Go Power 120w Portable Solar Panel

Doug & Angela

Doug & Angela

Novice
I bought a 560 last summer and I was planning on doing some dry camping at some point. The fellow that sold it to me tossed in a solar panel (Go Power) and Cary let me know I was missing a peice to plug it in (Marinco ConnectPro 12VBP) which I got. For the life of me I still can't figure out how to get it all to work. Does anyone else have one of these Go Power Solar Panels and did you use the Marinco ConnectPro to "plug in" your solar panel?
 
Is it the plug that needs to be mounted in the sidewall of the camper? If so, CampInn (or you if you are so inclined) would have to make some changes to the camper wiring. A few ictures would help me and others understand just what you've got.

Is this the plug you have?
prod_12vbp__87236.1465374669.jpg
 
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Ken, I uploaded some pics to this post of what I'm working with. Several plugs that don't plug into the teardrop directly, but this Marinco plug does. However, nothing will plug into the Marinco product. Thanks for your input! I was just up in WI getting a roof rack put on, so it'll be a while until we get up there again (from TX). If I can't get this to work, we'll have to stay with state parks and such. It'd be great to get what we have working, though.
 

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It appears to me you have all you need. You will just need to remove the alligator clips on your one wire and use those bare wires while following the wiring instructions on page 28 of the blue covered owner's manual. You just need 2 wires from the panel, a positive (red normally) and a negative (black normally). The connector has three leads to facilitate using it with either a solar panel that does not have its own controller or one that does have a controller.
 
Doug & Angela said:
Ken, I uploaded some pics to this post of what I'm working with. Several plugs that don't plug into the teardrop directly, but this Marinco plug does. However, nothing will plug into the Marinco product. Thanks for your input! I was just up in WI getting a roof rack put on, so it'll be a while until we get up there again (from TX). If I can't get this to work, we'll have to stay with state parks and such. It'd be great to get what we have working, though.
Click to expand...

Sounds like Jim has you covered. Looks like a pretty straightforward operation... Good luck!
 
Guys, I took off the protective waterproof cover to get the wiring taken care of and see in the manual (pg 28) that the insert arrow and the small triangle on the female connector line up with each other. I didn't take note as to which Pin the arrow was pointing to, though (I wouldn't cut it as an engineer). I uploaded the pdf from Marinco's website with the insert arrow. Any thoughts on which Pin should be on top (or which Pin the insert arrow should be pointing to)?
 

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Can't help you there. And there's not some sort of notch or groove or some other indicator that'd show the way to reassemble correctly?
Hopefully someone here knows - or you may have to buy another Marinco part to see how things get lined up...
 
Are you using a solar charge controller in the trailer or on the solar panel? This makes a difference on which pin (2 or 3) that you wire to in the connector. From the marinco pictures, I would assume that the cover goes on so the the arrow is oriented over the negative pin (#1). The cover and plug should have flats that need to line up.

If it were me, I would get a multi-meter and confirm on the trailer which pins are positive and negative. Then I would insert the plug in the right orientation, then slide the cover on so that the arrow lines up or mark the plug where the arrow should be. The positive wire will need to be on either pin 2 or 3 depending on where your solar controller is located.

I am assuming that the little triangle on the receptacle is the negative wire ( I have a 2 prong plug on my trailer, so cannot confirm how the 3 prong is wired).
 
I finally got around to this and got it figured out with Cary's help and thought I'd post it for anyone else with similar challenges. My solar panel has a controller on it and he said we can't feed one controller into another, so I followed instructions in the manual for if my panel has a controller and got it wired up per the instructions in the manual (pg 28 in my manual). Here was an email from Cary:

You cannot feed one controller into another. If you plan to use a solar panel with a built in control then you need to bypass the solar controller built into the camper. The third pin basically goes straight to the battery positive post instead of the solar controller.

I also took Henry's advice and got a multi-meter to have more confidence I was hooking it up right.

Thanks again for everyone's input!
 
I also took Henry's advice and got a multi-meter to have more confidence I was hooking it up right.

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Doug and Angela. Not all multimeters are created equal. For the panel and anything 12V with the trailer, you'll want one that can measure DC current, and not just voltage. A clamp style meter works best. Such as this... Clamp Meter

Many meters omit this functionality which is crucial for diagnosing automotive wiring issues.

Steve
 
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