Battery Backup

[horge]

You brought back memories, bill

A decade ago when we Manilans had to endure daily 8-hour blackouts --or brownouts, as we called them, merchants had a field day selling generators and power-storage devices.

In time, everyone pretty much migrated towards generators (we consigned the battery-and-inverter sets to deep storage). Generators are make some racket, but they're cheaper and more durable/dependable. Dunno what it's like starting them in your cold weather!

My main diss on some inverters is they don't yield a true sine-wave AC --it's more outright flipflop, or square-wave if you will. This can be murder on certain electrical devices, long-term.


horge



[This message has been edited by horge (edited 12-30-2000).]

[bill-e]

After our discussion a week or so ago regarding inverters and backups, I did a little research and I must say I'm impressed with what a couple of 12v deep cycle batteries and and inverter can do. But what I'm not impressed with is the cost. It will cost as much as a 4kw gasoline generator to do a decent job with the inverter.

Here's a link to an inverter:
http://www.price1.com/dc2ac/index.html

At $350, plus a couple of good marine or RV deep cycle batteries ($60 each at least), You are in the pricerange of a 4-5kw generator. and the generator will also provide home heat, well water, refrigerator, etc. (with some power management)

So the only thing the Inverter has on the generator is auto start.

So for say $470, you would be able to run a Mag 7 and a 200w heater (50% duty cycle) for about 74 hours or 3 days. With one battery it would work out to 36 hours or a day and a half($410 w/one battery).


Now if I could find at least a 300w inverter with auto switchover, which would be enough to run a mag 7 and a 200w heater, for 100 bux, I'd buy it.



------------------
Bill Esposito
bespo@cereal.mv.com
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