car battery question
car battery question
ahem I am getting rather desperate in terms of my daily power cuts, all this time for reflection is driving me potty, basically what I want to now is how much could I feasibly power of a car battery as they do in the provinces or how much would a cheap generator be. I know i should just find a new place but er well dont know the bats are circlin again
- The Governor
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The gererator thing has been covered a few times before, you can buy cheapo Chinese one for about $200 and $500 plus for anything half decent, but at the end of the day they are all ear bleeders and even the expensive ones I would run through a decent UPS for any computer equiptment.
Batteries are more interesting, I think single car battery isn't good for anything more than a few light bulbs and the radio. But I have seen an interesting contraption at the office of Jacked Camry, it's about six big batteries strapped together that will apparently run a few computer etc for a few hours without making your ears bleed, can you shed any more light on the battery thing JC?
Batteries are more interesting, I think single car battery isn't good for anything more than a few light bulbs and the radio. But I have seen an interesting contraption at the office of Jacked Camry, it's about six big batteries strapped together that will apparently run a few computer etc for a few hours without making your ears bleed, can you shed any more light on the battery thing JC?
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You are obviously not integrated enough into the local culture.
When we have a powercut at the office, everybody just goes home for the day
If we have a powercut at home, just head out to a bar for the evening
If the bar has a powercut, what the hell, the beer is still cold, get drinking !
Lay back in the hammock and have a serving wench peel you a mango
When we have a powercut at the office, everybody just goes home for the day
If we have a powercut at home, just head out to a bar for the evening
If the bar has a powercut, what the hell, the beer is still cold, get drinking !
Lay back in the hammock and have a serving wench peel you a mango
"We, the sons of John Company, have arrived"
- Jacked Camry
- Is the World Outside still there ?
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I dunno, I leave all technical questions to my minions.The Governor wrote:Batteries are more interesting, I think single car battery isn't good for anything more than a few light bulbs and the radio. But I have seen an interesting contraption at the office of Jacked Camry, it's about six big batteries strapped together that will apparently run a few computer etc for a few hours without making your ears bleed, can you shed any more light on the battery thing JC?
- Doctor Seuss
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We've discussed before the use of generators, which are necessary for a business, or someone with large energy needs.
As an option for a regular household, I recommend buying a truck battery and an inverter.
A suitable inverter will cost about $50. Im not sure how much a large truck battery would cost, but I imagine about $20.
Whilst you have power, the inverter will charge your battery from the mains power. When the power goes out, the inverter will convert the DC power of your truck battery to AC power, which can then be used for things like TV, fans and lights. To ensure long life of your battery, you should always leave a charge of about 15% in it.
Depending on your power needs (maybe you want to run a fridge too), you may only need a small car battery, a truck battery, or possibly mutiple batteries.
Generally, this is a great way to make sure you have power for a few lights, a fan, and a laptop in those times you lose power - without having to suffer the noise and smell of a generator.
If you want any help with this PM and Ill send you the details of what appliances use what wattage, and a formula to the determine the size of the battery and inverter you need.
As an option for a regular household, I recommend buying a truck battery and an inverter.
A suitable inverter will cost about $50. Im not sure how much a large truck battery would cost, but I imagine about $20.
Whilst you have power, the inverter will charge your battery from the mains power. When the power goes out, the inverter will convert the DC power of your truck battery to AC power, which can then be used for things like TV, fans and lights. To ensure long life of your battery, you should always leave a charge of about 15% in it.
Depending on your power needs (maybe you want to run a fridge too), you may only need a small car battery, a truck battery, or possibly mutiple batteries.
Generally, this is a great way to make sure you have power for a few lights, a fan, and a laptop in those times you lose power - without having to suffer the noise and smell of a generator.
If you want any help with this PM and Ill send you the details of what appliances use what wattage, and a formula to the determine the size of the battery and inverter you need.
- Doctor Seuss
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Excellent advice. well done!dannyw wrote:Anyway I would agree that a car battery is a reasonable compromise unless you are an NGO with a villa. I think I paid about 30 USD for the battery and 25 USD for an inverter/charger. It's been OK for several months.
My only issue is I couldn't find an inverter/charger with a *current* meter, so I never know when it really finishes charging. As a result I tend to leave it charging the battery all the time, which probably doesn't hurt the battery but wastes electricity. *Never* allow a lead-acid battery to run down below about 10.5 V. The inverter also doesn't have a battery voltage meter (only AC output), so I use a little multitester that cost about 2.50 USD.
