Off Grid Down Under by MDC
Off Grid Down Under is a brand-new adventure series brought to you by MDC Campers & Caravans, showcasing the very best of Australian travel—rugged landscapes, hidden gems, and real off-grid living. Each week, we take you to a new destination across the country, proving why MDC builds the toughest, most capable caravans on the Australian market. Tune in every Sunday at 4PM AEST on the MDC Campers & Caravans YouTube channel and get inspired to take the road less travelled.
Off Grid Down Under by MDC
EP 34 - Why MDC Has Used the Same Electrical System for Years
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Fifteen years is a long time in any industry — so what does it take to keep a partnership that strong?
In this episode of the Off Grid Down Under Podcast, we sit down with Shane Easton from Projecta to unpack the relationship that powers every MDC caravan.
From the early days of basic battery chargers to the brand new Intelli-GRID Gen3 system rolling out in the Forté SR Series 2, we break down why integrated electrical systems matter, what 300Ah as standard really means for on-road caravanning, and the one thing every new caravan owner should do before they ever leave the driveway.
If you own an MDC or you're thinking about one, this is essential listening.
Explore the full MDC range at https://www.marketdirect.com.au — and don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode.
Longtime listener, first time sitter.
SPEAKER_04We work with Projector right from the beginning of any project that you start to understand the depth of your power consumption.
SPEAKER_00What am I gonna say? I was so paranoid. That is your baseline. 200 amp hour minus five amps per hour. Having that sort of input into such a reputable brand, for me, is probably the biggest milestone out of anything. To be running factory 300 amp hour for what's considered an on-road van, not an off-grid van, it's unheard of.
SPEAKER_01G'day everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Off-Grid Down Under Podcast brought to you by MDC. I'm Sam, I'm the host. I'm sitting here with a couple of guests, as we always have. Mr. Wayne Chevis. Always good to be back, Sam. Nice to see you, mate. Thanks, mate. James Field. Hello. Commercial General Manager of Commercial and Product Development Within the Business. Yes. And uh guest Shane Easton from Projector.
SPEAKER_00Longtime listener, first time sitter.
SPEAKER_01Oh, lovely, lovely to have you on board, mate. Well done. Long time listener, first time caller. So yeah, I like that you're sitting here with us, mate. So thank you. Um Shane, thanks for joining us. Today's podcast is a bit of a deep dive into the electrical systems that we use in our caravans, but more importantly, the projector systems. The projector systems have been used in the MDC products for a number of years now. They're you know very reliable, very usable systems, fully integrated, trying to make the user experience as simple and easy for customers as possible. So we thought it'd be a good opportunity to bring you in and um understand a bit more about the projector brand, and I guess bring James into the discussion too, from a product development point of view, where we can talk about why decisions are made to partner with particular brands and you know the products we choose and why we do that. So tell us a bit about yourself, Shane. Where have you come from and what's your history with Projectors?
SPEAKER_00Uh look, originally I sort of fell into the job at Projector. My first job at Motorgear, they were bought out by another company, they didn't want any warehouse staff. And my boss knew the warehouse manager at NAVA at the time, which is a subsidiary of BWI with Projector, and went in for an interview, thought, yeah, this is just gonna be a fill-in type job. I'll do this for a couple of years, move on to something else. At that time, I was heavily into working on cars, so every day without fail, I'd be doing something different. And wasn't uncommon two o'clock in the morning, figuring out how I'm gonna get to work the next day because the car's not starting. Um, so I was sort of leaning towards that way, but it just never eventuated. But from the days of picking and packing, it sort of went into production where I got to see all these caravan boards as I was manufacturing them to a case of right, this is what they're using. How do I make it better? How do I make it easier for us? How do I make it easier for the customer? Then blew my leg out, playing basketball, got put into customer service. Now I'm listening to the customers. What are the customers' grievances? Where are they having problems? How can we fix them? And from there I went into the lab, and that's where it really sort of got a passion. So having to test all the new products before going to market. Like, am I happy with this? Would I be happy with a customer using this? To writing the test procedures. So IEC standards, ISO standards, ASNZS standards, MILSPEC standards, real-world testing, all that became part of my job to make sure the product we are releasing is right and fit for purpose in the market.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_00Then Mises and I decided that we wanted to move to Queensland, moved up to Queensland, which then put me into more of a forward-facing role with the caravan guys. And now I deal with a lot of the OEM manufacturers, end users, help with custom designs of systems and what's sort of best application for what that specific customer wants.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well.
SPEAKER_00And it's just sort of progressed from there and it's gone from oh yeah, I'll do this for a couple of years to now I'm probably more passionate about it than what I should be, and to the point where I frustrate people when I talk about it so much.
SPEAKER_01And you've been with the business for a while, haven't you?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, 22 years in three days' time. So I've spent more than half my life working for we should have a big play cake here for you instead, shouldn't we? Yeah, more than half my life working for them now. There's been a few instances where I thought, hmm, maybe I should walk out the door, but it just so happens that new opportunities came through and it kept me around for a bit longer. And I can't imagine myself working anywhere else now, to be brutally honest.
SPEAKER_01Has that uh diversity in your role positions and responsibilities played a big part in why you've been there so long?
SPEAKER_00Huge, huge. So I'd sort of work through one role for a couple of years, go, right, I'm getting an itch, I need a change, change into something new, same deal. But the last 16 years or so has primarily been a split of hands-on with lab testing, as well as the face-to-face and obviously work behind computer with standards and things like that. So I'm happy where I am now because it gives that diverse workflow with what I'm doing. And I get to meet new people regularly. I get to do all the shows and assist customers who either have problems with our products or unaware of how they function properly. And obviously, customers such as yourself at shows where if you guys get stuck on something, at least I can give you guys the education whilst the customer is there as well. And if there are any additional questions, it can all be answered at the same time.
