Tiniest Hymer Promaster Carrado/Axion

[BBQ]

Originally Posted by Smith101

...

To make matters worse, the solar never contributes to usable capacity or reduces consumption. With the lithium setup the solar only feeds the backup AGM battery which powers nothing except the BMS for the lithiums in case their capacity becomes too low to self start. All the solar does is keep the back-up AGM topped off. The solar would never send one watt to your fridge, for example. It’s likely the non-lithium setup would power the fridge far longer with good solar conditions. Solar on the lithium setup makes little or no sense, but the lithiums all come with it. I’m considering removing my solar panels to put in a fantastic fan.

...

It is possible that your solar is wired incorrectly.

This has happened to a number of RT owners.
One of the members here has to hire a specialist to reconfigure the solar system. It is working perfectly now. IIRC, RT picked up the bill.
(sorry I can't find/remember his username now. Let me sleep on it, I am sure it will pop up).

[Smith101]

Originally Posted by BBQ

It is possible that your solar is wired incorrectly.

This has happened to a number of RT owners.
One of the members here has to hire a specialist to reconfigure the solar system. It is working perfectly now. IIRC, RT picked up the bill.
(sorry I can't find/remember his username now. Let me sleep on it, I am sure it will pop up).

I'm basing this on what I was told by Lars Dudek, a Hymer employee, at the 2017 Pomona show. That's how the factory wires it when you have lithiums. And yes, I realize these are Roadtrek specific problems which don't occur on the Fit RV's solution or the new Travatos. I accepted this when I bought the van. Definitely not an elegant solution but adequate for what I need.

[silex840]

Originally Posted by kite_rider

Silex, welcome to the Axion if you've actually bought one by now.

Per your question on the rope light control, the difference between the controllers is how you adjust the dimmer on the light. Mine has the circle style, you slide your finger around the circle to make it brighter or dimmer. The other controller just has a 'brighter' or 'dimmer' button.

For what it's worth; before I owned it I was all wrapped around the axle about battery capacity, lithium, UGH, etc. My Axion just has the base installed 105 AH AGM and when my wife purchased the van it was severely abused by the ill-informed RV dealer. Voltage was a 9V when we first looked at it! It has 200W of solar panels on the roof; but I had taken two long trips before I noticed that there was no charge controller installed! The local dealer put in the factory suggested MPPT controller and now even with the damaged battery I'm rarely thinking that I don't have enough battery capacity. If the sun is out at all, there is plenty of power. Even when the sun isn't out; the existing battery keeps the fridge running, the heater going all night, and the bathroom exhaust fan going during showers and during the day if when I use it along with a window cracked open to keep the temp comfortable inside. The 2000W inverter keeps all of my 110V electronics charged and even runs the microwave oven for the short cook times that I run it. Frankly, I over estimated how much power I thought I would need. I'm trying to kill this abused battery while its still under warranty, but that seems to be easier said than done! I plan to install about 200Ah of quality AGM when this battery goes.

Last note on towing... I tow a smallish utility trailer loaded with a motorcycle, mountain bikes, SUP's, and kite surfing equipment almost everywhere I go. I figure the think is probably around 1000 Lbs give or take. So it's not a big trailer, but I've had zero issues getting this in and out off road trailheads and sandy beaches and I'm almost at 14K miles by now.

Please post pics of your roof racks and additional roof vents if you put these in, I'm interested in this too!

Yup I got one! I do as I say and say as I do. Appreciate your input! My lights is the 3 button style and it dims and brightens with the appropriate button press which is fine by me! For voltage on AGM, I hear it's best to keep it between 11.5v - 14.4v. When it drops to 11.6v, I start the van to charge it back up a little bit then shut it off after 10min or so. It usually gets it above 12v at that point. I'll be sure to post any upgrades done!

Originally Posted by kite_rider

Smith101: I’ve now had my Axion (lith 400) a couple of months. I saw nowhere in the specs that the Alde 3010 would not provide heat and hot water above 3300ft. Altitude. So when I camped at 4000ft I had neither. The Alde part to fix this is not imported. So I have to hire someone to hack into the supply line and insert a regulator so I can rebalance fuel/air mixture. I talked to Hymer and they don’t want to participate in a fix. So, beware of depending on specs.

This is the first time I've seen or heard of this. I just rolled in from my last trip and thought about the last 'high elevation' place I camped. That would be the Curt Gowdy State park in Wyoming earlier this week (elevation approx 7,600 ft). After a great mt bike ride, the Alde system had piping hot water in the shower and with overnight low was in the 40's and the furnace kept the internal temps right where I set them. Similar performance everywhere else I camped in Utah and Colorado. I've not checked my exact model number, but the van is a 2017 model year.

