Inverter - Charger - Leave well enough alone?
Here, yet again, I have more questions... you all must be getting a little tired of me with these inquiries, and I very much appreciate the patience of those who've responded to my previous posts. My ...
Forum Discussion
Well, it’s mostly a “what’s in the eye of the beholder” sort’a thing (as you’ll begin to see...), thus much depends on what you might consider to be an upgrade...From my perspective, if I were to do an inverter upgrade, I’d be looking at a True Sine Wave model, and likely a pass-thru inverter-charger...
Why??... Because sinewave is easier and better for delicate electronic devices, air cond motors due to better electrical efficiency (less wasteful energy to heat conversion). Either way, you’d want to know what your worst case energy consumption might be, then make plans accordingly...BTW, the ‘wattage’ rating of an inverter is often more to do with marketing gimmickry than electrical reality thus, there’s a few other important specs to first look into (i.e. important surge capacity and surge duration), and be aware that manufacturers often hide these details - in fact, this is often why some seemingly like-kind inverters have a wide breadth of price points - overstated inverter data sells!!
Other things worth consideration are whether the inverter is a hybrid-type (true supplemental shore-genny power load assist) and whether a LF (larger-heavier transformer based = slower) or a HF (more compact transistor-ladder design = faster)...Generally speaking, bulkier LF models are robust and very well suited for higher and longer duration surges, like air conditioners, etc, however (having said that...), note that my HF 2000w ProSine 2.0 has served me quite faithfully in this same kind of service (air cond. @41 LRA + fan ...).
To this end, you should plan for the future - to avoid nagging dc voltage drop bottlenecks (associated with extreme battery demands), I’d also go with 0004 batt cabling and keep the round-trip cable as short as practical...
To summarize, think about what inverter type and overall *system wiring scheme you could best live with, and adjust your sights accordingly...JMHO (been down this dang rabbit hole too many times but survived!! - lol!)
*(single or multiple outlets, ATS switches, a rewire, passive-cascading system with sub-panel, etc)
Just a few starting ideas only...
3 tons
Why??... Because sinewave is easier and better for delicate electronic devices, air cond motors due to better electrical efficiency (less wasteful energy to heat conversion). Either way, you’d want to know what your worst case energy consumption might be, then make plans accordingly...BTW, the ‘wattage’ rating of an inverter is often more to do with marketing gimmickry than electrical reality thus, there’s a few other important specs to first look into (i.e. important surge capacity and surge duration), and be aware that manufacturers often hide these details - in fact, this is often why some seemingly like-kind inverters have a wide breadth of price points - overstated inverter data sells!!
Other things worth consideration are whether the inverter is a hybrid-type (true supplemental shore-genny power load assist) and whether a LF (larger-heavier transformer based = slower) or a HF (more compact transistor-ladder design = faster)...Generally speaking, bulkier LF models are robust and very well suited for higher and longer duration surges, like air conditioners, etc, however (having said that...), note that my HF 2000w ProSine 2.0 has served me quite faithfully in this same kind of service (air cond. @41 LRA + fan ...).
To this end, you should plan for the future - to avoid nagging dc voltage drop bottlenecks (associated with extreme battery demands), I’d also go with 0004 batt cabling and keep the round-trip cable as short as practical...
To summarize, think about what inverter type and overall *system wiring scheme you could best live with, and adjust your sights accordingly...JMHO (been down this dang rabbit hole too many times but survived!! - lol!)
*(single or multiple outlets, ATS switches, a rewire, passive-cascading system with sub-panel, etc)
Just a few starting ideas only...
3 tons
