[Dollar Disco]

I bought a Solar trickle charger as a security measure against the known drain to the L322's battery if sitting for a while. I want to send it into the fuse box where one will find a few open fuse ports. My question is will any of these ports serve to feed the battery when the car is not in use? Do any of you use a system like this? How do you make it work?

 

[scimitargtc]

Ain't being funny but just how much power do you expect to get from a 'trickle' charger -- generally you get 50% of the rated power output at max lux so maybe if you live in a sunny clime and the car is outside and gets 10 hours per day of bright natural light it'll help - as for which fuse port find something that works all the time via the wiring diagram

 

[RRToadHall]

For many folks they would be of no use because our rigs are parked in a garage. If I were so inclined to use one I would wire directly to the battery to avoid any interferance with the electronics of the Rangie.

 

[LarryS]

For it to be useful you would have to know the battery drain of your L322 (per 24 hours) against the power of the solar cell and the likelihood of it putting out that power (for x hours) due to weather and the location of the panel. Since you asked OP i'm fitting one slowly myself as my own introduction to solar power and as i don't use the P38 everyday, but after doing the calc's i never bothered with those trickle types. The trickle types (5 watts or under) AFAIK don't need/have a regulator at all and so can be fitted direct to the battery, Does the L322 have a rear battery? if so this seems ideal.

 

[Dollar Disco]

I live in NYC. No garage. I have a cottage in Eastern Long Island as well.No garage. And I travel for work for a week at a time letting the car sit at the airport lot (outdoor JFK usually). I never had a dead battery in my 4 months of owning my '03 Rangie but I've read the forums and have seen some post about direct wiring to the battery. I don't expect to charge the battery only maintain. As we know, there are hundreds of sensors in this truck. Each sensor drawing only tiny milli-amps but that multiplied by (x) must be a significant drain over time sitting idle. My thinking is my 5w trickle charger will off set this drain.
I noticed my main compartment cig lighter is always on. I currently have it plugged in there. I just was to clean up the cabin.

 

[LarryS]

As an example the P38 when locked/alarmed draws 40mA, this is the best case minimum scenario, leave that for 24 hours and its 0.96 amps. In order to prevent battery drain any device (accounting for 80% efficiency) will have to put back in 1.2 amps during the brief period it has to do so. In purely idealised scenario 5 watts could do that in about 3.2 hours, in areas of more or less constant sunshine then that's doable (doesn't need direct sunlight, just a certain level), elsewhere is unlikely.

 

[Dollar Disco]

Thanks for the replies fellas. Larry's information is enough for me to know I'm not being silly with my concern of battery drain after sitting idle for a week.