Xantrex Inverter Upgrade

Overview

My 2007 Allegro Bus 42QRP came with a 3,000 watt inverter, eight 12 volt AGM batteries, and a 125 watt solar panel to power the residential refrigerator, convection/microwave oven, and various receptacle circuits. The problem is that the inverter was the Xantrex RV3012 modified sine wave inverter. Modified sine wave is not the same waveform as shore power from your electrical utility. It's a simulation of it and doesn't run things exactly the same way. It has detrimental effects on certain electronics, such as the in-door water dispenser and ice maker on my residential refrigerator. Therefore I wanted to replace it with a true sine wave inverter, which would give me good clean power., For more info on the differences between these two inverter styles please check out the RV Tech Library article Modified Sine Wave versus True Sine Wave for more detailed information.

This was fairly easy to do in my particular coach because the existing inverter was connected to a sub-panel so it was just a matter of replacing the inverter and rewiring to the new remote display. The battery cables and AC power wiring was already in place. I chose to use the Xantrex RS3000 inverter because it was the latest technology and was about the same size as the RV3012 so no new mounting fabrication work was required. The following images and text will show how this was done in the event that others want to add more capacity to their coach.

Note that I have also uploaded larger 1024x768 (XGA) images in addition to the smaller ones shown in this review. If you want to view a larger picture simply click on the image in the review and a new window with a full screen image will appear.

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Mark Quasius - "Cruzer"

The Installation

The existing inverter compartment is shown above. This compartment is the rearmost curbside storage bay of the coach. The RV3012 is mounted in a steel cradle that is suspended from above. It is kept above the bottom of the frame rails so that any cargo can slide under it as well as the frame rails when the slide tray (not shown in this image) is extended out either side of the basement.

The image above shows the original remote display panel. Along with the KingDome, Onan Automatic Generator Start, and HydroHot control panels is the Xantrex RC7 control pane at top right. This panel will need to be replaced because it does not interface with the RS3000. However, I chose to mount the new control panel in a different location and use this spot for the new solar panel charge controller that I was installing. I've never been a big fan of getting to this compartment area when parked because it's located over the driver's seat. Instead, I put the more commonly used panels into the hallway where it's easier to view them while living in the RV.

This image shows the original hallway wall space. The top 3 switches operate the ceiling lights while the middle row switches are for the galley power vent fan and the heating and air conditioning thermostat. The bottom row is the original solar panel display panel, which was going to be removed anyway because I was going to replace the single 125 watt panel with four 120 watt panels and the remote would not be compatible with that system. Because the new inverter remote display panel gave me much more information that before, I chose to mount the my new panel in this area so that it could be readily viewed during day to day activities.

This image shows the new RS3000 inverter. The only difference is that the battery cables connect to the right side of the inverter rather than the front corner, as in the RV3012. But the existing cables have plenty of slack in them so they can be easily moved. The extra fuse and junction stud off to the right were things I added in order to better facilitate adding more batteries to the coach. They are not needed for a simple inverter swap so you can ignore them.

These two pictures show the remote display setup. On the left the new hallway wall space is shown. The previous solar panel display has been replaced by a SeeLevel tank monitoring system. I located the SeeLevel panel there because it was a good fit for the original solar panel display seeing as how it was wide but not very tall. For more info on the SeeLevel installation please see the link at www.rvcruzer.com/seelevel.htm for details. I then located the inverter's System Control Panel (SCP) directly above the light switches. The panel above it is the remote display for my energy management system. Further details on that installation are found at www.rvcruzer.com/panel.htm.

A big benefit to installing the panel in this area is that it's easy to get wires to. All of the existing wiring comes up from the basement at the curbside HydroHot compartment. From there it runs up through the cabinets to the ceiling. Once near the ceiling the wiring takes a lateral turn and goes over the top of the pantry cabinet. There is a removable wooden louvered grill that hides the surround sound speakers so it's easy to fish those wires over to the hallway. From there the wiring drops down through a 1" deep cavity behind the hallway wall until they get to the panels, which are cut into the 3/4" cherry paneling in the hallway. This makes it easy to add wiring parallel to the existing wiring. I did not have to penetrate the exterior walls or ceiling to run the cable.

The Xantrex RS3000 is one element of a networked system that Xantrex has introduced. This system includes automatic generator start modules and battery usage monitoring devices. They are all connected by a cat5 network cable and data is hared between items. The SCP will monitor any device on that system so you don't need to have a separate display panel for every device. Information is also shared amongst the various devices so that the automatic generator start module will know when the batteries are getting low or the inverter is trying to handle too large of a load and will kick in as needed. All of this is done via a user friendly system of menus displayed on the LCD screen. The biggest thing is that you will have battery condition, inverter load, charge amps, and other data displayed at an easy to monitor location.

The hardest part of the installation was connecting the System Control Panel to the inverter. The first consideration was where to put it. It didn't quite fit in the existing spot where the OEM inverter display panel was found. I didn't want to chop around and make it look like a hack job plus I really wanted it more readily accessible. The second consideration was that the OEM remote panel used a flat 4 wire cable between the inverter and remote display. But the newer RS3000 needed to communicate much more data with the SCP so it required a cat5 network cable. This meant I had to pull a new cable to the panel. The hallway in the 42QRP was the perfect choice. It was easy enough to get the cable to and would be mounted at eye level in a convenient spot for monitoring. It saved me from having to run a new cat5 all the way to the upper cabinet over the driver's seat too but it turned out I had to do that anyway later on for the solar panels.

One other concern was the battery temperature sensor. The original sensor that came with the RV30122 was not compatible with the RS3000. But the sensor supplied with the RS3000 had too short of a cable to reach the batteries in the rear of the coach. But it was possible to cut off the OEM sensor and simply install the new one by splicing it into the OEM cable.

Summary

This installation worked very well. I now have true sine wave power when on inverter that match the generator's output as well as shore power. I also have better information as to battery status, charging status, and inverter load. Plus, it's in a handier location.

If you want more information, the following links will take you to supporting documentation:

This review written 12/2/06