cost of a generator, we can not run our air conditioners but it is dead quiet and costs nothing, zero, nadda, nix to operate.
The most common mistake many solar newbies (and RV manufacturers) make is they install the inverter to far from the batteries and run to small of a wire from the batteries to the inverter. You also need a kill switch and a catastrophic fuse between the battery bank and the charge controller and ideally again between the batteries and the inverter.
I think Ray from www.loveyourrv.com has a YouTube video explaining his install in detail.

[Fishrsafe]

Originally Posted by Cypressloser

I'm unable to post meaningful pictures at the moment because we are still in the dead of winter, yes -29C yesterday morning and over a foot of snow late last week and we live in our Legacy.

When we 1st started with a res. fridge and solar we found that 480 Watt and 4 batteries were just borderline and it couldn't always keep up with the demand but this all depends on the amount of sun hours you get on an average day. Anyway, more is always better. On a good summer day we run the the washer and dryer in the morning and still go to bed at night with the full batteries.
I can't see why a 2nd charge controller wouldn't work but the cost is low enough that I personally wouldn't worry too much and just upgrade the existing one.

We have six 160 Watt panels on the roof connected to a 60 Amp PMMV charge controller that is mounted out of sight, the readout and battery monitor are mounted inside the cabinet with all the other monitoring and control stuff. Two 6 Volt AGM batteries are installed on the battery trays while the other four live in the generator box, in hindsight we should have put them all there.
The Xantrex Freedom SW 3012 inverter/charger (in for repair on the automatic transfer switch at the moment) is mounted right on the other side of the dividing wall in the storage bay - again in hindsight, we should have been mounted it in the generator box to keep the storage bay free. FYI, AGM batteries do not require venting and will not cause corrosion.
The stand alone WFCO charger that came with the RV is normally unplugged and the dealer should have, when they transferred the setup from our old trailer, isolated the converter from the solar setup so we wouldn't have to manually turn it off when we run on solar.
In a nutshell: 3x the cost of a generator, we can not run our air conditioners but it is dead quiet and costs nothing, zero, nadda, nix to operate.
The most common mistake many solar newbies (and RV manufacturers) make is they install the inverter to far from the batteries and run to small of a wire from the batteries to the inverter. You also need a kill switch and a catastrophic fuse between the battery bank and the charge controller and ideally again between the batteries and the inverter.
I think Ray from www.loveyourrv.com has a YouTube video explaining his install in detail.

Thanks for your help again, I really appreciate it. Our current set up for our dealer is 3 160 watt Zamp solar panels and 30 amp Zamp controller. We have 4 6V Deka flooded cell golf cart batteries and a 1000 watt factory installed inverter. So far no issues running the fridge on just the batteries, it’s been very sunny here in SW FL. I plan to upgrade to AGM 6V batteries once we actually hit the road next March.
We also have an Onan 5.5KW genny to top the batteries off when the sun is not cooperating.

If I read your comments correctly, you are also running your washer and dryer off the batteries/inverter? I am interested in being able to use a coffee maker and fan. Wondering if I just upgrade our inverter can will I be able to power a fan and a Kuerig machine.

Thanks again,

Pete

[Cypressloser]

I'm no expert by any means but I'll try my best.

Originally Posted by Fishrsafe

Thanks for your help again, I really appreciate it. Our current set up for our dealer is 3 160 watt Zamp solar panels and 30 amp Zamp controller. I believe your charge controller is maxed out with 3 panels, you'll need to upgrade if you're installing more panels.

We have 4 6V Deka flooded cell golf cart batteries and a 1000 watt factory installed inverter. So far no issues running the fridge on just the batteries, it’s been very sunny here in SW FL. I plan to upgrade to AGM 6V batteries once we actually hit the road next March. Deka, Trojan all good batteries, but because they are flooded you can not install an inverter in the same space until you upgrade to AGM. AGM batteries won't save you any money, they are just more convenient and you never have to worry about corrosion.

We also have an Onan 5.5KW genny to top the batteries off when the sun is not cooperating. Watch your weights, batteries and inverter are extremely heavy.
You can, if you know what you're doing, use an external battery charger in combination with the onboard charger and solar to speed up the charging process and have your batteries charged in half the time but be careful they can overheat and blow up if you pump to many amps in too fast.

If I read your comments correctly, you are also running your washer and dryer off the batteries/inverter? Correct, the dryer draws around 20 Amp and the washing machine between 5 and 12 Amps.

I am interested in being able to use a coffee maker and fan. Wondering if I just upgrade our inverter can will I be able to power a fan and a Kuerig machine. Your best friend is a "Kill A Watt" to determine the power requirement for individual appliances. The built in inverter is IMO to far from the batteries, the voltage drop would be to much for an efficient setup in this location and the wiring would be insufficient. Search for an online voltage drop calculator to determine the required wire gauge. I think it would be better to install a separate, larger inverter near the battery bank and turn the fridge inverter off without pulling the plug. Some recommend several smaller inverters instead of a big one but for a setup like ours and for what you have in mind one 3000 Watt inverter is the way to go.
Thanks again,

Pete