Power Inverter Questions

[muddog]

1:I have inherited a 1500/300 power inverter if I hook this up to the battery of my truck for emergency use only, and use it for say half its rating (so say 750 watts, in appliances) will this ruin my charging system?
2:if I powered this same inverter with deep cell 12 v batteries would two do the job,and also do they make a battery charger that would be powered by my truck battery(while running) to charge the deep cells, in a no power emergecny?

[segalaw19800]

Do you have any pic of the inverter

[Jetster]

1. No, Why would it
2. Your truck will charge deep cell batteries with out anything. Just a set of jumpers. I would however not install a deep cell battery in your trucks battery rack. There heavy and will eventually break it. They make kits for dual battery systems Also don't smoke around charging batteries

[segalaw19800]

Battery Charging

Battery charging takes place in 3 basic stages: Bulk, Absorption, and Float.

Bulk Charge - The first stage of 3-stage battery charging. Current is sent to batteries at the maximum safe rate they will accept until voltage rises to near (80-90%) full charge level. Voltages at this stage typically range from 10.5 volts to 15 volts. There is no "correct" voltage for bulk charging, but there may be limits on the maximum current that the battery and/or wiring can take.

Absorption Charge: The 2nd stage of 3-stage battery charging. Voltage remains constant and current gradually tapers off as internal resistance increases during charging. It is during this stage that the charger puts out maximum voltage. Voltages at this stage are typically around 14.2 to 15.5 volts. (The internal resistance gradually goes up because there is less and less to be converted back to normal full charge).

Float Charge: The 3rd stage of 3-stage battery charging. After batteries reach full charge, charging voltage is reduced to a lower level (typically 12.8 to 13.2) to reduce gassing and prolong battery life. This is often referred to as a maintenance or trickle charge, since it's main purpose is to keep an already charged battery from discharging. PWM, or "pulse width modulation" accomplishes the same thing. In PWM, the controller or charger senses tiny voltage drops in the battery and sends very short charging cycles (pulses) to the battery. This may occur several hundred times per minute. It is called "pulse width" because the width of the pulses may vary from a few microseconds to several seconds. Note that for long term float service, such as backup power systems that are seldom discharged, the float voltage should be around 13.02 to 13.20 volts.

Chargers: Most garage and consumer (automotive) type battery chargers are bulk charge only, and have little (if any) voltage regulation. They are fine for a quick boost to low batteries, but not to leave on for long periods. Among the regulated chargers, there are the voltage regulated ones, such as Iota Engineering, PowerMax, and others, which keep a constant regulated voltage on the batteries. If these are set to the correct voltages for your batteries, they will keep the batteries charged without damage. These are sometimes called "taper charge" - as if that is a selling point. What taper charge really means is that as the battery gets charged up, the voltage goes up, so the amps out of the charger goes down. They charge OK, but a charger rated at 20 amps may only be supplying 5 amps when the batteries are 80% charged. To get around this, Xantrex (and maybe others?) have come out with "smart", or multi-stage chargers. These use a variable voltage to keep the charging amps much more constant for faster charging. From http://www.windsun.com/Batteries/Bat...AQ.htm#Battery Charging

[Kreij]

If you pull 750 watts at 12 volts you are drawing 62.5 amps.
Your battery should handle this.
You can look at your alternator to see what it's output is ... it should be written on it somewhere.
If it's more than 60 amps when the vehicle is running you're good to go. If it's less, you will eventually drain the battery as you are drawing more than the alternator can supply.
A lot of the newer alternators do not respond to higher RPMs like the old one's did and maintain a pretty level output when idling or when the engine RPMs are higher.