Who has inverters?

[97grandby]

I'm looking to add around a 1000-ish watt inverter to my system and wondering what inverters you have added and how well they work. As always thanks for your help and opinions.


1990 Ford F-250
1997 fwc grandby

 

[craig333]

1250 Xantrex. Runs the microwave and the coffee grinder. Works well, should work better now that I have more solar and battery capacity.

 

[97grandby]

1250 Xantrex. Runs the microwave and the coffee grinder. Works well, should work better now that I have more solar and battery capacity.

thanks how much solar and battery amp hours do you have?



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[K6ON]

I have a 1500 watt inverter. Like Craig, mine runs my microwave just fine. I have 200 watts of solar, and 200 amp hours of battery in the camper. The camper is wired directly to the truck with welding cable, and truck has 300 amp hours of battery to run high power radio gear. Total available to camper 500 amp hours.

 

[97grandby]

[qwuote name="K6ON" post="151855" timestamp="1473826860"]I have a 1500 watt inverter. Like Craig, mine runs my microwave just fine. I have 200 watts of solar, and 200 amp hours of battery in the camper. The camper is wired directly to the truck with welding cable, and truck has 300 amp hours of battery to run high power radio gear. Total available to camper 500 amp hours.[/quote ] wow 500 amp hours is a ton. What type of radio gear do you have that is that power hungry?


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[Stalking Light]

I have a 1500w GoPower inverter, 150ah battery and 300w solar. I mainly just use my inverter to run a toaster, though, and the battery charger for my D4s since I haven't found a 12v version of the charger.


Charlie

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[cdbrow1]

I have 2000 watt Xantrex inverter. Very happy with it. Get pure sine wave inverter if you can - they are worth the extra bucks IMHO.

 

[K6ON]

"wow 500 amp hours is a ton. What type of radio gear do you have that is that power hungry?"

I have a ham radio amplifier in the truck that puts about 1100 watts of RF into the antenna..With the amp and the radio, total current draw is around 170 amps on transmit. I also have an Extreme Air compressor that draws over 100 amps as it reaches 120 psi into the air tank, and of course the 1500 watt inverter that draws well over 100 amps when running the microwave.

Go to www.qrz.com, enter k6on in the search window in upper left corner, scroll down about 3 pictures and you'll see all the radio gear in the truck.

 

[Old Crow]

I don't imagine this will help you pick an inverter, 97grandby, but I'm responding to the more general thread title....

In our old van camper I just take along a 150-watt West Marine inverter to plug into the cigarette-lighter socket. I mostly use it to charge up our two laptops (I had tried an aftermarket 12-volt charger but it was much slower). We don't have a furnace, fridge, or water pump so don't even have a house battery in that camper. We just run off the vehicle battery and depend on the alternator to charge it. (And of course can't have a microwave, toaster, etc). We also charge the camera, Inreach, GPS, two dumbphones, a micro-starter battery, and run an over-counter fluorescent light, Fan-Tastic fan, and Smittybilt air compressor off the vehicle battery (and alternator). But we don't do it all at once!

I bought the used Hawk shell and F150 as a package. The rig came with a Xantrex Pro-Sine 600 in the truck's cab and it was used to charge the camper's battery with a very high quality marine charger the previous owner had for his boat. The charger wasn't part of the deal so I bought a Xantrex one and use the inverter and charger to charge the (single) house battery. I don't have a fridge, don't use the furnace much, minimize use of the battery and move every day, so it works for me but I don't know that I'd recommend this setup to others.

I don't like the fan noise of the ProSine in my cab in warmer weather. The fan comes on whether I have anything plugged into it or not (when powered on). I also have to be careful to not leave it powered on when the truck is parked for more than a day or so as it will drain down the vehicle battery just being powered up (without the charging load).

I also didn't have a great experience in trying to get tech support from Xantrex. (If others have had a different experience, please chime in--- I'd love to hear I just had some bad luck.)

 

[tree]

im using a zamp pure sine 1000/2000, with dual rv agm batteries, noco 2 bank on board charger, and zamp 60 watt portable solar. added a bass pro switch panel as well.

 

[Cayuse]

Have a small inverter that I almost never use. I did just buy an AC adapter for my camera and might try shoooting some shots with the intervalometer so maybe there will be some future use.

 

[Casa Escarlata Robles Too]

I have a 150w inverter and like it.Use it for coffee grinder and charging small batteries.
Have been using it since we got the camper in 09. I wired it right next to the battery,on the outside of the box.
My solar is small,105w,but my power needs/usage are small.
Frank

 

[craig333]

1250 Xantrex. Runs the microwave and the coffee grinder. Works well, should work better now that I have more solar and battery capacity.

Currently 250 watts of solar and 250ah in the camper, more if I add in the truck ( I need to go see what those have). I ran it for a long time with 100watts of solar and a 75ah battery. For the three minutes or so to microwave a breakfast burrito it was fine. It was my fridge mostly that made me want to upgrade the solar and batteries.

 

[97grandby]

"wow 500 amp hours is a ton. What type of radio gear do you have that is that power hungry?"

I have a ham radio amplifier in the truck that puts about 1100 watts of RF into the antenna..With the amp and the radio, total current draw is around 170 amps on transmit. I also have an Extreme Air compressor that draws over 100 amps as it reaches 120 psi into the air tank, and of course the 1500 watt inverter that draws well over 100 amps when running the microwave.

Go to www.qrz.com, enter k6on in the search window in upper left corner, scroll down about 3 pictures and you'll see all the radio gear in the truck.

Wow you have some very impressive looking gear. I have wanted to get a ham Radio and license for a while just haven't gotten around to doing it just yet.

 

[cdbrow1]

"wow 500 amp hours is a ton. What type of radio gear do you have that is that power hungry?"

I have a ham radio amplifier in the truck that puts about 1100 watts of RF into the antenna..With the amp and the radio, total current draw is around 170 amps on transmit. I also have an Extreme Air compressor that draws over 100 amps as it reaches 120 psi into the air tank, and of course the 1500 watt inverter that draws well over 100 amps when running the microwave.

Go to www.qrz.com, enter k6on in the search window in upper left corner, scroll down about 3 pictures and you'll see all the radio gear in the truck.

You must be the guy putting those fuzzy lines into my TV.

 

[K6ON]

Wow you have some very impressive looking gear. I have wanted to get a ham Radio and license for a while just haven't gotten around to doing it just yet.

A ham radio ticket is very easy to get today..no code and a simple multiple choice test.

 

[K6ON]

You must be the guy putting those fuzzy lines into my TV.

Maybe 40 years ago with old tube type TV's and outside TV antennas, but not today with cable, and everything on UHF.