SPEAKER_03It's it is definitely a value add to have you walk onto the stand and go, hey, what's happened? And any any squirrely questions, and you spend time with the team, and you know, you walk out of there having helped us, and the team has got a little bit more knowledge at the end of the day.
SPEAKER_00So it gives you that good feeling at the end of the day. I know I've walked in, I've done the best that I can, and the list of people I've spoken to are either if they're not happy, they're not telling me. But generally speaking, what I see is when I walk away, they're they're happy with what's happened. So I can't really complain.
SPEAKER_01It's a it's a big learning curve, I think, for people coming into new but using electrical systems for the first time, people don't really it's only when you get in a caravan or a camper trailer or you camp that you start to understand the the depth of your power consumption. You know, I want to use a fridge. I haven't used a fridge before, so how much current is it pulling? What settings am I fridge on, and how much current could I be pulling less if I just drop the settings a little bit or I plug it in before I leave the house and make sure that the battery I'm not drawing down on the batteries before I've even left the driveway, things like that. So usability has a big part. Can you just talk about the I guess the caravanning side of the business as opposed to the other arms of projector a little bit, just to provide the scale of the business?
SPEAKER_00So we'll start with the caravanning side. Realistically, if we go back that sort of 15-16 years when I was working customer service, the biggest impact we had on caravan was here's a 25-amp charger, hook it up to your battery. Here's a low voltage disconnect, you run your circuits through there, that protects everything. Yeah. To effectively where we are now, where we've got full integrated systems which communicate with each other, they give you sort of first-hand experiences to what the system is doing, how you are using it, and then what your expectations are from the system. Um I mean, we've grown exponentially in that sense. I mean, I was part of the Gen 1 release for our first power management systems, and it was a a tough road. I mean, two days before Christmas shutdown, we've got a sample product that's having an issue that myself and one of the engineers are scratching our heads, and you go, well, there's a choice of a thousand different components here. Like, what's causing this problem? So it's it was difficult in that sense, but I think we've got a good flow on what the market wants now. We cover about 80% of requirements. Um and since that first iteration, it it really has grown to from your standard, this is your basic system, to big, big, big off-grid systems where you manage expectations of a customer. You can go forever off-grid. Um, but outside of the power management side, we've got jump starters, which we've won awards for. So the rapid recharge technology, we've got EV charges, we've still got all your sort of battery terminals and things like that. So there is that basic range there. Components, and then you've got systems as well. Yeah. DC charges, solar panels, all the basic stuff. So as an avid camper as well, I mean, I've got basic DC charges, I've got solar panels on the roof of the car, multiple different batteries. Obviously, I try and test new systems, so my setups change continuously. But you go from that basic, all right, I want to use their solar panel, I'll use a competitor's product here, I'll use a competitor's product here. Then you've got, I want the whole gamut, I want the entire setup. Give me this, and then that'll cover everything for you.
SPEAKER_01Are there this is just a random question, is are there issues when you are crossing brands or crossing systems into others as you talk about that? You sort of talk about going that solar panel and that charger and then that.
SPEAKER_00The biggest issue I've found is if we don't know what the competitors' products are capable of, then it's difficult to isolate when there is an issue. So, for example, if we don't know what a solar panel specifications are when it's connected with one of our either DC chargers or power management systems, and it's operating in the way that we're not used to seeing, it's difficult for us to go, okay, it's an our product problem or it's a panel problem, or it's that link between the panel and the charger. Sure. That's probably the most difficult point is not knowing the specifications to ensure that it will cooperate correctly. This is why that when that happens, we try and work as closely as possible with those manufacturers to get those details so we can then help spec, right, this is what you want to do to make sure you don't have those problems. Then the other big issue would be having multiple different source points of information. So you could run, again for argument's sake, one of our DC charges, a third-party brand shunt, a third-party brand water tank sensor, a third-party brand gas sensor. You've now got four different apps you've got to monitor, four different points you've got to monitor. Which one's right, which one's got a tolerance on it, which one's doing this, which one's doing that. It becomes overwhelming on the information and it it doesn't make for an enjoyable trip.
SPEAKER_01No, it can make troubleshooting challenging, right? You're not you're not dealing off the same page.
SPEAKER_00Exactly. And you get the point of no, it's not our product, it's their product. No, it's not our product, it's their product. No, it's not our product, it's their product. It'll drive you crazy, wouldn't it? And then the customer's sitting there pulling their hair out, going, well, I've got a problem, but everyone's saying it's everybody else's fault. So we we try and take a little bit of onus and go, okay, we're not going to pass the buck. If it is something with someone else's product, we will try and drill down to a point where we can categorically go, we have eliminated everything up to this point. So you need to get that point investigated.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's it's kind of a good segue to sort of move to James here. How did this how did the relationship between MDC and Projector start? And I guess the second part of that is how important is it then to partner with a single brand and for those in the product development phase?
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Uh good questions. So I think let's start with the the start and where we started with Projector. So 2010, and interesting hearing Shane's journey. So, no different to MDC. 2010 is when we we started the journey with Projector. And at the time, MDC was making very different product to what we build today.
SPEAKER_01Probably more the soft floor folds trailers and things like that, as opposed to the full caravans.
SPEAKER_04Similarly, the electrical systems were significantly different to what we see today. So I think people might have wanted a fridge, and that's about it.
SPEAKER_01Or a couple of lights.
SPEAKER_04If you're lucky now that's a little coffee machine, yeah. Back to what Shane said, at that time it was a very basic battery charger if you happen to have a battery to charge it, and a low voltage disconnect if you happened to need it. And that was it. So at that time it worked very, very well. The projector product range fitted well into what MDC was producing at that time in 2010. And I think the reason why the relationship has gone so well is Projector has innovated and grown, I guess, in the same way that MDC has in their product range. They've understood the caravan market a lot better. They've got a wide range of uh componentry and systems that are available to us. But I think looking at why we like to uh partner with Projector and why we use so many of their parts and systems is the people. We've got access to people like Shane, who are arguably one of the best in the business when it comes to electrical systems as they pertain to caravans. Agreed, hands down. So the people, the support, the education they're able to provide to our customers. So I think back to our Mark III uh product, and we've got educational videos with Benny Blood, uh, we've got system videos and education there. So the education side of it and their innovation. I think just kind of catch on that.
