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mike-uswest's avatar
mike-uswest
Explorer II
Jul 13, 2021

Inverter problems-a bit long

I have an Arctic Fox 25Y trailer that I bought a few years ago used. It is in good shape, but I seem to have a problem with the Xantrex 2000 W Freedom XP inverter. I know nothing about inverters, and have used it only to run the TV. My last fifth wheel I put a hard wired 500 W inverter to use for TV. We have a Zamp Solar Controller/battery charger, 360 W of panels that work good as long as you have any sun, a High Pointe microwave 900 W output-1350W input, a Champion 2000 W inverter generator, 2-6 volt Interstate Batteries. I figured I would try the inverter with a higher task than running the TV. We had a couple of TV dinners, the batteries were up good, and so I wanted to see what my set-up could do. It ran about 1 1/2 minutes and shut off. Taking a lot of power. So I hooked up the generator and it did just slightly better before shutting off. Here at home I tried it hooking up to 110 plug and it worked fine. Now according to my voltage meter on the batteries it is running at 15.5 volts. Normally it will be at 14.8 until it reaches full charge than down to 13.6. Can anyone tell me what is going on, and if I have a problem, where? Thanks for the time.

Mike
  • BFL13's avatar
    BFL13
    Explorer II
    Jul 13, 2021
    The inverter will have a high voltage shut off near 15v.

    15.5v is over the fridge DC input limit of 15.4 so don't turn on the fridge.

    solar can go over the high voltage setting if something fries in the controller or if the controller is by-passed.

    Sometimes a converter will have a broken component and go over-voltage.
  • 3_tons's avatar
    3_tons
    Explorer III
    Jul 14, 2021
    Even though the battery voltage measures ok, I believe that once under a heavy load the inverter might be alerting you to least one bad or marginal cell which is starving the inverter…Also, when using the M/W via generator, make sure the OEM converter-charger is set to off..

    3 tons
  • pianotuna's avatar
    pianotuna
    Nomad III
    Jul 14, 2021
    1350 input watts =~105 amps. That is 105 amps per cell. Batteries are tested at 25 amps per cell.

    Solution is to add another pair of six volts in parallel.
  • wa8yxm's avatar
    wa8yxm
    Explorer III
    Jul 14, 2021
    I agree with watch teh 12 volt battery voltage
    Another thing the xantrex look at waveform of "shore power" some generators (IE: Inverter units) are nice cleans sine waves.

    Many "Contractor" open frame types are downright scary waveform wise
    With the latter the inverter may refuse to pass power and charge batteries.

    As for the 15 volts
    You may need to edit/adjust battery type or pramaters in the menus
    Or you might have a leaky regulator pass transistor.. I did.

    What did i do about it? I put the charger into standby and used a progressive Dynamics Wizard (9180+wizard) converter.
    I liked the PD Wizard better than Xantrex's programmers anyway.
  • mike-uswest's avatar
    mike-uswest
    Explorer II
    Jul 14, 2021
    Thanks for the answers, it looks like I just don't have the battery capacity to make a TV dinner without hookup, which I don't have out in the woods, and no space for more batteries. So I guess it is just in the oven , even on 100 degree days. I would have thought the generator would have enough power to take care of the problem. I had a 1000 W Yamaha that I didn't think would be strong enough so I got the 2000 W champion which is heavier so more trouble, and still doesn't come up to the task. I guess I will just have to do what I can do. Thank you.

    Mike
  • mike-uswest's avatar
    mike-uswest
    Explorer II
    Jul 14, 2021
    BFL13- That did come down to 13.6 a float charge an hour or so after. It seems back to normal after.

    Mike
  • pianotuna's avatar
    pianotuna
    Nomad III
    Jul 14, 2021
    Try turning on a 60 watt load before you run the microwave. That may "wake up" the generator. Try this with the inverter, too.

    Also try disconnecting the converter. The generator doesn't have enough "head room" to recharge the battery bank * and * run the microwave, too.

    There are hybrid inverter/chargers which will do "load support" and which would allow you to run the microwave. Victron is what I would choose.
  • theoldwizard1's avatar
    theoldwizard1
    Explorer II
    Jul 14, 2021
    BFL13 wrote:
    That does not explain the 15.5v you saw.

    That would bother me also !

    You had better check the fluid level in the batteries OFTEN 9r they will boil dry.

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