The plan is to modify the system to pump heated glycol mix near the plumbing since I have had my plumbing freeze up after sub 20 degree overnight temps. I was inspired by member Avanti on this from a post about a modification to his van's hydronic system...

I need to look into the glycol setup too.

Originally Posted by warpig

To jump in on the Axion talk but on a different topic, I am interested in owner's overall feelings about it. I am strongly considering a 2017 with lithium, volt, UG, and solar. This would be my first RV and I don't want to screw the purchase up. Have you had any problems? Would you recommend it? Any other info that you can share would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

You'll love it! Mine is the base model and I'm totally fine with that as the foundation is a sound platform to built upon. Personally, I'm sticking with AGM batteries and getting the UG installed with a SOC (state of charge) gauge which I recommend everybody should have especially for AGM since they don't rely on a BMS like lithiums do. It measures battery capacity left in percentage. You don't want AGM going below 50% as that's "no mans land" and the battery will be hard pressed to come back to full charge after that.

Originally Posted by kite_rider

No, I'm not since I've never removed this factory installed battery to inspect it. I can say for certain that it is a single battery mounted under the chassis and looks to be about the size of a Group 27 battery. I just got back from my last trip; I departed on March 9th and the fridge has been on the entire time. The heater was used on many cool evenings and the water heater was used a lot. During the whole trip, I only plugged the system in one time at a state park just outside of Omaha, Nebraska last week. I tested the rooftop A/C there (previously I've only used it occasionally when it was NOT plugged in, but the van was running so I could rapidly cool the van) and I also tested the feature on the Alde system that uses shore power rather than propane for heat. It worked fine.

There was not a single time on this trip when the fridge stopped working or the heater didn't run all night. Note that I only use the 2000W inverter to charge my laptop and run the microwave for short periods of time (like 1 to 3 minutes) - otherwise it's off. So I'm not using the inverter at capacity ever and it's not on very long. An hour or two usually in the evenings.

There is a volt meter on the control panel and the voltage ranges from about 12.4V (when fully charged) to around 11.9V in the morning before the sun is out and when the heater is on and I've used the inverter to charge the laptop and cook some dinner and breakfast. Once the sun is shining I'm usually over 13V.

Unfortunately for me, I'm quite the power user and I plan to jump in the #vanlife bandwagon so I need all the power and capacity I can shove in this thing!

Originally Posted by kite_rider

Warpig:

+1 on what Smith101 says about the Axion. Unless you need that constant A/C when unplugged then I would avoid the Lithium and UG. Sad, since it seems like cool tech if it worked. I differ from him on the Alde, it's been better than I expected. Low power use consumption (I don't use the air circulation fan and like that you can turn it on and off) and it's really stingy on it's propane use. The propane seems to last forever...

In addition to the short length which is hard to find, the layout is unusual and not for everyone. Many class B's have a bathroom in the middle that splits the sleeping area from the dining/riding around area. That probably works well for most people, but in our case we wanted the larger common area even if it is a pain to setup and tear down the bed. Some people like to camp with the doors closed and stay inside to watch TV or something I guess. We like to have the sliding door open and visit while my wife cooks. This layout seems more inviting in this situation. Plus, I use this rig as a 'daily driver' and the extra space is good for hauling around SUP boards and my kite foil board which is awkwardly sized.

The only issues I've had are pretty minor. There is an aluminum heat shield that goes around the propane tank. This has rattled around and was already fixed once before it started again on the latest trip. Plus, the drawer latches are not strong enough to keep loaded up drawers from flying open on curves. I've been experimenting with various magnetic and friction latching schemes to correct this. Otherwise it's exceeded many of my expectations - which are probably low anyway since I'm coming from a VW Eurovan Camper..

+2 for me. I rather like the bed setup. I did notice that the entire aisle underneath is open so you can lay additional luggage and the like down the center row and unfold the bed without hitting anything. There is even cutouts that allow one to reach in and grab whatever they need! Well thought out setup.

[booster]

Originally Posted by falfal3

So funny when people, like you, try to sound like some authority on a subject. What idiots, like you, forget is there are those, like me, that have real world experience on which to draw the truth. Go away and sell your, uninformed BS elsewhere. Thanks for the laughs though.

