Use for M725 storage box!

What Blitz said is correct.

Batteries are rated in amp hours or how many amps it can put out in hours. To quote a battery site:

Quote:

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The most common battery rating is the AMP-HOUR RATING. This is a unit of measurement for battery capacity, obtained by multiplying a current flow in amperes by the time in hours of discharge. (Example: A battery which delivers 5 amperes for 20 hours delivers 5 amperes times 20 hours, or 100 ampere-hours.

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Again you would use the power equation. This will allow you to determine how long your batteries can maintain the inverter load before they are discharged.

Draining a battery fast is hard on it. Lithium Ion batteries can actually explode if drained to fast.

To continue that equation,
If You drained Your batteriers at 5 amps for 20 hours, to equal 100 amps of draw on the batteries,

It would take you 3+ ( 3.2 or so )hours to recharge those batteries at 31.6 amps from the generator.

With inverters You also need to keep in mind that the higest quality ones out there have a 10 % LOSS of power, in the conversion process form 12 volts to 120 volts.

The Average LOSS ( Of most brands out there ) is actually around 20 %.... simple converting the power from 12 volt DC to 120 volt AC.

The bigger inverters, and higher quality ones... will have less loss, automatic shut off when the battery bank gets weak, ability to measure the temperature of the battery bank ( cold lowers their effeciency , Heat will kill them ) and a remote ON / Off capability for "distant" control, readily accesibel fuses, and LED indicators for the power output and battery reserve strength.

I personally would spend more $$$ on a higher quality inverter, and save that power loss, have MORE amps than you think you need, and have all the goodies that go with it.

The Cheapo, off brand, readily available inverters off the shelf, will be massively OVERRATED.... say for 2000 watts (run ) but will actually get hot and be inefecient and really only put out 17oo watts (run ).

If I were You I would go Trace or Xantrex... buy it once and be done with screwing around.

The off brand and smaller cheapos will just fry... as You are using them.

One last thing....
You DONT need PURE SINE WAVE output, unless you are running medical equipment or top end computer systems...

Modified Sine Wave is fine...

I would avoid Square wave.

Always FUSE Your 12 volt bank as well, before the inverter,( BIG Fuses 100 to 300 amps and correct wire size )and cover the tops in WOOD to prevent a flying wrench from burning up Your rig at the next bump.

http://www.xantrex.com/power-product.../overview.aspx

The difference between a generator and an alternator is the generator produces DC voltage. The alternator produces AC voltage. If your end goal is 120 volts why not produce the 120 VAC right from the alternator?

Keep in mind it would be pretty unclean voltage and you wouldn't want to power any electronics with it but you can run lights and motors just fine.

Some people actually turn old electric motors into alternators. It actually works well because electric motors have the correct number of poles to produce 60 Hz when spun at the proper RPM. That is really what you want for powering AC devices. A car alternator will produce much higher frequencies. Hz=Hertz or frequency.

What you are actually doing when you are using the car alternator is producing 3 phase AC voltage and rectifying it to DC by using a bridge rectifier. When you attach an inverter you are converting the DC back to AC. That is not as efficient as just staying AC from the alternator.

I have used the GM alternator (a CS144 which is rated at 124 amps) as a welder. It welds fairly well and will run my 120 volt grinder (to clean up my terrible looking welds) when I'm done welding.

I am actually in the idea phase of using my M715 PTO to run an alternator to produce 220 volts. I figure the PTO can put out enough horse power to run my entire house during a power outage.

There are lots of videos on youtube that show you how to use car alternators. Some of them actually show you how to do it right too.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jeeper

What you are actually doing when you are using the car alternator is producing 3 phase AC voltage and rectifying it to DC by using a bridge rectifier. When you attach an inverter you are converting the DC back to AC. That is not as efficient as just staying AC from the alternator.


Very true... no loss in convesion... just have to have the engine running... a battery bank would be quiet... Both ways would be great to have the option of... on an as needed basis ( 2 alternators would be required )

I have used the GM alternator (a CS144 which is rated at 124 amps) as a welder. It welds fairly well and will run my 120 volt grinder (to clean up my terrible looking welds) when I'm done welding.

I Like this idea a bunch !


I am actually in the idea phase of using my M715 PTO to run an alternator to produce 220 volts. I figure the PTO can put out enough horse power to run my entire house during a power outage.

I like this idea even more.
The FTD-7 Pto that is "almost here" ( being shipped) has dual output shafts... front and rear,,, The front for a winch and the back... I figured a water pump or generator... I like this idea a bunch too

There are lots of videos on youtube that show you how to use car alternators. Some of them actually show you how to do it right too.

