British F1 Grand Prix 2019

[Roy C]

One of the things I was really hoping to do with my MP was to use it to camp for motor sports events. So I’ve just booked weekend tickets for the F1 GP at Silverstone with camping at the official Woodlands campsite. A minor issue in the excitement of first time camping at a Grand Prix is that unfortunately there were no electric hookup pitches left so I’m wondering if I can get through 3 full days without running out of leisure battery.

Any views on this and any other advice on camping at Silverstone / Grand Prix would be much appreciated.

 

[RFT]

Time to consider solar panels. I'm going for the flexible version with a Victron bluetooth controller.

 

[mptripsaway]

One of the things I was really hoping to do with my MP was to use it to camp for motor sports events. So I’ve just booked weekend tickets for the F1 GP at Silverstone with camping at the official Woodlands campsite. A minor issue in the excitement of first time camping at a Grand Prix is that unfortunately there were no electric hookup pitches left so I’m wondering if I can get through 3 full days without running out of leisure battery.

Any views on this and any other advice on camping at Silverstone / Grand Prix would be much appreciated.

You should be able to do three days "off grid" with ease. I have done it many times and if you read one of my previous posts regarding one of our longer trips I think I made record of lesiure battery performance. As you will be out all day watching cars go around in circles the only drain on the battery will be your fridge. Hope you have a great time, I did it a few years ago in a tent and had a brilliant weekend.

 

[mptripsaway]

You should be able to do three days "off grid" with ease. I have done it many times and if you read one of my previous posts regarding one of our longer trips I think I made record of lesiure battery performance. As you will be out all day watching cars go around in circles the only drain on the battery will be your fridge. Hope you have a great time, I did it a few years ago in a tent and had a brilliant weekend.

Here it is Roy:

We were off mains power for virtually the whole trip, power for roof up & down, running the fridge on setting 3, lights and usb chargers for phones etc. 3 days from a full charge took the battery down to 12.4v and 6 bars on charge indicator. Also used aux heater on one occasion for a couple of hours reduced battery to 12.3v.

 

[Roy C]

Time to consider solar panels. I'm going for the flexible version with a Victron bluetooth controller.

It did cross my mind but thought I might be pushing it a bit with the expenditure on the race tickets and camping. What kind of costs are you looking at?

 

[Roy C]

Here it is Roy:

We were off mains power for virtually the whole trip, power for roof up & down, running the fridge on setting 3, lights and usb chargers for phones etc. 3 days from a full charge took the battery down to 12.4v and 6 bars on charge indicator. Also used aux heater on one occasion for a couple of hours reduced battery to 12.3v.

Thanks - I think I had your post somewhere in the back on my mind. I just found out the camping ticket allows you to arrive on Wednesday and that might be a little early for me so we’d likely travel down on Thursday, get there middle of the day and then leave Sunday evening, so I am tempted to see if the leisure battery will last for that long based on your post before I go the solar panel route.

 

[RFT]

It did cross my mind but thought I might be pushing it a bit with the expenditure on the race tickets and camping. What kind of costs are you looking at?

£570 + fitting + the Victron controller - £800 ish???

 

[jeff porter]

Hi Roy see you there (Silverstone) we are down on the Friday/Sat/Sun, have also booked to take MP to Monaco GP via boat Portsmouth/Santander, this year also, has anyone done that run/stay yet?

 

[Roy C]

Hi Roy see you there (Silverstone) we are down on the Friday/Sat/Sun, have also booked to take MP to Monaco GP via boat Portsmouth/Santander, this year also, has anyone done that run/stay yet?

Hi Jeff, We’ll likely pitch up on Thursday. I’ll look out for another MP, what colour is yours? Ours is Cavansite blue.

 

[jeff porter]

you wont miss us................... Cavansite blue too!

 

[Roy C]

We arrived Thursday around 2pm and the battery lasted until somewhere between 4.30pm and 8pm on Sunday - so just over three days. Of course there wasn’t any battery power left to lower the roof but ran the engine for 30 seconds and that charged it enough to get the roof half way down. Ran the engine for 30 seconds again and got the roof fully closed.

Aside from the MP leisure battery acquitting itself well it was a brilliant weekend with Hamilton winning followed by watching the dramatic men’s Wimbledon final and the even more dramatic England win in the cricket world cup final on the big screens at the campsite.