Diy Van Electrical System – Wiring Maxxair Fan & 12v Lights to Goal Zero

When I was building out my home on wheels, by far the most daunting part was figuring out the camper van electrical system. Every time I looked it up, it felt like my brain shut off as soon as it saw boring words like “inverter,” “lithium,” “deep cycle….” I knew I needed solar power, but I was so lost on how to make it happen.

While I (mostly) figured out all the vocab, as someone with less than zero experience messing with wires, I needed something easier. If you have an electrician friend, I’m jealous and I want yo to introduce me. But if you don’t and you’re afraid that you might burn your van down, this guide is for you! This easy camper van electrical system guide should tell you everything you need to know – one  thing I found frustrating when reading other people’s guides was the lack of detail – how do you connect wires? How do you mount solar panels? What size fuses do I need?

If you’re an idiot  a beginner like me, I gotchu. This guide is going to talk about all of it – wiring a Maxxair fan to the Goal Zero Yeti, wiring 12v lights to the battery, connecting solar panels, and all the basic camper van electrical system stuff that will help you figure out the mess of wires, fuses, and plugs.

Pin this photo to bookmark the van electrical guide for future reference!

Some of the links in this blog post are affiliate links – which means I get a small commission if you buy any of these items (at no cost to you). Which is great because I was going to share anyway, and this allows me to keep making free guides! 

Solar System for Camper Van & Solar Panel Wiring Diagram

I’ll start from the top of the camper van electrical system. The solar panels go on the roof of the van – this is where all the magic happens. And by magic I mean the power of the sun gets collected and sent to the battery. Which is kind of like magic, I like to think.

A Renogy solar panel for a camper van electrical system.

Solar Panels for the Camper Van Electrical System

The first part of the camper van solar system is the panels. These are the solar panels I used. The Renogy 100 Watt solar panels are lightweight, flexible, and easy to mount. The other popular solar panel I’ve seen (and actually used for my first van) are these panels from Goal Zero, but they’re a lot more expensive, heavier, and a little bit harder to install, so I definitely prefer the Renogy ones.

If you choose a different solar panel, watch out for the voltage. Check how much the battery you use can handle. The Goal Zero Yeti (which is the battery I chose, more about that later) can’t handle more than 22 volts. This solar panel is 12, so it’s well within the range! 

Voltage is the power of the electric force – so if it’s too high, it can ruin your battery. The watts are a measurement of how much power the solar panel can collect. A few paragraphs down I’ll also talk about how voltage works when you have more than one solar panel!

The ones I used are 100 watt solar panels – so 100 watts is the maximum amount of power it can collect. But, it doesn’t actually reach 100 – the actual wattage depends on how much sunlight there is. 

I have four solar panels on my roof 400 watts total). I started with 2 panels, and found that it was really hard to keep my battery charged in the winter when days are shorter, and if there was more than one cloudy day in a row my battery would die. With 4 solar panels, I almost never have problems! I’m careful about parking in the sun, and as long as I don’t spend too much time in the shade, or encounter too many rainy days in a row, this is enough for me to keep my battery charged.

I power my fridge 24/7, charge my phone and laptop, and use the lights pretty often. Most people have a similar power consumption, so unless you’re operating power tools or maybe a TV, I’d recommend 300 – 400 watts. 200 can work if you’re always in the sun or don’t have a lot of big electronics.

The Renogy solar panels have 6 holes around the edges to make mounting it easy. Just drill pilot holes, then insert self tapping screws. Make sure to put sealant under and over each screw – you definitely don’t want leaks! The 3m sealant is popular with van lifers, and as far as I can tell, it works perfectly. 

Camper Van Solar Wiring Diagram

Combining solar panels does not increase voltage – if you connect them correctly. My solar panels are all 12 volt, so when they’re connected the voltage is still at 12. This next section will explain how to connect your solar panels, and there’s a camper van solar wiring diagram!

This is called a parallel connection. The two solar panels are not connected to each other – instead you use branch connectors to join them and connect to the battery. If you have more solar panels you may need more branch connectors!