If you are going to attack folks, you should at least provide the quote of what you are taking issue with, so we all know what is of question. It is also a good idea to be able to separate opinion, speculation, and proven facts from each other. Somehow telling a (likely) fairly long time poster here to go away, when you have just showed up, seems a bit over the top to me.

There are a lot of folks here that have spent a lot of time and effort trying to learn how the lithium systems work, or don't work, particularly in respect to the Roadtrek systems that have had many issues. There are also current and past Roadtrek lithium/voltstart owners here that add what they have learned.

There are certainly happy Roadtrek users out there, and you are one of them, but that doesn't negate the issues that Roadtrek has had, and may still have, in many of their systems. Their lack of transparency and lack of any useful monitoring system on their setups makes any real evaluation nearly impossble without adding parts. Many of the questions could be easily solved if they would just supply a wiring diagram, but they won't do that, so nobody knows how the system is designed to work.

It is understandable that many users just want to be able to run stuff and don't care how it is done, or if they know much power they have left, but many also like to have at least some information to know what is going on.

Lithium systems in general are still evolving, so lots of discussion and speculation will certainly continue for a long time to come. There will be good stuff and bad stuff happen with them and both will be up for comments both for and against.

[GeorgeRa]

Originally Posted by booster

If you are going to attack folks, you should at least provide the quote of what you are taking issue with, so we all know what is of question. It is also a good idea to be able to separate opinion, speculation, and proven facts from each other. Somehow telling a (likely) fairly long time poster here to go away, when you have just showed up, seems a bit over the top to me.

There are a lot of folks here that have spent a lot of time and effort trying to learn how the lithium systems work, or don't work, particularly in respect to the Roadtrek systems that have had many issues. There are also current and past Roadtrek lithium/voltstart owners here that add what they have learned.

There are certainly happy Roadtrek users out there, and you are one of them, but that doesn't negate the issues that Roadtrek has had, and may still have, in many of their systems. Their lack of transparency and lack of any useful monitoring system on their setups makes any real evaluation nearly impossble without adding parts. Many of the questions could be easily solved if they would just supply a wiring diagram, but they won't do that, so nobody knows how the system is designed to work.

It is understandable that many users just want to be able to run stuff and don't care how it is done, or if they know much power they have left, but many also like to have at least some information to know what is going on.

Lithium systems in general are still evolving, so lots of discussion and speculation will certainly continue for a long time to come. There will be good stuff and bad stuff happen with them and both will be up for comments both for and against.

I admire your patience.

Cheers.

[kite_rider]

Originally Posted by silex840

Yup I got one! I do as I say and say as I do. Appreciate your input! My lights is the 3 button style and it dims and brightens with the appropriate button press which is fine by me! For voltage on AGM, I hear it's best to keep it between 11.5v - 14.4v. When it drops to 11.6v, I start the van to charge it back up a little bit then shut it off after 10min or so. It usually gets it above 12v at that point. I'll be sure to post any upgrades done!

I need to look into the glycol setup too.

Unfortunately for me, I'm quite the power user and I plan to jump in the #vanlife bandwagon so I need all the power and capacity I can shove in this thing!
.

Cool! It's nice to find other owners who are willing to roll up their sleeves and make some modifications and improvements.

A couple of notes on battery voltages:
1. Battery talk is akin to religion on this forum; just beware that there are zealots here of every stripe. So as we discuss be ready for 'fire and brimstone' from some random netizen out there..
2. I've been under the impression that for longevity of the AGM battery, never let it go below 50% SOC. So if I had a 'good' battery in my rig I would actually start the van (to charge the battery) when it gets to around 12.1V rather than 11.6V. If you let it go below 50% (as the religion states) your battery will be experience a rapid death. Given this gospel, I've been trying to kill my battery by being a negligent owner, but it seems to be stubbornly difficult to do. Now that the days are longer and I'm parking outside in the sun more, the solar system seems to rapidly address the kind of loads that I put on the system overnight. Or at least it looks like the battery is above 50% SOC due to the 'surface charge' or some other reason.
3. I'd be interested in knowing more about your power needs for #vanlife. I've been on the road a TON in my old 02 Eurovan Camper and now the Axion, and other than winter camping for backcountry skiing; I'm not sure how I would use so much power. Only exceptions I can think of are: using an induction cooktop, an electric toaster oven, or ?? Of course building an 'off the grid' A/C system that runs for hours would require a lot of battery power. Anyway, my recent experience in the van has me questioning just how much power I actually need.

I've got a whole other list of 'improvements' that I'd like to make to my Axion - I'll post those separately.

[booster]

There are several very good discussions on this forum about the 50% rule for lead acid batteries, both wet and AGM.