I have a little color TV, and it runs fine on the inverter, along with several flourescent lights, a DVD player and my laptop. However, I burned out a fan motor twice before I realized what was happening. You can't use fans with these cheap inverters! Find a 12V DC fan: I think I paid about 14 USD.
What is the name, model, specs of your inverter?
The problems you report with your fans is because of the type of inverter you have. Your inverter sounds like it is not suited to variable speed devices.
There are three different types of power inverters, and the difference between them is wave signal output.
The three different wave signals represent three different qualities of power output and so three different price categories.
1. Square wave inverters result in uneven power delivery that is not efficient for running most devices. Square wave inverters were the first types of inverters made and are obsolete. I dont think these are sold in Cambodia, but you should be wary.
2. Modified square wave (modified sine wave) inverters deliver power that is consistent and efficient enough to run most devices like computers, lights and fridges. This type of inverter is the most popular in Cambodia. As you have noticed, they are not suitable for some models of fans... the variable speed fans.
3. Pure sine wave inverters are the most expensive, but they also deliver the most consistent wave output. Some sensitive equipment requires a sine wave, like certain medical equipment and variable speed fans or rechargeable tools.
Its worth spending the extra bucks to get a pure sine wave inverter, because you can count on it running all your appliances with no problems.
Last edited by Doctor Seuss on Mon Apr 17, 2006 12:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.
- Doctor Seuss
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- Doctor Seuss
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Some extra info if you are interested in doing this....
In order to figure out how much power you will need at any given moment during the day, you need to know some basic terms relating to power. The first and most important is...
Power = Amps x Volts or Watts = Amps x Volts
You need to know this because you are going to add up the total power requirement that you need or want at any given moment during the day. This is sometimes called doing a "load analysis".
Most electrical devices have the power rating on the back or underside of the device. It's usually listed in watts. Most devices that run in your home are going to be 120 volts. So if the rating on a device is in amps (or current), just multiply the amps by 120 volts to get the input power rating in watts.
Add up all these to get the total amount or the maximum amount of watts that you will use at any given moment during the day. This is, of course, the worst case scenario because you will rarely have all these devices running at the same time.
Here's some typical ratings (in Watts) for everyday devices:
Central Air Conditioner . . . . 5000
Electric Clothes Dryer . . . . . 4800
Electric Water Heater . . . . . . 3000
Dish Washer . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1500
Toaster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1000
Hair Dryer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1000
Drill - heavy duty . . . . . . . . . 1000
Drill - light duty . . . . . . . . . . 220
Washing Machine . . . . . . . . 800
Dryer - motor only . . . . . . . . 500
TV - 21" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
VCR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Refrigerator . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
Blender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
Stereo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Rechargeable device . . . . . . 6
Computer & Monitor . . . . . . 110
Computer printer . . . . . . . . . 120
Microwave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 900
Food Processor . . . . . . . . . . . 400
Vacuum Cleaner . . . . . . . . . . 650
Light - Incandescent . . . . . . . 60
Light - Fluorescent . . . . . . . . 15
Now it's time to use a little common sense to figure out what size inverter to get. Inverters are rated by the watts they put out. Remember inverters convert DC battery current to AC current that you can run all your devices from. You're obviously not going to have all your appliances or lights running at the same time.
As you know, an inverter takes the DC current stored in your battery bank and converts it to usable AC current. The things you want to consider when purchasing an inverter are output power in watts, quality of output (modified sine wave or true sine wave), and efficiency rating.
For info about inverters, youget all the specifications on various inverters at
www.traceengineering.com or www.xantrex.com
When buying your batteries, consider the following...
Batteries are used to store your electricity until you use it. What you want to get is the "deep cycle" type of battery. Do not buy car starting batteries or even dual purpose type batteries. Get the true deep cycle type that are used for RV (recreational vehicle) accessory or
marine accessory. These deep cycle batteries are made to discharge almost completely over and over again. They will cost more, but are worth it. Back home a 115AH battery was US$99.
What you want to look for are batteries with the highest AH (Amp Hour) rating as possible. The higher the AH rating, the longer the battery will last without having to recharge it.
The AH rating is the amount of hours that a battery will last with a 1 amp current load attached to it at 80 degrees F.
(If you are looking at batteries and they only have a RC on the battery,
you can easily convert RC to AH by multiplying the RC by 0.6.)
Anyways... remember when you did your load analysis? You figured out the maximum wattage you would use on any given day. Now you want to go back and figure out the "average" wattage you will be using during any given hour. Just take the total number of watts of each device, multiplied by the hours that device is used each day, add these all up. Just divide by 1000 to get Kw (Kilowatts) and then divide by 24 to get Kwh (Kilowatt hours). One Kwh is simply using 1000 watts of power for a period of one hour.