One of the wires on the Renogy solar panels is really short for some reason (probably to sell more cables… I see you, Renogy), so you may need a short extension cable to ensure that both solar panels can reach the branch connector. This small extension cord needs to be spliced together – I used a butt connector and this crimper. I then put some waterproof flex tape over the connection to keep rain from getting in.

Then, the branch connectors connect to another extension cable (you’ll need two of these), which goes through your roof! You can either use a hole saw to drill a large hole that the ends of the extension cable will fit through, or cut the wires, drill a small hole, and splice them together inside the van.

I went with the big hole option, so when I put sealant over it, I had to put some tape over the hole from inside the van – so that the sealant didn’t just fall through. I kind of think doing a small hole and splicing the wires would have been better, but alas. 

A diagram of a camper van electrical system and how to wire solar panels


Goal Zero Yeti Battery Van Setup

Now that the solar panels are mounted, you’ll need a way to actually store that power. The battery is the powerhouse of every camper van electrical system – it’s the middleman between solar power and electricity. The solar panels collect the sunlight, but the battery stores it – and the Goal Zero Yeti converts solar energy to useable electricity… somehow. The Goal Zero van setup is simple, because the battery is a plug & play system that doesn’t require any additional setup!

I have a Goal Zero Yeti 1400 – which they don’t sell anymore, because they’ve upgraded the design. The equivalent of what I have is now the Goal Zero Yeti 1000X, but there are some smaller and cheaper options if you don’t need quite as much power (and you can add expansions if you need more power).

A Goal Zero Yeti battery for a camper van electrical system.

I won’t lie to ya – it’s expensive. But, having electricity in the van allows me to work from anywhere, so I just tell myself it balances out that way.

This thing is incredible because it’s everything in one – you don’t need to get an inverter or figure out which battery you need, the Yeti has all of it. It tells you how many watts you’re getting and how many you’re using, how much charge you have left, and how long it will last. You can plug everything you need right into it (though I keep this under my bench, and added an outlet to my wall – more about that later). It also has a handy app that you can use to connect to the Yeti and see all the stats – handy if like me, your Goal Zero Yeti is tucked away and you can’t easily see the screen.

To connect your solar panels to the Yeti, you’ll need this cable. Connect your panels to the battery, and you have power! Easy as that.

My solar panels charge the battery, but you can also plug it into a wall outlet – it comes with a cable that allows you to do that, so if you’re near a friend’s house you can plug it in. I’ve also lugged it into Starbucks for emergency charging. You can also plug it into your car’s 12v outlet – but do not do this with the wall plug and an adapter! It can overload your battery, and you need a specific Goal Zero cable to safely plug it in. How many cables are they gonna make us buy, right? 

I have the car adapter, so my battery also charges while I drive. It’s also possible to connect it to your alternator to charge that way, but I have a somewhat irrational fear of car problems and am afraid to mess with my van’s mechanics :).

Pros of the Goal Zero Yeti Battery for Van Life

  • easy to use
  • includes everything you need (inverter, battery, charge controller, surge protector)
  • can be charged from alternator or car’s DC plug 
  • easily connects to solar panels
  • can be connected to wall outlet
  • can be expanded after (upgrade later instead of paying all at once)
  • doesn’t take up a lot of space

Cons of the Goal Zero Yeti Battery for Van Life

  • heavy (fine if you’re keeping it in your van, not ideal if you plan to take it out often)
  • takes a while to charge fully
  • requires add ons for car charging

Camper Van Electrical System – Outlets

You can totally plug everything right into the Yeti, but because I’m storing mine under my bench, it’s not that easy to access. Plus, I thought wall outlets would be cuter for my van.

This outlet has two AC ports and two USB ports, and is basically just an extension cord. The Yeti has two AC ports, so I plugged my fridge into one, and this outlet into the other. I used a jigsaw to cut a hole in my shiplap paneling (before I put it up), and ran the wire from the outlet to the Yeti. Easy peasy!