IMO the bottom line is that strictly adhering to the no more than 50% discharge is not really necessary. You lose some life, but it is not 1/2 like the rule states, it is more likely somewhere under 1/5 less life, based on total energy in and aout. For that loss of life, you gain 60% usable capacity and 1/2 the weight and initial cost.


The other part is that the discharges average, it appears, so if you go to 80% once and 20% once you come out just about where you would be with two 50% discgharges.



Others will certainly disagree, but we wouldn't hesitate to go to 20% if we wanted to stay someplace longer, as with a good recharge based on amps to the batteries any damage would essentially so small it wouldn't matter.

[kite_rider]

Originally Posted by falfal3
So funny when people, like you, try to sound like some authority on a subject. What idiots, like you, forget is there are those, like me, that have real world experience on which to draw the truth. Go away and sell your, uninformed BS elsewhere. Thanks for the laughs though.

Originally Posted by Davydd

Are you addressing me? I’ve had 800ah of lithium ion batteries for 3-1/2 years now in my B and in an extreme cold climate in Minnesota. How’s that for real world experience?

Davydd, I don't think he was attacking you, but it's hard to say since he didn't quote anything in that unfortunate newbie post. I actually thought he was after Smith101 regarding the Alde heater altitude comment.

Anyway, I just wanted to encourage you to keep 'fighting the good fight' for the lithium solution. Even though I have a pitifully underpowered AGM system and now plan to just expand upon the AGM for my current rig (based this on feedback and suggestions from other good folks on this forum as well as recent personal experience) - I think lithium is the way of the future and I still want to build a 4x4 sprinter (or transit) as a 'single fuel' vehicle with tons of lithium power like you have in your rig! Your posts are *very* helpful!

[cruising7388]

Originally Posted by Smith101

To make matters worse, the solar never contributes to usable capacity or reduces consumption. With the lithium setup the solar only feeds the backup AGM battery which powers nothing except the BMS for the lithiums in case their capacity becomes too low to self start. All the solar does is keep the back-up AGM topped off. The solar would never send one watt to your fridge, for example. It’s likely the non-lithium setup would power the fridge far longer with good solar conditions. Solar on the lithium setup makes little or no sense, but the lithiums all come with it.

Your conclusion that solar only addresses the AGM supporting the BMS doesn't square with the way it's connected on lithium equipped Roadtreks where the solar controller, the AGM, the Nations alternator and the shore side battery charger are all common to the lithium battery(s) charge port.

[BBQ]

Originally Posted by GeorgeRa

I admire your patience.

Cheers.

+1

[wincrasher]

Don't worry folks, FalFal will be back in due time complaining that his system has failed, he doesn't know why, and can't get anyone at Hymer to help him fix it. Heard this sad song many times, and it doesn't seem to ever have a different ending.

I was pretty happy with just my drop-in lithiums upgrade (and converter upgrade) and getting along fine, as my power needs have been fairly modest. It's a pretty good way to go for simplicity's sake if you want low complication, and have modest power needs.

But I'm very excited to get my new Volta system on the Travato I ordered. I have no doubts it will work very well. July seems a long way off.

[silex840]

Curious what kind of MPG y’all getting? Best and worse and under what conditions? For short jaunts of a mile or two I’m noticing 5mpg which is horrid! But hey I’m happy I can even do short trips since I wouldn’t be so lucky in a diesel.

Another question that popped in my head is how useful is the UG if just sticking with AGM batteries? I’ve only seen Carado spec’ed with lithium and UG together at the same time which leads me to believe they can’t work separately but I could be wrong.

[BBQ]

Originally Posted by wincrasher

Don't worry folks, FalFal will be back in due time complaining that his system has failed, he doesn't know why, and can't get anyone at Hymer to help him fix it. Heard this sad song many times, and it doesn't seem to ever have a different ending.

....

Sad prediction. But I concur. This has happened so many times, it is not funny anymore.

[mumkin]

Originally Posted by silex840

Another question that popped in my head is how useful is the UG if just sticking with AGM batteries? I’ve only seen Carado spec’ed with lithium and UG together at the same time which leads me to believe they can’t work separately but I could be wrong.

I've been using the UG for 3 years with my 2 Group 31s (which replaced the original EcoTrek200) and it works great. Granted I do very little boondocking to have tested my limits.

My new Simplicity will have the same... after the dealer replaces the one AGM with 2 Group 31s.