SPEAKER_01This is a great point to tell viewers if they haven't seen it. The Mark III walkthrough videos with the projector that Benny did is a great way to understand your system. If you haven't seen it, check it out. We'll put a link in the description below. But that is a really useful and supporting tool for anybody who's just bought a Mark III caravan.
SPEAKER_04Sure. And I guess let's talk about the product then. So we were talking about the ecosystem or projector and what happens if you introduce things that aren't native projector or aren't all projector branded. Um, we work with projector right from the beginning of any project. So rather than just picking off the shelf or going, oh, that's a kind of a cool electrical component, yet let's use that. We will meet with projector and go, this is what we want to achieve. This is the customer outcome we want with the caravan. This is what we want the capability to be, and then we work backwards from there.
SPEAKER_01That could be we want to put a bigger fridge in this, we want to put an oven in this, we want to have all these active components, we've got to expect that the customer is going to use them all at once. Absolutely. So the load that we're gonna need and the demand we're gonna put on the system is this has to be factored in.
SPEAKER_04So scope it that way, and then once we understand those parameters, projector will come back to us with some proposed systems as to how they'll work, and then from there, we will get all the systems together, we'll prototype it, and then we'll test it. So we'll work with Shane and the team, and we will do that. So a good example of that is our Life Pro Plus lithium batteries that we utilize. Projector team have tested those countless times in terms of charging performance and compatibility with the systems, and that's critical. Back to your point, Shane, around making sure that these things do work and your team understands, and our team understands how they work together.
SPEAKER_00I think that was one of the first conversations I had with you. We're talking about this earlier. Um, you try calling one of the engineers because I was doing some testing for you, and he's looked at me and gone, you need to call James back. And they go, Oh, I've got this guy that's running a huge company here for a test that I've just done because he needs answers. What am I gonna say? I was so paranoid. But um, no, look, after that conversation and we ran through what I'd found and what the nuances were and how to overcome that. I think it's it's become easy since then. I think when you and I talk now, it's more private than what it is work. It's a quick five-minute work call and the rest of the time, oh yeah, how's the family? How's life?
SPEAKER_04And it comes back to those relationships, and that we're big about that with all of our suppliers and everything we do with MDC. We will partner with the right people, and the support from those people are key to us.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it that's it's the only way you're gonna manufacture a high-quality product is if you have those relationships and grow those relationships. It's the only way it's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_01I was gonna ask about some key milestones, I guess, that MDC and Projector have probably shared together, and obviously it was the birth of both your children and things like that. You're both in the birthing suite with each other, what it sounds right out. But um, so what are yeah, are there some standout milestones?
SPEAKER_04There is for me. I I was thinking about this before. I guess there's two key milestones I can think of in in my time. First one was when we moved the old entire MDC range from AGM batteries to lithium. Yep. That was huge for the whole industry, I think. Correct. It really was. And and uh as simple as that sounds, there are some complexities around it. You certainly have to change the componentry, you have to understand the differences. So that's one. Uh the second one for me, I think a key one is uh sorry, two more, I guess. The first one is the Mark III range, where that was the first time we did off-grid air conditioning. So that was a big tick for us, and that was going back to what I said before, that was one of the key objectives of that project was off-grid capability, and we wanted to be able to run the air conditioner off-grid. So that was another key milestone, and I think a good segue into I guess what we'll talk about later today is around our new on-road series, where we've gone to a more let's call it more sophisticated sophisticated system where we're running a one-screen for as much as we can. So we've kind of simplified it's a more sophisticated, complex system from a projector standpoint, but it's uh an easier system for the customer.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_04So I think, yeah, to answer your question, I think there's probably three key for me milestones in that relationship and and journey we've had together.
SPEAKER_00For me, it's probably a little bit more difficult to get those key points because I've been in the background for so long. Um, but the one, probably the big one for me is that transition from being in the background, being given the product, and go, you need to test this. Write the report, write the procedure, give all the information to then having that forward-facing position with the guys at MDC, going to their manufacturing and sitting down and running through this is the diagram or the wiring we want for this specific van. And then personally assisting with what the best outcome is going to be for manufacturing these new vans. So, say this is the diagram that's originally come up. Well, no, you want to change this and do this and do this because of X, Y, and Z. That having that sort of input into such a reputable brand for me is probably the biggest milestone out of anything because I have that input. I can turn around to friends and family and go, that's me. Yeah, I agree. I'm huge. Look at me. I did that. That was my input there. So it it really does make me feel good that that's where it's progressed to over the years. Yeah, that's great. Um, but that's probably my biggest milestone. The rest of Az is it's all back-end stuff, so it's not huge in the grand scheme of the relationship between BWI and MDC. It's the the working relationship, right?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. What challenges, Shane, do you have or have to consider when you're building, say, an off-road system versus perhaps an on-road system, understanding perhaps there's different demands, higher expectations?
SPEAKER_00That's the key point is managing customers' expectations. And generally what you'll find is even with a lot of on-road vans, they still have off-road suspension. But they've got highway terrain tires. They've generally got a smaller battery capacity, a smaller solar capacity, but it's managing a customer's expectation of going, you are spending X amount of money on this, and then you're spending Y amount of money on your full-off grid, which is generally triple the power, triple the solar, triple all of the additional components to do that. So people who are buying the on-road can't expect to get the off-road. And it's the education piece around that to get them to understand, particularly on solar. Solar is probably the big one, is at 5.30 in the morning, you are not getting full solar. Solar is a bell curve. It starts here, goes to full power, comes down again.
SPEAKER_01And it's angle of the sun, too, that has a big impact on solar.
SPEAKER_00Angle of the sun, upper atmospheric conditions, irradiance levels, even the temperature of the panels themselves. Panels will derate up to 30% when they get hot.