The fridge I have is a Dometic electric powered cooler. I chose this over a regular mini fridge because it is way more energy efficient, as it only turns on when it needs to cool down, as opposed to being on all the time. This helps conserve a ton of power, so I think it’s worth the extra cost over a regular mini fridge to ensure that I’m not left with a dead battery and rotting veggies. The downside is that there’s only one compartment, so you can have either a fridge or a freezer, but not both at the same time. I’ve learned to live without ice cream, but Dometic does make some bigger models that have two different compartments!

A silver and white outlet that is part of a camper van electrical system is on the van's wall, next to a white light switch.



How to Wire Maxxair Fan to Goal Zero Yeti Battery

A fan is essential for your camper van electrical system. It helps keep the van ventilated and keeps moisture from building up – mold is a vanlifer’s nightmare, so having good ventilation is key.

I think the Maxxair fan is the best – you can find cheaper ones (the Fantastic Fans are popular), but this one has a rain shield, and my favorite thing about it is that it can stay open while you drive (essential for me – there’s no way me and my pea brain would remember to close it every time). 

After you do the scary thing and cut the hole in your roof (a Jigsaw is best for this), you’ll have a fan with two wires hanging out – one white, and one black. I used 14 ga wire for this. What’s a little weird about this is that the fan’s black wire connects to the red 14 ga wire, and the fan’s white wire connects to the black 14 ga wire. I connected them with butt connectors and a crimper.

The other end of the wires should be next to where you’re going to place your battery. It still needs to be connected to the fuse box, but I’ll explain that in the next section.

Wiring 12v Lights to Goal Zero Yeti Battery

This was probably the most confusing part of doing my camper van electrical system. So many wires….

If you’ve spent any time on the #vanlife side of the internet, you’re probably familiar with these ceiling lights. Everyone and their dog uses them to light their vans and RVs, but that’s because they’re kind of the best!

They’re cute, bright, and don’t draw a lot of power! To install them, I used a 2.25 inch hole saw to cut 4 holes in the shiplap panel. Make sure to run your wires before you put up any paneling on your walls – unless you want your wires to be on the outside for some reason. I used 20 gauge wire and taped it to the ceiling, with one end being close to the battery, and the other in the approximate location of the lights. Make sure to do a red and a black wire for each light! 

I put up my ceiling panels after this, because I wanted to be able to install the lights right away to make sure they worked – but I left the walls alone for now, because I still had to figure out where my light switch and fuse box would go. 

After I had nailed the shiplap panel with my 4 holes in it into place, I pulled the wires through the holes and connected them to my lights. Here, red wires connect to red, black wires to black. I connected them with butt connectors (smaller ones than I used for the thicker wires).

The lights have little clips, so after the wires are connected, you just insert them into the hole, and they snap into place!

We’re almost done! Now it’s time to connect the light switch – I recommend doing some of your wall panels now (I started from the top and went about halfway down the wall) – so that you can cut a hole for your switch and your outlet, and put the wires through there. 

To connect your lights to your light switch, you’ll need to grab all four red wires from your lights. Use a wire stripper to strip a little bit off the ends of the wires, then twist them together.

Next, you’ll need a wiring spade. Put the four red wires into the spade (the rounded side). Crimp tightly. You can also connect them with a butt connector and have one wire go into the spade, either way works.

Now, connect the spade to your light switch by putting all your red wires through the hole in your wall, and then just inserting one of the prongs on the switch into your spade. I went with a simple on/off bezel switch, but if you want to get fancy with it you can also get something with a dimmer!

The light switch has two prongs – the second one will connect to the fuse box, so grab another wiring spade, crimp one 14 awg red wire into it, then connect that to the second prong. Make sure the rest of the wire is long enough to reach the fuse box. Your black wires don’t go to the switch – they’ll connect right to the fuse box.

Maxxair Fan wiring diagram & 12v Lights to fuse block wiring diagram

Now, it’s time to connect everything to your fuse block. I recommend getting this fuse block – it has a negative bus bar along with the positive, so you only need to buy one contraption.