BTW... the majority of the problems that we get over on Facebook is user error these days. But there are still too many people needing replacements. Most users over there love them. I find it too labor intensive... don't want to have to be thinking about when to turn on or off... or how many to turn on. I guess I must admit that I am getting old...

[Davydd]

With the second underhood alternator (or UG as one calls it) I have found solar of no importance. I can drive or idle for 15 minutes per day to replenish my batteries equivalent amp hours that my 420w of solar contributes on a good day. I can drive less than one hour to replenish the use of my batteries for a whole day and I am a high user of electricity leaving the inverter on all the time to make my van transparent in electrical use be it boon docking or shore power. With the Volta system you can reduce your idle or driving time to one half of that.

[booster]

Whether the solar is significant or not really is a variable between users and systems.

With moderate sized system, maybe 300 watts, you can get up to about 100ah per day max, maybe 40-50 average. If you use about that much power, it is significant and you will keep up with your use as long as you have enough battery capacity to get though poor sun days.

If you use 200-300 ah per day, the solar isn't nearly significant, especially if you have lithium batteries that can charge all the way to full at high rate. Then you need an engine generator to do that high rate charging.

If you are large power user and have AGM batteries, they will accept large charge rates, but only up to about 80% state of charge after which charging tapers quickly and takes a long time. For these setups, having and engine generator to get you to 80% SOC quickly and solar to handle the longer, slower, charging works very well. There are several such systems in use by members here.

Bottom line:

Low use with good solar size-don't need engine generator as stock alternator will have enough capacity.

High use with lithium and engine generator--don't need solar much as it will be a small contributor

High use with AGM--works best with solar and engine generator

[avanti]

In evaluating solar, one should really examine two separate issues:
(1) Whether it will contribute significantly to your total energy consumption
(2) What it may contribute to the pragmatics of battery management.

Booster's analysis addresses both, but I find thinking of them as distinct issues to be helpful.

In my particular situation, solar has little value WRT #1, but great value for #2:

Large AGM + outdoor storage + Trik-L-Start + modest solar = carefree battery ownership

[kite_rider]

Originally Posted by silex840

Curious what kind of MPG y’all getting? Best and worse and under what conditions? For short jaunts of a mile or two I’m noticing 5mpg which is horrid! But hey I’m happy I can even do short trips since I wouldn’t be so lucky in a diesel.

I track mileage on Fuelly.com. For the 13,200 miles tracked on my rig I'm averaging 15.2. Note that almost all of this is towing a small trailer and many of the states I cross now have 80mph limits. Over the last few thousand miles I've changed my driving habits a bit and am cruising the freeways at around 70mph and my onboard computer tells me my average consumption is 15.7. This weekend I took a trip to the Columbia River Gorge area without the trailer and my onboard computer says I'm averaging 17.9! Speed limits here are 65mph. During the first 8 or 9K miles the transmission seemed to hunt around a lot to the right gear; now it feels like it's not doing that as much and my mileage may be getting a bit better.

I really love the small displacement diesel engines these vans have in Europe. We borrowed a small Ducato based RV and toured around 11K miles in England, Spain, France, Italy, and Germany. After doing a bunch of math to convert liters to gallons and kilometers to miles I calculated 24MPG average for the trip! Power on the small engine was 'so so', but good enough... As much as I love diesel, the whole NA emissions requirements seem to have made the choices here limited and increased my fear of costly emissions related repairs ...

[warpig]

Thank you to Kite Rider, Smith 101, Silex, and falfal for your input on the Axion. The model that I am looking at does have the eco, volt, UG, and solar. You have given much to think about.

Here is where I am currently at. I've been focused on the Axion, Aktiv, but always have my eye on the 59G. I like the Axion and Aktiv for their shorter lengths. I like the 59G because it has a lot of bang for the buck. I don't know if I'm ready to pull the trigger on a purchase immediately, but here are the offers on the table on the Axion & Aktiv:

- Axion (eco, solar, volt): New/2017 67k out the door
- Aktiv (2AGM, UG, no solar, no volt): Used/2018/10,300 82k out the door
- 59G (standard): New/2018 estimating around 76/77k out the door

None of the dealers are particularly close,so any service would be done elsewhere. My preference would be to boondock on most excursions, but I would certainly be staying at campgrounds as well. Obviously, there are many other issues at play that will go into my decision, but in terms of vehicles and price, I welcome any opinions that anyone has. I am very fortunate to have found this forum and appreciate all that I have learned so far. Thank you.

[BBQ]

.

If you like to park in the shade,
rooftop solar is useless.

But it is still a good thing to have.