Howdy from Montana

[Stephanie_MT]

Hi, I'm Stephanie, pleased to digitally meet you!

I'm going to ask some questions, and then, if you feel like reading more, I'll tell you about myself. I've lurked on this website for a few years learning about and looking for a lightweight camper that my Subaru outback could pull, that was in pretty good shape, and that I could afford. I figured I'd have to travel to get one, but last year I purchased a 1973 Hunter Camper II right in my Montana town that met my requirements. It is about 10 feet long and perhaps 8 feet wide, and the Suby pulls it without a problem. It came with 2 cracked but working solar panels, but my housemate thought they were too broken to work and threw them away. Well at least he was tidy. Can someone tell me what to get to replace them? They are to charge an EverStart Plus 400W USB 3.1A with a replaceable fuse. (See picture below.) Apparently they worked pretty well, because the electric lights in the camper still turn on 10 months later! Also, does anyone have a manual for this kind of camper or a similar model? I'd be happy to pay for getting a photocopy or a .pdf of a scan of the manual. Thank you!

I'm a retired art professor. My big retirement project has been starting a community letterpress print studio. People can come to our print events and print for fun, or they can rent the studio inexpensively and use our presses to print their own items. Unfortunately, we're on an ongoing Pandemic hiatus. I can't imagine how we'd sanitize all the lead and wood type and spacing materials if we had to! My partner in the project and I just printed a broadside (poster) for a project that is on GoFundMe now. Our broadside will be a premium for people who donate $100 or more to the project. She will be a documentary on the work of poet Aimée Baker, whose poetry deals with women who are the victims of violence, cold cases, or missing. Every year over 300,000 women go missing in the U.S. She has grown from a short, 10-15 min pandemic project by filmmakers Jason Greer and Vanessa Ciccarelli to a full length documentary film with actor Kate Mulgrew narrating (Mulgrew was Captain Janeway on Star Trek, and is the cook on Orange is the New Black), and actor Raven Goodwin (on New Girl, Glee, Lovely and Amazing, and many more) voicing the poems. So, that's about me and what I'm up to.

The camper is for adventures with my dog, the Great Garbowski, aka, Garbo. I didn't choose her name to honor the beautiful, talented star of 1950's film, but because it means "kind." I suspect Greta Garbo chose her stage sur-name for the same reason. My Garbo is kind, companionable, and very beautiful.

I envision us camping, hiking, exploring, and one of us napping while the other one draws, sketches, does watercolors, and reads. Thanks for all the information you have already shared with us.

All best,

[ZachO]

Welcome!

Solar panels will depend on power needs. I have one 100W panel, and it supplies me more power than I can really use during the summer. I really depends on how much juice you need. I'm not familiar with the "everstart", but I think it's just an inverter. It takes 12V power from the battery and inverts it to 120V for household electronics. The solar panel will charge the battery.

Looks like a good find.

[Stephanie_MT]

Thanks Zach! I had written a whole different post, which explained that I didn't know my inverter from my battery, and that my housemate had tossed the solar panels that came with my camper because they were cracked and he thought that meant they were trash. But that letter disappeared into the ether! The panels must have worked, because 10 months after I bought it, the lights in the camper still light up.

[Keith2000]

Welcome!

I don’t know anything about your trailer but it looks fun in all the right ways. I don’t know anything about solar panels, but others will chime in.

In fact I was about to move on from your post, but am so glad I didn’t. Please share a quick link to your studio or go fund me page. That sounds reallllly cool. The kind of place we would visit when we can get back on the road.

To expand a bit on what Zach said: you have a battery somewhere that is powering your lights. You may have a solar controller somewhere or it maybe been a part of the panels that got tossed. I don’t have solar so I’m not much help there.

[Stephanie_MT]

Hi Keith2000,
Thanks for your note, and your interest in the print studio! You can take a look at it at Quoin Community Print Studio on our facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/quoinbozeman/, or our instagram page, instagram.com, then put quoin_press in the search window. When we are open again, we'd love to have you come print! Even when we're open, we aren't open for drop-ins, but we are very flexible in opening and printing with folks who let us know they are coming to town, Bozeman, MT. Hope to see you sometime in the future! Cheers, Stephanie

[Bob & Jackie C]

Renogy and Zamp have great panels for sale. Either one might have what you need after you figure out what you need.

[Stephanie_MT]

Hi Bob and Jackie,
Thanks for the suggestions! I appreciate it.
Stephanie