You’ll need some ring terminals to connect to it. I drilled a hole in one of my wall panels to put all the wires through, and screwed the fuse block into the wall. This all sits under my bench!

Starting with the fan. To wire the Maxxair Fan to the 12v fuse block, then the 12v fuse block to the Goal Zero Yeti, grab the black wire from the fan and crimp it into a ring terminal. Then, choose any one of the negative terminals – which means the first three rows at the top. Unscrew the screw, pop the ring terminal over it, and screw it back in. 

A diagram of the 12v lights and Maxxair Fan wiring for a camper van electrical system

Then, crimp your red wire to a positive terminal – any one that isn’t in the first three rows at the top. There’s a + on the bottom of the fuse block and a – on the top. Red wires are positive, black are negative. That’s all for now.

To connect the lights, grab your red wire that’s coming from the light switch, and connect it to a positive terminal. 

Grab the four black wires that connect to each light, and twist them together. Connect that to a negative terminal.

Next to each positive terminal is a spot for a fuse. Your system won’t work without one, so insert a fuse into each slot where a wire is connected. A 10 amp fuse is best for the Maxxair fan, and 5 amps is enough for the lights. If your system isn’t exactly the same as mine, look up what sizes fuses you need.

The point of a fuse is that if you’ve got too much electricity happening (that’s not the science-y way to say that, but you know), the fuse should blow, stopping the current and preventing any damage to your battery or other parts of the connection. If you use one that’s too small, it’ll blow and your electrical won’t work. If it’s too big, it won’t blow when you need it to, and you can damage something expensive.

A diagram of a camper van elecctrical system, connecting a fuse block to the goal zero yeti battery.

12v fuse block to Goal Zero wiring diagram

We’re almost done!! Just one more step to get everything working. You need to connect the Goal Zero Yeti to your fuse block. This is easy to do! You’ll need this cable, which plugs into the 12v powerpole port on the Yeti. The red wire connects to the positive terminal at the bottom of your fuse block, and the black connects to the negative one at the top! The cable was a little short for me, so I cut both of them and added a few inches of wire to each one, connecting them with butt connectors.

Once that’s done, the Yeti is connected! I plugged my outlet extension into one of the AC ports (the standard wall outlet one), and my fridge into the other. From there, I plug all my electronics into the wall outlet to power everything in the van!

Van Life Electrical System Diagram

That’s everything I did in my camper van electrical system to make things work! Solar power and wiring isn’t the easiest to figure out, but it’s so worth it when you can be in the middle of the woods and have a fridge to keep things cold and lights to read by. 

The van life electrical diagram on the right is an overview of the whole system, and you can Pin this (and any other diagrams in the post) on Pinterest to save for future reference!

A diagram of a camper van electrical system, including solar panels, battery, and connections.


Summary of Materials Used for My Diy Camper Van Electrical System

Here’s a list of everything I used for my DIY camper van electrical system! I hope this helped – happy building :).

If you have any questions, leave a comment below!

Main Components

37 Comments

  1. Hi, I really enjoy your content and this site has been so helpful to me! I’m curious, what the fuse box is plugged into on the Goal Zero. Is it the red/black input section?

    Thank you!

    1. Hey Chelsey, thanks so much for the kind words! I’m so glad it’s been helpful, you’re so sweet for taking the time to tell me that :). The fuse block plugs into the Anderson Powerpole port on the Goal Zero – the one right under the regular 8mm solar input.

  2. Great info and advice. One question however….I’m trying to find the cable to connect the Yeti to the fuse box. When I clicked on the link “this cable” the product is not found. I haven’t been able to find it on the Yeti web site either. Thanks for your help!!

    1. Hi! It looks like the cable I had linked isn’t available anymore, but here’s a link to a different one! Different brand, but same cable :). Thanks for the comment too, I’ll make sure to update the post! https://amzn.to/3O6Cpu4

  3. Thank you for your article! It was EXACTLY what I was looking for, and I so appreciate your guidance! We plan to get the Goal Zero and you explained everything perfectly.