SPEAKER_04Which is counterintuitive to the sun being critical to the charging, then the solar panel gets hot and then it derates.
SPEAKER_00Exactly, because to get the maximum irradiance level that the panels are tested at, it's got to be hot. It's got to be in the middle of summer. But it gets hot and then it derates.
SPEAKER_01But that from a development point of view, that's why we run the solar kind of system on the on the caravans, right?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, consideration. Correct. And that one of the considerations and the way we fit, I guess, our solar difference to some of the others in industry, we don't stick them right down to the roof. We give them that ventilation gap when we mount them to try and maximise that. You can never stop them getting hot, but we try our best to minimize the ability for them to get hot. Optimize the panel to perform as it as it as best it can.
SPEAKER_00The other big one too is some manufacturers, they're still using PWM regulators. And they are they're great for entry level, but you're pretty much driving to a caravan park and charging on mains the whole time.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You then go to MPPT, it's slightly better, but again, it's managing those expectations. I mean, I'm looking at the roofs of a couple of your vans here, and depending if you're facing which way you're facing, true north or east or whatever, you're gonna get some shading throughout the day. There's nothing that can be done about it.
SPEAKER_04You can't because you want to maximise the amount of solar on the roof, but by doing so, there's naturally gonna be shading by things like the air conditioner antenna. Yeah, and you can't do anything about it because the sun moves, you've got to have those things up there, and you've got to maximize the roof uh space.
SPEAKER_00So you're then getting phone calls going, well, I've got 800 watts worth of solar. Why aren't I getting 40 amps at nine in the morning?
SPEAKER_01Well, it's because you've also just driven down you've also just driven down the Gibb River Road for two weeks and it's covered in dust and dirt. That's the other thing, like cleanliness and and that's the big thing.
SPEAKER_00Birds bird proof things or whatever it is. For experienced caravanners, they know this. Correct. But you look at the way the market's changed, and at least since COVID, everyone's now looking at a caravan or something like that to travel the country they live in. Because to be fair, it's a beautiful country. That's all there is to it. But they are also the ones that don't have the education. And this is where I think where you guys do all of your MDC tech talks and Things like that is fantastic because it gives the education to the customers and go, these are your expectations. This is what you have to understand. And you tend to get a lot less questions, calls, and conversations because they've been made aware of what the requirements are before they even purchase the van. And that's that's the big thing. A lot of manufacturers buy this once they've bought it. No, I don't know you. I've got your money. Go away.
SPEAKER_01There's so much to learn, like especially with caravan as a whole, but things like your solar charging, you know, from an off-road perspective, when you're camping, you there is a lot to learn, and that takes time. So people that have been doing it for five years, they're probably just getting to the point where they feel comfortable with everything. Somebody who's picked the van up yesterday will ring up and go, Oh, why isn't it charging properly? And it may be that the van's parked halfway under a shade cloth. Things like that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it is it is a lot about the expectation, Sam. Like when you think, as we as we've discussed previously as well, and earlier today, you've gone from just needing to run a fridge to now you've got lights, you've got, and you know, as we know, LED lights, especially light bars, like security lights on a van, like this, they pull a lot of power. Internal LEDs, you're running constantly running fans. You know, a lot of people don't realise that an inverter just being turned on, even if there isn't an appliance, it's constantly sitting at a ready state. So yeah, it's always pulling current. Always pulling current. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. Oh, I look at myself. I've been in the caravan industry for so long now. I bought my first second-hand caravan six months ago, and I'm still learning things, even though I've been in the industry. My old man's been towing caravans for 30, 40 years. He's still learning things as he goes. So you can't expect to know everything. But as long as your expectations are I don't know everything.
SPEAKER_01It's okay to not know. Exactly. Just like exactly. You don't need to be throwing stones. Exactly. Start shouting from the rooftops that something's not working when you just all we've got to do is ask.
SPEAKER_04Exactly. Talking about the expectations, I'm thinking here around uh, you know, paper specification versus out in the field. One of the most common questions we get is how long can I go off grid? You know this question well, right? How long's a piece of string? But it's genuinely still something that we get asked all the time. There's so many factors involved, as you know, air conditioner, how how fast is the fan going, what temperature you've got it set at, how cold is your fridge going on, are the kids leaving the lights on? Because they all got charges plugged in. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Is it raining? Even ambient temperature. Is it 30 degrees, 40 degrees, 15 degrees? Even those things make a huge difference.
SPEAKER_04So hard because the brochure, rightly so, will always say the specification because the specification is the specification. Yep. Translating that to real world is very challenging for a customer, and it's very hard to answer that question. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I usually answer it with is how long is a piece of string? And realistically gauge it from worst case scenario. So, worst case is you've got 200 amp hour with a battery, you want to run your fridge full time, you've got no solar input, no AC input, no DC input. Yep. What is the maximum drawer of that fridge? So let's say the fridge draws 5 amps per hour, that is your baseline. 200 amp hour minus 5 amps per hour. That is your minimum. That's how long and how many hours you'll be able to run it for. So you always go for the maximum runtime with zero charge. And from there you work it forwards. If you get 10 amps worth of solar, you extend it out. But at least they know that if you've got five days worth of poor conditions, you've got the fridge running, and that's it. I can run for X amount of time if I'm only using the fridge. And that's probably the necessity that people need to know.
SPEAKER_01Very, very true. Our cameraman Craig and I we did a a um a power comparison when we went out to one of the tread four-wheel drive breast cancer fundraising events, and we did a comparison. He had three children with him on the event, and I was there on my own, and I had one van, he had another, and the the difference in power consumption was phenomenal over a three-day period, and it was quite overcast and whatever. So it was that scenario where we were just drawing down, we weren't really recharging, and yeah, I think I still had three quarters of the battery left, whereas Craig was yeah, scraping the barrel. So with three two kids and chargers and devices and camera gear, like it was a really good experiment.
