How much power does the Bobil Electric use?
- Bobil Vans
- Mar 14
- 3 min read
Our Bobil Electric tanks come with a choice of sizes and electrical elements inside, but how much power do they use in real terms, and how long does it take?
For all heating times, we will assume a cold tank of water at 15C, and you will be heating it continuously up to 60C.
Bobil Electric 10L
Our standard Bobil Electric 10L tank, which also comes standard with the Bobil Hybrid system has a choice of 2 electrical elements:
230V Tank
This tank has a 230V 800W electrical element, that can be run off either an inverter, or external hookup AC power. This element is the quicker of the 2 for heating water, heating water in around 40 minutes from cold.
12V Tank
This tank has a 12V 200W electrical element, that runs directly off your 12V AGM or lithium campervan leisure batteries. By itself, it takes around 2.5 hours to heat water from 15-60C. Whilst slower than the AC element, it has the added benefit of being able to heater water automatically based on if your batteries are "full" or not via our smart controller or simple controller, which come in the kit depending on the controller you choose.
For both elements, to heat water from 15-60C uses around 50-60Ah at 12V. The AC element will use a little more if run via and inverter from your batteries as the inverter needs a little power to run and there are some inefficiencies by converted DC to AC power.
We also sell a dual voltage tank, our most popular iteration, which has both the AC and DC element in. These can both be run at the same time if you wanted which reduces the heating time to around 30 minutes with both elements on.
Bobil MINI Electric 6L
Our smaller Bobil MINI Electric 6L tank, which also is used in the Mini Hybrid system, only has a 12V element available
This tank has a 12V 200W electrical element, that runs directly off your 12V AGM or lithium campervan leisure batteries. By itself, it takes around 1 hr 45 minutes to heat water from 15-60C. or around 50 minutes for 40C water. It too has the added benefit of being able to heater water automatically based on if your batteries are "full" or not via our smart controller or simple controller, which come in the kit depending on the controller you choose.
Heating water from 15-60C uses around 25Ah at 12V, and heating water from 15-40C (enough for warm water washing up), takes around 14Ah at 12V.
Bobil MAXI Electric 15L/25L
Our larger Bobil MAXI Electric tanks, which also come with their own Bobil MAXI Hybrid system has a choice of 2 sizes and elements:
15L Dual Voltage Tank
The dual voltage tank is a scaled up version of our standard 10L tank, with all the same benefits. It again comes with a 200W 12V element and 230V 800W element. The heating times are as follows for 15-60C:
230V: 60 minutes
12V: 3hrs 40 minutes
Both at the same time: 45 minutes
25L 230V Tank
This is the largest tank we sell, and to reflect this is has an upgraded 1500W AC element which can be run through an inverter or external hook-up. It takes around 1hr 40minutes to heat up all 25L of water, which should be plenty of hot water for almost any need.
The 15L tank will take around 90-100Ah at 12V, and if you run the 25L 230V element via your inverter, this will take about 150-170Ah at 12V depending on the efficiency of your inverter. If you have the power this would mean you can store a lot of hot water when you are on hook-up, or are on full battery.
How quickly does the water cool down in the Bobil Electric Tanks?
The answer to this question depends on many factors, including where you install your tank (internally or externally). whether you use any hot water (as when water is used, the tank backfills from cold water from you fresh tank reducing the overall temperature if not being heated) and the ambient temperature of the air around the tank.
That being said, as a very rough average, the insulated tank will loose around 0.5-1C per hour, if it is not being heated or any water is being used. You can of course keep the electrical element on and this will maintain your water temperature indefinitely, providing you have the battery power.
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