Or... what you could do, if you are currently getting an electric bill from the electric company, is just look on your electric bill. There should be a monthly Kwh figure. Just divide this figure by 30 to get your daily Kwh figure.
Once you have your daily Kwh figure, you can determine how many batteries you need.
Let's say you use 12Kwh per day. How many 100Ah batteries do you need to buy so you only have to recharge the battery bank once per day?
Assuming we recharge when the batteries get discharged 50%. To figure out the Kwh in one 100Ah battery, we just multiply 100 x 12 (volts) =
1200Wh. Divide this by 1000 to get 1.2Kwh per battery. 10 fully discharged batteries would produce 12Kwh of power each day, so 20 half discharged batteries would give us the same amount of power each day.
Needless to say, if you buy batteries with a high AH rating, you will need less of them. If you hook batteries in SERIES, that is positive to negative terminals, then that doubles the voltage, and the AH rating stays the same. If you hook batteries up in PARALLEL, that is positive to positive and negative to negative, then the voltage stays the same, but the AH rating
doubles. In both cases, series and parallel, the power (remember amps x volts) in the battery bank is the sum of the power in the individual batteries.
You can also have 2 banks of 10 batteries
hooked up in parallel and then you can hook the two banks in series to get 24 volts. Some inverters require 24 volts input.
Depth of Discharge (DOD) - There are two facts that will help you decide when to recharge your batteries. One, the deeper the discharge, the fewer cycles your batteries will last.
And two, the time it takes to charge a battery bank from 0% to 80% is less than the time it takes to charge it from 80% to 100%. So... it is best to set your system up to discharge to 30% and only
charge to 80% (that's 50% of battery capacity). This will make your batteries last longer and at the same time will conserve electricity by keeping the charging time to a minimum. Just remember to recharge to 100% every 10th cycle.
Some battery maintenance tips:
Batteries produce hydrogen gas when in heavy use and when being charged. This is highly explosive gas so avoid flames and sparks near batteries and always store and charge them in well ventilated areas.
Low Maintenance batteries: keep the water level 1/8 inch below the bottom of the refill hole. Use only distilled water.
Maintenance Free batteries: These are more prone to deep discharge failure and are more expensive, but do provide some benefits like faster recharging, reduced corrosion, and 40% morelife cycles charges/discharges).
Buy new batteries: All batteries have a date of manufacture on them. It is usually stamped on the core or printed on a sticker. It is alpha and numeric characters with letters for the months and numbers for the years. For example, January 1998 would be A8. Don't buy batteries that are
more than 3 months old.
Don't mix and match different size and/or different age batteries in a battery bank. Always use the same size cable too.
Baking soda and water will neutralize sulfuric acid if you get it on your skin or clothing. It will eat holes in your clothing if left untreated.
C Recharge batteries when they get down to the 30% discharge state and charge to the 80% charged state. Charge to 100 % every 10th cycle.
In order to figure out how much power you will need at any given moment during the day, you need to know some basic terms relating to power. The first and most important is...
Power = Amps x Volts or Watts = Amps x Volts
You need to know this because you are going to add up the total power requirement that you need or want at any given moment during the day. This is sometimes called doing a "load analysis".
Most electrical devices have the power rating on the back or underside of the device. It's usually listed in watts. Most devices that run in your home are going to be 120 volts. So if the rating on a device is in amps (or current), just multiply the amps by 120 volts to get the input power rating in watts.
Add up all these to get the total amount or the maximum amount of watts that you will use at any given moment during the day. This is, of course, the worst case scenario because you will rarely have all these devices running at the same time.
Here's some typical ratings (in Watts) for everyday devices:
Central Air Conditioner . . . . 5000
Electric Clothes Dryer . . . . . 4800
Electric Water Heater . . . . . . 3000
Dish Washer . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1500
Toaster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1000
Hair Dryer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1000
Drill - heavy duty . . . . . . . . . 1000
Drill - light duty . . . . . . . . . . 220
Washing Machine . . . . . . . . 800
Dryer - motor only . . . . . . . . 500
TV - 21" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
VCR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Refrigerator . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
Blender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
Stereo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Rechargeable device . . . . . . 6
Computer & Monitor . . . . . . 110
Computer printer . . . . . . . . . 120
Microwave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 900
Food Processor . . . . . . . . . . . 400
Vacuum Cleaner . . . . . . . . . . 650
Light - Incandescent . . . . . . . 60
Light - Fluorescent . . . . . . . . 15
Now it's time to use a little common sense to figure out what size inverter to get. Inverters are rated by the watts they put out. Remember inverters convert DC battery current to AC current that you can run all your devices from. You're obviously not going to have all your appliances or lights running at the same time.