SPEAKER_04Yep, yep, yep. It all comes back to that experience and education of being proactive and knowing your loads, checking your screens and your time to goes, because it's too late once you're flat. You need to be monitoring it as you go. And I went away recently with my kids and because they don't understand, right? And even it comes from experience and education. They're used to living in a house. You leave everything on all the time, and the worst you're gonna get is in trouble. Yeah, whereas it you it's not infinite out there, you don't have a perpetual uh power machine out with you. Once it's gone, it's very hard to bring it back unless you've got a solar generator. So monitoring it constantly is key.
SPEAKER_00The best thing you can do is if you buy a new van, second you get home, charge it up to full, take it off for charge, leave in your van for a week. Give it a shakedown. You know what your usage is gonna be, you're gonna know how long you're gonna last, you're gonna get that real-world info before you go out in the middle of nowhere, try it and go, damn, I have to cut my holiday through it.
SPEAKER_01It's a good way to put it. You don't have to take it off and go and drive two hours down the road, just do it in the driveway. Do it in your driveway, in your back.
SPEAKER_00And that way you know that without kids I can go two weeks. With kids, I can go two days. So if you give it that shakedown before you go, you know how the van works, you know what each thing does, and you know how long you can last. So if you do those things before going anywhere, I think you'll find your experience is going to be a lot better because you're not living in fear of, will I run out of power? You go, I know I will last this long in these conditions.
SPEAKER_01I was gonna ask the question what's one piece of advice you'd give customers around there, but I'd say that's probably the best advice I've ever heard.
SPEAKER_00So it's and I do it myself.
SPEAKER_01Become familiar with it.
SPEAKER_00With my van, it's got no power management in it. It's just a secondhand van back from the 20s like early 2000s. So I'll redo all of that myself and I'll do the same thing. I'll park it in the backyard, I will live in it for a week, I will face it true north, I will face it east, I will face it west, and go right, where which is my best position to have this park when I'm off grid to maximize solar, minimize shading. And so I know that if I do go away with the kids, I don't have to worry about packing them up in the middle of the night because the little one's got no milk for night time, and she's gonna scream the park down. So I think that realistically, if you can do that as a minimum, you're laughing.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, great. James, when we're looking at product selection and supply selection, what's some of the key criteria that you think about when you're when you are choosing a supplier? We talked a little bit on it earlier, but sure.
SPEAKER_04Uh people is one of the big key ones for us, the relationship, the support, but also the support Australia side, uh nationwide. Uh supply chain comes into it. But in all honesty, and you know, I can speak fairly candidly about this, price is not our first consideration. It's probably not even in our top three. Whereas you look at others who play in a similar space to us in industry, it'd be pretty high up there for them. Certainly consideration for us. Obviously, we want to have a an affordable product in the market, but um, it's not the number one factor for us. We want to make sure the product's reliable, of good quality, the people behind it know what they're doing, the support uh network is there for our customers wherever they are around Australia. Great. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Wayne, what are you seeing from customers? What are they looking for?
SPEAKER_03More power.
SPEAKER_02More power. It's just different.
SPEAKER_03No, look, it's um it's definitely that integration to smart systems. Like we are seeing more and more customers come in and go, I want a fossil fuel-free caravan, I don't want diesel heaters, I don't want gas, I don't want, don't want to have to turn on a gas bottle for my hot water system. And for me, I wouldn't have even thought of a hot water system when they're talking about gas-free. I would have straight away gone, oh, you want induction cooking and everything. And then that brings you back to the you've got a gas, hot water system. Oh, but that's different. Like it's I understand, but no, it's uh it's definitely one of those things where we are seeing more and more of that um want that self-reliance and having a one-stop, like a full electric van, which you know everyone, everyone, that's that's the pinnacle and dream for power system management. Um, but it is one of those things where it's again setting the customers' expectations, like you know, you you're not gonna be able to run your your diesel heater or or a heater for very long unless you're running, you know, diesel 1500 amp of battery overnight. Like that's that's the whole purpose of a diesel heater.
SPEAKER_01Because your battery demand is so much going to be so much more, absolutely.
SPEAKER_04Just want to touch on that more power thing because it comes up all the time. Yeah, it's an interesting space that we're all playing in at the moment, and Shane would appreciate this more than most. Is we're all not just MDC, but basically everyone trying to develop models and create new new things. It's very hard to go more at the moment because we're all at our threshold where by the time everything's in the caravan that a customer expects or would like, you're already up towards that three and a half ton ATM once you've factored in your your allowable payload. So there's the answer's not any more, just whack more solar on, give it more battery capacity, that's how it'll get more power and head off grid. We're all trying to think of how to do things smarter.
SPEAKER_01We're at the limit of technology in some respects. Solar panels can only you can only put so many panels on the roof. You can only have so much wattage that it can draw. And batteries are heavy, mate. They really are. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And that's a big problem. You put 1200 amp hour in one of your vans, for argument's sake, how are you going to replenish that? You can't.
SPEAKER_03Which then leads-that's a 3,000 water solar.
SPEAKER_00But it then also leads on to the vehicles that are towing these things. I mean, I had one um a couple of days ago, or last week I should say, um, where our 50 amp DC DC charger, they didn't understand that it would draw 70 amps worth of current. But you've got a vehicle towing it that's only got an output of 90 amps from the alternator. So you allow what the vehicle needs to actually run, you're already exceeding what the vehicle's capabilities are. And people want more charger. Well, it's more power, so you need to add on additional components upstream to be able to do that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, agree. It's like having a super large water tank, but a really small tap. Yeah, to feel it's gonna take forever.
SPEAKER_00Exactly. Does that make sense? If you can't replenish what you've done the previous day, then there's no point. You need to change what you're doing, not how much you've got.
SPEAKER_04And that comes back to the why. And when we work with the likes of projector around system design, we do it around that and we build an ecosystem that matches everything. We're not just it's not mismatched, is I guess my point around too much battery capacity versus solar or the other way.