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Great thread.
Too bad Your family didnt "get it" Panther...
Must be a Guy thing to discuss in the Man cave : )

Yeah, I find this stuff interesting. We're so conditioned to be lazy, go buy a product vs looking into how this stuff works and DIY

Keep in mind where my truck is, at the barn has no power and is 60 ft from the house. Running all the extension cords is getting tired.

Probably what I'll do is get a good inverter and call it a day.

I dont have means of hooking up my arc welder so setting one off the alt is appealing. I can swap out alts easy enough, have one for each use.

The pto idea is a good too, I'd like to see that. I might look into a pto winch though.

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Its all a work in progress.

you will refine, tune and add and collect stuff for this for years.

I've said it b4 and I'll say it agian... I always wanted one.

Wrecking yards are one of my favorite places now, and scrap metal recyclers.

In the big city, just keep looking on curbs for what You need :)
I think 5 or 6 of my main computers over the years were curb finds that I rebuilt.
!2 volt motors from thrown away trolling motors, and treadmills. etc..

Just take Your time and keep at it. It will all fall into place.

I like everything we discussed here. Great food for thought.

As a suggestion... find a used battery shop somewhere around you and kinda get to know the guys there. They usually will have used batteries for 40 bucks or so that are deep cycle or even GEL cell.
A lot of telecom companies scrap out their batteries every year or so, weather they need it or not.... and You can usually find some good HOT deep cycles by the pallet full, old "dead" inverters, interconnect cables, fuses.... even 24 volt Aircraft batteries over time.

The telecom companies use them for emergency backup rack systems... and most are usually air conditioned, constantly trickle charged and never drained at all during their life.

They just replace them to "keep with standards" and its all to Your benefit.
They sell them as scrap by the pallet load.

I highly suggest finding a used battery shop around you somewhere.
You can usually get them for the cost of the weight of the lead or a small price for a gel cell.

A resettable type fuse, like this one is cheap to use between the batteries and an inverter:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/250-AMP-12V-...3D230857518539

Even an old UPS backup system for a computer has an inverter inside of it, and when You fnd those "on the curb" there is usually nothing wrong with them but a small internal Dead 12 volt alarm size battery.

Keep Your eyes open, take Your time and keep getting it : )
Projects like this come together over Years and last several decades.

Good on Ya Panther.

Thx Blitz
Picked up the inverter. Its some kind of industrial unit with many of the specs you mentioned.

Its 1600 watt and similar to this one:
http://equalizerqa.com/ProductDetail...Xw/M1s0KEVtZA=

Continuous output: 1600 watts
Output waveform: true sine wave
Low battery alarm
Battery polarity reverse (by fuse)
Over-input voltage protection
Low battery auto shutdown
Overload & over-temperature protection

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Couple pics:
http://i1109.photobucket.com/albums/...606_163455.jpg
http://i1109.photobucket.com/albums/...606_162918.jpg

Looks good Panther.

Its good to see you moving forward quickly.
no BS ing around.

1600 watts will actually run a lot of stuff.

The best suggestion I can give you is to use as LARGE of cables as possible to connect this inverter to your battery bank, and fuse the bank.

Welding cable is excellent... thin stranded, very fine copper wires, but in a large gauge and flexible cable.
I would use at least 1/0 cable to feed this unit... and keep the cables as short as possible to the batteries... but with enough slack to remove them easily.

I think you got a really good start, and this will handle 80% of anythng you will want to run. larger Motors,fridges, and ac units... probably not... But its a great start.

The more batteries you have, the longer you can run, silently... and it will pull less amp hours off of each individual battery... so they will be quicker to recharge as a bank.

Just ry to manage your run times and loads so you never never pull the batteries down below 50% rated capacity.
It will take a lot longer to recharge them, and this is considered "cycling" the battery.. and it will lessen its lifespan considerably.. at more than 50 % draw down of capacity.

Yep. You got it done pretty quick.
You can detail it out for a long time now.

Thanks for the photos and data.

Pure sine wave is a Bonus !!
You could run a defibulator off of this

So the inverter shuts off at 10 volts. The problem is my batteries dont hold a charge. Unless the alt is running, the batteries are then fully charged, it runs but theres not much reserve. Not a good system.

Good news is I got 2 exide deep cycle agm batteries that are only a year old!

Gotta love craigslist. I think I'm done adding stuff. Trying to do this on the cheap and I believe I have. Everything for air and generator came in at 200, batteries ran another 100 so I think thats pretty good.

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