As you know, an inverter takes the DC current stored in your battery bank and converts it to usable AC current. The things you want to consider when purchasing an inverter are output power in watts, quality of output (modified sine wave or true sine wave), and efficiency rating.
For info about inverters, youget all the specifications on various inverters at
www.traceengineering.com or www.xantrex.com
When buying your batteries, consider the following...
Batteries are used to store your electricity until you use it. What you want to get is the "deep cycle" type of battery. Do not buy car starting batteries or even dual purpose type batteries. Get the true deep cycle type that are used for RV (recreational vehicle) accessory or
marine accessory. These deep cycle batteries are made to discharge almost completely over and over again. They will cost more, but are worth it. Back home a 115AH battery was US$99.
What you want to look for are batteries with the highest AH (Amp Hour) rating as possible. The higher the AH rating, the longer the battery will last without having to recharge it.
The AH rating is the amount of hours that a battery will last with a 1 amp current load attached to it at 80 degrees F.
(If you are looking at batteries and they only have a RC on the battery,
you can easily convert RC to AH by multiplying the RC by 0.6.)
Anyways... remember when you did your load analysis? You figured out the maximum wattage you would use on any given day. Now you want to go back and figure out the "average" wattage you will be using during any given hour. Just take the total number of watts of each device, multiplied by the hours that device is used each day, add these all up. Just divide by 1000 to get Kw (Kilowatts) and then divide by 24 to get Kwh (Kilowatt hours). One Kwh is simply using 1000 watts of power for a period of one hour.
Or... what you could do, if you are currently getting an electric bill from the electric company, is just look on your electric bill. There should be a monthly Kwh figure. Just divide this figure by 30 to get your daily Kwh figure.
Once you have your daily Kwh figure, you can determine how many batteries you need.
Let's say you use 12Kwh per day. How many 100Ah batteries do you need to buy so you only have to recharge the battery bank once per day?
Assuming we recharge when the batteries get discharged 50%. To figure out the Kwh in one 100Ah battery, we just multiply 100 x 12 (volts) =
1200Wh. Divide this by 1000 to get 1.2Kwh per battery. 10 fully discharged batteries would produce 12Kwh of power each day, so 20 half discharged batteries would give us the same amount of power each day.
Needless to say, if you buy batteries with a high AH rating, you will need less of them. If you hook batteries in SERIES, that is positive to negative terminals, then that doubles the voltage, and the AH rating stays the same. If you hook batteries up in PARALLEL, that is positive to positive and negative to negative, then the voltage stays the same, but the AH rating
doubles. In both cases, series and parallel, the power (remember amps x volts) in the battery bank is the sum of the power in the individual batteries.
You can also have 2 banks of 10 batteries
hooked up in parallel and then you can hook the two banks in series to get 24 volts. Some inverters require 24 volts input.
Depth of Discharge (DOD) - There are two facts that will help you decide when to recharge your batteries. One, the deeper the discharge, the fewer cycles your batteries will last.
And two, the time it takes to charge a battery bank from 0% to 80% is less than the time it takes to charge it from 80% to 100%. So... it is best to set your system up to discharge to 30% and only
charge to 80% (that's 50% of battery capacity). This will make your batteries last longer and at the same time will conserve electricity by keeping the charging time to a minimum. Just remember to recharge to 100% every 10th cycle.
Some battery maintenance tips:
Batteries produce hydrogen gas when in heavy use and when being charged. This is highly explosive gas so avoid flames and sparks near batteries and always store and charge them in well ventilated areas.
Low Maintenance batteries: keep the water level 1/8 inch below the bottom of the refill hole. Use only distilled water.
Maintenance Free batteries: These are more prone to deep discharge failure and are more expensive, but do provide some benefits like faster recharging, reduced corrosion, and 40% morelife cycles charges/discharges).
Buy new batteries: All batteries have a date of manufacture on them. It is usually stamped on the core or printed on a sticker. It is alpha and numeric characters with letters for the months and numbers for the years. For example, January 1998 would be A8. Don't buy batteries that are
more than 3 months old.
Don't mix and match different size and/or different age batteries in a battery bank. Always use the same size cable too.
Baking soda and water will neutralize sulfuric acid if you get it on your skin or clothing. It will eat holes in your clothing if left untreated.
C Recharge batteries when they get down to the 30% discharge state and charge to the 80% charged state. Charge to 100 % every 10th cycle.
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