SPEAKER_00And then from that, it's the education. This is the expectation. Again, what I was saying before, take have a shakedown at home. You do that, you don't need 800 amp hour with a battery. 400 will suffice, but you're monitoring what you're doing. Again, while I was away, I checked the power ratings on my kettle and on my toaster. Thousand watts for the kettle, 890 watts, I think, for the toaster. I can run both of them on a 2,000 watt inverter for five minutes, give the kids breakfast and me a coffee, and it'll be recharged within about 45 minutes. So your power consumption is the big point, not I need more battery, I need more solar, no, cut your consumption. Change your behaviour. Exactly. Change your behaviour a little bit. Yeah. You're not at home.
SPEAKER_01So we talked about integrated systems and we've we've just launched, literally this week, our new Ford SR Series 2 ranger caravans. What excites you about that, James, from uh electrical system? Because that's been the been some innovation in that space.
SPEAKER_04I think the number one thing that excites me with it is the user experience. The user experience is significantly better with this system due to the fact that we're running this seven-inch touch screen and you've got so much visibility around consumption, usage, uh legacy data on what you've done days prior. You've got everything at your fingertips, and it's super easy to understand.
SPEAKER_01I've I've played with that as well, you know, having presented on it and things like that. But we have essentially there is a calendar in there, and you just can scroll back and go, wow, actually, I thought I had a couple of sunny days, but in fact it was cloudy, and I can see I only pulled 50 amps that day or whatever it was, and I needed 300. You can start doing the calculations pretty quickly. Agree.
SPEAKER_00And you can work out, well, on this day I used these three appliances and it drew this much down. Okay, I know not to use that because of the load draw.
SPEAKER_01So, how did that come into the development world for you guys? That's part of the Gen 3 system.
SPEAKER_00It came about from talking to people such as yourself, like what and obviously end user customers. What do they want to experience? And I'll use the the age gaps here. So again, I'll use my old man as a reference. He's been caravanning for years. He doesn't care about anything fancy. All he wants to know is his battery's charged, his lights are turned on, he can use his microwave and kettle when he wants to, that's it. The rest of the time he sits outside reading a book or traveling around. Then you look at myself. I'm on that generation where I'm starting to enjoy technology, so we make it that a little bit more intuitive for people such as myself, so I can read data and go, okay, this is what I'm doing. But then you've got the generation coming through where everything is about technology. So we've had to take all that on board and then design a screen that meets all three of those markets. And I personally I think the seven-inch screen is very elegant in its simplicity. So it gives you everything that you need to know at the touch of a button, but it also gives you that in-depth data, so solar yield and DC yield and load use and things like that. But it also gives the ability for gas sensors and things like that as well to monitor external items you generally wouldn't be able to do. Um, and when you put all that together in an interface where people are going, I want that. I like how it looks, I like how it feels, it's easy to use. Pair that with the phone app, which is a replication of the screen itself. You get guys like me when I go around with mates and sitting around the fire after a few beers, going, Hey guys, look what I can do. Look at me, I can turn this off.
SPEAKER_01Doesn't sound like wine at all.
SPEAKER_00That's definitely gonna be me. And and then again, you get the next generation that they don't care. They'll walk in, they'll go, All right, lights off, I'm going to bed. Yeah, yeah. But they can see that, hey, I've got 80% left of my battery, I will get overnight, no problems. When they get to midday, oh, I've charged up this much so I can stay off grid for a bit longer.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. And it's look, it's a real credit to projector in all honesty. And oh we did a lot of due diligence before uh adopting the Gen 3 system into the current on-road or the new on-road series. And from what we looked at in the market, the user interface for the projector system on that seven-inch display is the most straightforward. And you hit the nail on the head the way you said that it's it's set out in a way that it it caters to all you know markets and and caters to all types of education and people who would maybe understand a little bit, but also understand uh a lot.
SPEAKER_00We we also have overseas clients. Um so when we work with our supplier partner, uh, they sell this through into like the European market, US market, and things like that. And we actually have the overseas market seeing our design of the screen going, we want that. Yeah. So I think that sort of speaks volume with the effort of the engineers of going through down in Melbourne to say, hey, look, this is how we want it. It's now become a global product, which is being specifically asked for through the European countries, which are known for having far superior tech and things like that to what we've got. So in in that sense, I think we really have hit the nail on the head and done it right this time.
SPEAKER_01So do you think we're moving towards smart caravans as as a similar to smart homes, the Google, Google nest and things like those?
SPEAKER_00Uh to a degree. So I personally I'd like to see scene modes. So basically you tap a button, which is your storage mode. It'll then set the caravan up with say alarm sensors, automatic stare in, cuts off all specific loads, so it's minimum draw, so on and so forth. Uh you've then got travel mode, which will then allow some features to be turned on, like DC charging and things like that. And then you get to your caravan site, which would be say called site mode. And that'd be your stairs down, your level right, like your level legs down, roof up. So it becomes uh like your home automation. This setting, this setting, this setting, this setting. The catch is is you need a lot more products that don't exist at this point in time to integrate into those systems. And you've got to be wary with how far forward you go with them because we don't know what the tow vehicle is going to be doing. Are we gonna have to go fully electric? How do the 48-volt mile hybrid systems work? Do they have the ability to tow these caravans that are now uh basically home away from homes with all the automation? That's where it starts to become hairy. So I think for now, if the market really doesn't change significantly, home automation, 100% way to go. But if the vehicles which are towing it, which don't have the capabilities anymore, particularly with total weights, DC DC charging, because we don't know what the outputs are going to be, that side of it would have to be the focus first. How do we keep the weights lower? How do we ensure it charges while driving? Can we then use a solar on the roof to charge back into an EV? So you can go off-grid. That becomes a focus, not the home automation, which is a nice to have, but not a must as the overall sense in the end of the year. Chicken or the egg, you need that first before you can develop where you're going for. And without knowing what we're going to be forced to do, I mean, you look at this fuel crisis at the moment, that's gonna force a lot of people into EVs. So have we already missed the market on the EVs because we didn't focus on that when we first came out? It's it is a grey area that does need to be investigated.
