We have upgraded to a campervan from tent camping yeh! Starting to stock the new camper up and purchasing a few things. Do we really need 12 v items? If so anyone got a good recommendation for a hand vacuum, kettle etc?
You don't say what type of campervan you have so I'm guessing you'll have the standard setup of 12v sockets from the leisure battery & normal 240v sockets to use when you're on EHU?
Don't bother with 12v appliances for anything involving heating (eg. kettle, hairdryer) - they don't work particularly well and unless you have a large battery bank they'll take far too much out of it. For when we're off grid (ie. running on the battery) the only things we run off the 12v are phone chargers, a small TV, lighting & the water/heating pump. We use gas for the fridge, kettle and for the hot water/heating.
We don't bother with a vacuum...we have a dustpan & brush for when we're away, and we just use the normal vacuum when we're back at home. Do you really need one?
We bought a small electric kettle for our van. Like vampgirl we use a dustpan and brush for cleaning, though we do have a rechargeable hand held Gtec vac, but it would take up too much room. The only other electric things we use are chargers, or maybe a fan/heater, but not at the same time as the kettle.
Like others, we only use a (low wattage) kettle or fan heater when we've got EHU. We give the van a good vacuuming when we return from trips and just carry a dustpan and brush when we're away.
We don't have a TV (glad to get away from it) but if we did, I'd get a 12V one. We don't switch on phone either - it's so nice to just disappear for a while.
------------- Two drifters off to see the world.
I'm tired of reality, so I'm off to look for a good fantasy.
Thanks for all your replies. The camper van was a recent purchase, second hand and we have no experience and little knowledge so please bare with me for the novice replies and questions. Yes we have 2 leisure batteries. We do have an invertor but new to all this. We have gas as well so just as easy I suppose to heat up water on the hob. I assume we can use normal electrical items if hooked up to a campsite electricity and only need 12 v when wild camping. I think a dust pan and brush is the way to go. It served us well in a tent for 2 week. Thanks for advice and money saved.
We converted from tent to small campervan and found that a lot of the stuff we used for the tent was still usuable in the van. We seldom use the sink or taps so have a washing up bowl to take to the sanitary block, or we boil a kettle and wash up on the table outside. And as we prefer to cook outside we use a suitcase stove on the camping table. The table can also be used inside the van. The plastic tubs we keep pots and pans in slide into the spaces under the bed.