  4. Omg thank you!!! This is exactly the information I was looking for, we have the same kind of battery. Because I don’t know anything about electric systems I could not figure it out by myself and tried to search for YouTube videos but could not find the right info anywhere. Awesome! Greetings from Berlin

  5. Hi! When wiring to the fuse block, does it matter where you place the +/-? For example, is there matching +/- spots on the block or does it not matter where the wires go? Thank you!

  6. Hi! For the cable that connects from the goal zero to the fuse block (iGreely Dual Positive/Negative ATC Style Fuse Holder 10AWG Wire with Ring Terminals)

    Does the red part go into the red part on the battery and then black to black? Thank you so much!

  7. This is amazing!! Thank you for sharing your easy diagrams with links to the materials. I was so confused and scared of setting up my electrical system and this totally eliminated those fears!

  8. Is yours still working? I have the GZ Yeti 1500. And it works great – except – most of the time I power on my Maxxair it errors out (beeping, closing, and stopping). But occasionally it works. Everything else works great – lights, Dometic fridge, etc.

    I wonder if the GZ puts out less than 12v sometimes. I think the Maxxair fan needs a minimum of 11.3v. Blergh.

  9. Hi Anna! Thanks so much for this guide it’s so incredibly helpful. My only question is the link for the cable that connects the solar panel to the goal zero is also the same link as the goal zero to the fuse block. Is this correct? I’m about to purchase everything. Thanks!

  10. This was so helpful in its simplicity. Although I have a EcoFlow Delta Pro, I think most of this applies – of course, I’ll double check but at least I know what I need to double check!!

    1. Hey Ann, did you ever complete this with an ecoflow? I have the river pro 2 and I’m wondering how this works 12v powerpole connector

  11. Hi. Great information and thank you for sharing. Just wondering why you need the fuse box at all. Isn’t that the benefit of a goal zero as a plug and play?

    1. The fuse box isn’t 100% necessary, but it depends on what you’re plugging into the Goal Zero Yeti! For example, the 12v lights I used don’t have a plug (you have to wire them), so they go through the fuse box. I guess you could skip the fuse box and wire them straight to a 12v connection on the Yeti, but I would’ve needed a splitter for the powerpole connection and the fuse box just provides a little bit of extra safety 🙂

  12. Anna, This is THE BEST explanation of everything I needed for my cargo trailer conversion wiring! I have looked at a gazillion pages and videos and THIS article literally saved my sanity LOL. Your humor is fantastic, your diagrams are so incredibly thorough, and I did it because of you! Thank you so much for publishing this, truly, I could not have done it as efficiently and confidently if I didn’t have this guiding me!

      1. My heater adventures:
        I was debating what to do for a heater and used a Little Buddy for a full winter season. I then made the change and added a Espar D2 Heater. Mounted in the passenger seat box, I was very easy to install and works great. It also wires to the 12v Fuse block and runs off the diesel fuel.

        A drawback on Little Buddy’s is the bottles. 1lb bottles (most are single use) so you create waste and if it’s really cold, the bottle will only last 2 nights, 3 tops.

        1. Sweet! I actually just got a Mr. Buddy heater too – it can also run off of a 20lb propane tank which is much less waste and less money. I wish I could do a diesel heater, but my van is gas :).

  13. Hello, thank you for the very helpful diagram. When connecting the Light switch to the fuse box, you mentioned using “one 14 awg red wire”. Was this a typo or do you want a thicker wire running from the fuse box to the light switch and then after the switch, using a butt connector with the 20 awg red wire?

    1. The switch has two prongs – so the one that goes from lights to switch, I put all four thin wires into one spade and connected that. Then, the other prong connects the switch to the fuse box, so I used the 14 awg wire for that.

  14. Does your fridge go to your fuse box? If so, what gauge wiring do you use for it? And if not, how do you have your fridge connected to your goal zero?

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