SPEAKER_04100%. I think so. You asked about, you know, are we gonna see smart caravans? This is very pie in the sky, but the way I kind of see how we can make them smarter is using AI. So in a very simplistic sense, it tells Wayne, hey Wayne, have you considered turning your fridge up slightly? If you do so, it'll give you an extra five hours off grid. But rather than so grabbing that data that we already have, but rather than us trying to interpret it, having AI interpret and actually tell you, or the van automatically tweak itself to maximise your time off for it.
SPEAKER_01If it's hot outside, it knows it needs to crank the fridge up or whatever, but then it can cool it down at night to turn the power drill down.
SPEAKER_04Let's be honest, how many caravanners actually actively adjust their fridge temperature throughout the day during other than you, Wayne? Obviously, because you're an expert. Even Banksy. They just have a fridge off so we can see who's got more power at the end of the trip.
SPEAKER_00Beer's got to stay cold.
SPEAKER_04But I think to answer your question there, I think there's a real opportunity there from an AI perspective that could really change that game. And for the more novice caravanners, give the answers that you need to know to really maximise that time off grid. Maximise the customer experience too.
SPEAKER_01You don't have problems. If you can eliminate some of the problems through better management, then fantastic.
SPEAKER_03Even just for the integration of apps, and you know, I do it when we go out with our groups. Like I end up being like Shane, walking around and checking our team's power consumption on their vans. Like, oh yep, nope, you need to turn your lights off. Or I think uh with our cameraman Craig, obviously, last trip we did, he had uh his kids with him and he ran out of power really quickly. Um but obviously apps the apps themselves that uh projector user make it really easy for us to troubleshoot for customers because the app will the app itself will tell you what is wrong with the system. It also makes it easier for us to teach our teams and keep our customers informed as well. So the education on how to use the system is built into the app. It's it's quite a simple thing. But with your Gen 3 stuff, I I mean James James has shown me it before, but you know, I actually got to get I was left unsupervised with it yesterday. Me unsupervised with a new system, and I had a little play, and I'm really, really impressed with it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And the even being left unsupervised, you spend like five minutes going, oh yeah, I've learnt everything. Yeah. It's very intuitive. Yeah, gonna go away now. I want to enjoy this outside.
SPEAKER_01Well, that's a that's a perfect segue. We I believe we're the first to roll out the new Intelli RV Gen 3 system.
SPEAKER_00So I believe so, yeah. I'm pretty sure there's some sort of agreement between Melbourne and uh MDC. Again, that's way above my pay scale, so I reckon James could probably answer to this one.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Uh I think we're certainly one of the first. I'm not sure the detail there, and you know, that's not that's not the be-all and end all for us. But the reason why we were so keen to align with the Gen 3, and we certainly had some pre-production versions from Projector, and again, one of the great things with working with Projector is we align our projects together and happy to do these things. So with the Gen 3, and Shane probably knows the technical detail better than I do, but one of the reasons I guess we didn't so much focus on the Gen 2 and Tele RV system until the Gen 3 came out was the charging capability. That was really important to us to make sure that we are aligning the system, that everything was very well matched. So when we went to 300 amps uh in the New Ford SR Series 2 battery capacity, I wanted to make sure whatever battery management system or uh electrical system we fitted was matched appropriately to charge that battery. So now we've got what is it, 60 amps in the 60 amp AC, 45 amp MPPT, and 45 amp DC DC, all built into that one unit. Correct. And the Gen 2 had less than that from memory.
SPEAKER_00And the Gen 2 also was only a VSR input as well, which is no good for lithium whatsoever. Juice I won't go too much into the tech of it, but basically the balancing of the two batteries for smart charging vehicles. VSRs just don't work with lithium. So the DC DC charger built into the Gen 3 is the big winner for this model specifically. Because it eliminates an additional component that needs to be connected via communications, puts it all into that one unit, and is primarily designed for lithium batteries and smart charging vehicles, which pretty much everything from 2010 onwards is.
SPEAKER_01So that's the big that's the big improvement, really, from a customer perspective who's driving newer cars and things like that, bigger tow vehicles to tow bigger vans, that's going to be the big standout.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And it loots back to feedback here, so it comes back to the why. Why did we do the Ford SR Series 2 range? And the focal point for us was essentially the the heart of the system, which is your electrical system. So that's incredibly important to us. We worked closely with Projector on that and having to align and be able to pick up the Gen 3 system and roll that out as standard in the production specification.
SPEAKER_01So, how does the system then I guess align with how we're seeing the evolution of caravans from a development point of view?
SPEAKER_04I think that so it used to be very, very clear delineation between a touring or on-road caravan and an off-road caravan. I think the expectation now for an on-road or touring caravan is that you've got a suitable ability to head off-grid. Because off-grid doesn't always necessarily mean off-road. I mean, there's so many farm stays, hip camps, customers love doing that. They don't necessarily want to go to a caravan park and sit three metres from the next family. They want to head out and enjoy, but still can utilize something that's that's an on-road caravan and just heading a little bit off that bitumen, pulling up on your site, but still got the ability to be off-grid for a number of days. And that was important to us in the series two update that we had increased capability off-grid, and that's what the the Intelli RV Gen 3 systems allowed us to do. That's amazing.
SPEAKER_01So I don't know who to direct this to. I'm going to throw it to Wayne, actually. Yep. So, where do you see RV electrical systems going in the next five to ten years? Yeah, put your tech hat on and your customer experience piece, and then I'm going to throw it to what the answers are more likely going to be.
