Inverter connection

[Torchy]

I am thinking of buying a 2000w inverter and am wondering if it is safe to connect to the EHU lead when off hook up so all the internal power sockets are live. Could there be any problems I am not aware of, eg putting a drain on leisure batteries when not being used.
Just thinking of convenience. TIA.

 

[funflair]

At the very least you would need to turn off battery charger and make sure that the fridge was on gas otherwise you would very quickly have a flat battery, other than that I think it would be OK but will wait to be corrected.

 

[tacr2man]

What are you thinking of running when on inverter , and how big and what type of battery bank do you have ?

 

[Stealaway]

What are you thinking of running when on inverter , and how big and what type of battery bank do you have ?

As above but to avoid any complications I have three independent 13a sockets wired directly from the invertor.
I swop appliances to the van circuit sockets when on hook up.

 

[Torchy]

What are you thinking of running when on inverter , and how big and what type of battery bank do you have ?

E-bike battery charging, laptop. No high wattage items.

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[Torchy]

E-bike battery charging, laptop. No high wattage items.

I have 2 x 110a leisure batteries and 110amp solar panel.

 

[Tombola]

yes if you can switch off the fridge an duse 12v where possible

others have done the same. Or use a switch over relay on teh internal hook up cable

 

[Stealaway]

Ebike charging sockets in my garage. 1 x ehu .1x inverter

 

[pappajohn]

I have 2 x 110a leisure batteries and 110amp solar panel.

110amp panel......that must be bigger than the van
You mean 110 WATT and will be useless at charging batteries with a 2kw inverter draining them.
To be of any real use you need 300 watts or more.

 

[autorouter]

As well as the issues already covered, like battery charger and fridge, there is also the constant drain from the batteries even with no load. So it's best to switch off the inverter unless it's actually being used. The larger the inverter, the higher the no-load drain. Also higher quality inverters tend to have lower lo-load drain. The figure tends to be tucked away in the small print, or sometimes not even listed.

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[autorouter]

You mean 110 WATT and will be useless at charging batteries with a 2kw inverter draining them.
To be of any real use you need 300 watts or more.

To add numbers to that, a 100 watt panel will give you about 500 watt-hours maximum per day, which is enough to power a 2000W inverter for 15 minutes.

 

[funflair]

J

110amp panel......that must be bigger than the van
You mean 110 WATT and will be useless at charging batteries with a 2kw inverter draining them.
To be of any real use you need 300 watts or more.

Just so as we don’t confuse Torchy the inverter will only use amps from your batteries relative to what you are running plus a bit to run the inverter itself wether or not you are running anything.

 

[funflair]

To add numbers to that, a 100 watt panel will give you about 500 watt-hours maximum per day, which is enough to power a 2000W inverter for 15 minutes.

At full power which wouldn’t be required for charging bike batteries.

 

[autorouter]

At full power which wouldn’t be required for charging bike batteries.

Yes, a bike battery is probably 300 to 500 watt-hours, so a 100W panel would probably give you enough to charge that. If that's the biggest item to charge, then a smaller inverter (with a smaller background drain) might be more suitable, 300 or 500 watts for example.

 

[cyberyacht]

I have, for research purposes, connected my inverter(1500W) to the vans EHU socket which then provides power to all the mains sockets. The on-board charger was switched off, as it is usually anyway. I have 300W of solar to 240AH Lithium so could, in theory, run the fridge on 240V for a while. A bright sunny day in southern Europe might run it for a couple of hours either side of mid-day (GMT) if I wanted to save some gas but as a practical "pretend mains supply" solution not really realistic.

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[Raul]

E-bike battery charging, laptop. No high wattage items.

So why 2000w inverter? The loads are not that big to warrant a 2kw, then, your battery will be on its nose with 2kw load. Limit the inverter to what you actually need, like 800w more than enough for those loads. Then the battery will manage to cope even at full load. Also, you don’t have enough solar to replenish back what you take out. That leaves you within ehu or alternator charging it back.

 

[68c]

E-bike battery charging, laptop. No high wattage items.

May I suggest you research DC to DC converters. These will take 12volt DC from the leisure battery and convert it to the 42volt DC you need to charge an ebike battery. You can set the voltage and maximum current. It is preferable to using an inverter which takes the 12volt DC from the leisure battery and converts it to 240volt AC then your bike charger takes that 240volt AC and convert it again to 42volt DC.