Power loss through inverter

[Hawkeye Ed]

Here’s our real-world electricity usage in our 2020 5.0 while boondocking last week for 4 nights at Ft. Casey State Park during the Escape rally organized by Bobbie.

The weather was often cool and rainy with some sunshine but also lots of clouds. Our Escape has two Lifeline GPL-4CT 6-volt batteries with a total capacity of 220 amp-hours at 12 volts although we don’t want to draw the batteries down to more than 50% state of charge to preserve their life. So that gives us a theoretical useful capacity of 110 amp-hours.

We don’t have an inverter. My CPAP runs on 12 volts as does the furnace fan, the 3-way refrigerator electronics, the lights and the various device chargers. We also have a couple of 45-watt portable Zamp solar panels that we used three days. Bottom line, the batteries never dropped below 80% and I estimate our daily usage at about 20-25 amp hours, considering how the the solar panels replaced most/all of what we used each day even though there were lots of clouds.

That tells me even without solar we could have run everything for 4-5 days without ever using up 110 amp-hours and dropping our batteries below 50% state of charge. It also taught me that if it were a hot sunny summer here in the Pacific Northwest and I were to also power my portable compressor beer fridge, I probably could boondock indefinitely, or at least until the beer ran out, by deploying the 90-watt portable solar panels each day. Hope that’s interesting to you.

[rajenkins]

A quick reply to the original question in this thread. I am always looking at ways to cut weight (so we can haul a couple of cases of wine if we are headed to southern Utah for three weeks :-) Rather than having a single use item like a dedicated TV set, running on 12 volts, why not consider a USB-based TV tuner (Like something from Hauppauge) that plugs into the laptop computer you probably have with you and that can handle both off-air signals (from a lightweight, USB powered antenna) or digital cable signals in an RV park. A lot of modern laptop computers no longer have internal DVD drives. But you can easily purchase USB-powered DVD drives. And for many common brands of laptop computers, you can purchase a 12-volt power brick that will run your computer. Lots of times, we are either off the grid, or too busy to watch TV. But we can always watch a DVD on the computer.

[Jack!]

Originally Posted by mr.stang

Greetings, I am trying to find a television in 12 v and the supply is limited. I will have the 1500 inverter from Escape, my question is. Is there significant power loss using the inverter vs going direct dc. Standard Escape solar set up 17b 1 panel, 1 Lithium battery. Thanks Stan

What you will find is 12v RV TV's cost more and have limited features and screen resolutions, as compared to household AC TV's. That said, I found a good solution.

I found a good quality AC TV at lower cost with great screen resoution and lots great features that I didn't want to give up to get a 12V DC RV TV. The often overlooked catch is it has a standard AC power cord, but the power cord has a power brick. The brick converts the household AC120V power to 19 volts DC power. So in reality, this is not a AC TV. It's a 19V DC TV. Then I ordered from Hong Kong via Ebay a voltage converter that takes the trailer's 12V power converting it to 19V at 3amps. Now this 19V DC TV runs beautifully on 12 Volt trailer power, no inverter required. It has lots of ports and BT for casting with a great LED picture. Very light in weight.

Hope this helps!

Product Links below:

https://www.amazon.com/LG-Electronic...s%2C133&sr=8-2

https://www.ebay.com/itm/19194335339...mis&media=COPY

[John in Santa Cruz]

my experiences so far with 360W of MPPT solar on the roof is, parked in the open, on a clear day, with a discharged battery, the solar can generate 2000WH per day, thats about 160 amp*hours at 12.x volts. these measurements were done in winter/early spring at central california latitudes

phew, 7 amps at 12V is a fair bit for a small television, thats like 85 watts.

one thing I learned by experience a couple years ago, car stereos are rather inefficient. I've been using a bluetooth speaker (JBL Charge) with a headphone cable, even with the speaker plugged into a USB charger, its using around 5 watts (1 amp at 5V) if the speaker battery is discharged, and significantly less when its fully charged