SPEAKER_03No, look, I I spoke about uh you know fossil fuel-free vans earlier, so smart caravans, and I did make a little note here, and I've been laughing to myself for the last 10 minutes about it, actually. If someone was to make a mini nuclear reactor, the customers would buy it. Yep. A hundred percent. It's not it's not about power, it's and it's something that comes from experience in how long will the batteries last. And it's like, well, if you maintain them and you look after them and you you utilize them and and uh don't overload them while you're off grid, it's you're gonna run out of water before you're gonna run out of battery power. And it's um we I think you're gonna see that shift towards more smart, smart caravans and especially more power, more solar. And you know, it as technology changes and just solar panels themselves have changed a lot over the last three or four years, let alone the last 10 or 15. So power power provision is more efficient than it used to be, and power management is more much more efficient than it used to be as well. So where are they really going?
SPEAKER_01Instead of nuclear reactors in our caravans.
SPEAKER_00Right now we've sort of stagnated because we need to get the advancements in the battery technology. So not quite nuclear reactors. Oh no, not for you. I know what you would do. Um so once we get the technology within the batteries, we then need the technology in the solar, we then need the technology in the DC DC charging, we then need the grid capabilities for the AC charging to handle more. I mean, how many times have you been to a caravan park? It's a 15 amp, you plug in and it trips because you've got brown power or something like that there. But until those forms are improved on, uh, particularly solar, um, correct, they are. They've they have come so far in solar, and the size of the panels have reduced exponentially for the amount of output, the cost has reduced exponentially, but they're still heavy. So with having the heavy aluminium-frame panels, you're losing weight to be able to put in an additional battery or something like that. So you can go flexible panels, but I despise them because you can rule them down, you get no cooling, they are not rated to what they say they're rated at. I'm not a fan of them. The aluminium-framed ones are the way to go until the technology advances further in the flexible. But they're they're probably your key things is without advancements in battery, so you become full electric. Yep. You are no longer running gas or anything like that, without advancements in solar, so you can yield more power faster from the same amount of sun, basic, basic steps, which are going to be essentially a smart home stuff we were talking about. You can do more, but you can't necessarily stay away for longer back to the previous points without managing your power well. Yeah, wow.
SPEAKER_01James and I'll probably actually back to Wayne. Do you think off-grid capability is going to become kind of a standard expectation among customers, regardless of the van type?
SPEAKER_03As as James touched on, obviously, you know, off-grid doesn't mean off-road necessarily. And we're we're seeing it more and more with uh I'm traveling, you know, up the coast, like I want to get to Cairns, but I want to free camp on the way. And I know it would be that default of oh, you're gonna take it off-road. Like you want an off-road caravan, but you want that off-grid capability. So, you know, the amount the amount of times I've seen caravans pulled up in truck stops, don't do it. Yes, you've got caravan stops for a reason, don't pull up where the trucks pull up. Um, but no, it is it is that it is gonna become the norm, I think. It's more power, and people are gonna want that expectation because as James also said, you don't want to be parked three metres away from a family with screaming kids.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, is that the difference too between the terminology of off-grid and off-road? Yeah. So you can have off-grid, but not off-road. You don't have to be off-road, yeah. Yeah. And I mean, with the price of batteries these days, lithium batteries are cheap now. So I can see a lot more caravans becoming off-grid caravans, but not off-road caravans. Yeah. Because that's where the additional work comes into with the better suspension chassis and things like that.
SPEAKER_04So I genuinely think that we have led the charge in terms of that with the new Ford SR series too, around being, you know, arguably the first to do something like that at a grand scale with a range that is a dedicated on-road series with some serious off-grid capability as standard.
SPEAKER_00To be running factory 300 amp hour for what's considered an on-road van, not an off-grid van, it's unheard of. It's generally 100, maybe 200 amp hour, or you're talking big, big, big systems with maybe 400 amp hour. So that's that's huge for the market to see that as a standard. That's going to bring in so much additional capability for people who, as you say, are going up north into the caravan spot. I don't want to pay for a park tonight, I'm going to pull over here. Oh, buggered, I'll spend two days here. Yeah, no problems. Let's enjoy the trip.
SPEAKER_04Yep. 525 watts as standard as solar on the roof as well. Uh solar input for an additional 600 watts of regulated solar, like that is some serious capability.
SPEAKER_00I mean, these systems can handle whatever you want to throw at it. It will clip the solar, obviously, to 45 amps, but I think I ran 1400 watts into one at home, just in the whole, let's see what happens. And surprisingly enough, I was disappointed because nothing special happened. All it did was early in the morning it went, oh, I'm charging at 45 amps. And then by midday, my battery was full. I said, okay, that's sort of disappointing. I wanted to see sparks and smoke, but no, just did what it did. So yeah.
SPEAKER_01Safety is boring, but it's necessarily it's necessary, though.
SPEAKER_00You're talking to a guy who put a hole in the lab roof in Melbourne. So I'm I'm if you want something blown up, I'll do it for me.
SPEAKER_01I blew myself up 12 months ago, so don't worry about that. You can watch the progression on the YouTube videos of the healing process that I underwent. But anyway. Not electrical related, just uh private fun on a farm. Anyway. So uh well look, thank you. That's been really, I think, valuable, Shane. Hearing what Projector's doing, where you've come from as a business, and where you're evolving to is really interesting. And I think your insights into the evolution of what electrical systems are going to demand and the the industry growth that needs to happen around that is really insightful. So thanks for sharing that.
SPEAKER_00Anytime.
SPEAKER_01Thanks, Wayne. Always good to be this input. Can't wait to see this nuclear reactor. You're wild, mate. Just climate. And thank you, James. It's always valuable to get an insight from I guess the yeah, from the horse's mouth. You know, you're in commercial product development for the business, you know what's happening. You've you're delivering these new models for us. So thank you. And uh it's great to have your knowledge. No problem. Always happy to be here. Thank you. Well, thank you everybody for watching. If you do like what you've seen, please like, please subscribe to the off-grid down under podcast, and click on any of the links below. We've got links to the new SR Series 2 and some of the other videos we've talked about and referred to in the video today. So thanks for joining us, and we'll see you on the next episode.