PilgrimStill wrote:
Awesome input! Thanks. I will do some research on all those suggestions. I get the inference that a PSW is preferable to a MSW. True?
Not all inverters have the same quality in engineering and parts and that includes PSW inverters.
PSW generally will provide a cleaner waveform that looks a lot closer to what your commercial utility provides and for SOME equipment it is better for.
However, not ALL equipment "needs" psw, in fact if it has a switching powersupply (like a computer or TV) there is zero reason to buy PSW because those supplies are designed to take pretty much any badly distorted waveform and keep ticking..
The problem starts when you buy the cheap stuff, even cheap PSW inverters may not work well, the reason for that is it takes more parts and engineering to properly form a perfect sinewave. More parts and engineering makes the inverter cost more.
MSW gets a bad rap because of the cheap imports like the HF stuff, not all MSW inverters are bad..
Really cheap MSW inverters can often make the induction motors run hotter than they would on PSW and some just simply cannot even start an induction motor.
There are high quality MSW inverters, you will pay more than even some of the low cost PSW inverters.
To get any inverter of sufficient quality that will be able to deal with the inductive startup kick of a fridge compressor you WILL want to put the money into a good one the first time..
Very few inverters publish the surge time, Tripplite is one of the very few that does.. Most do not and the reason for this is many of those inverters that surge current is milliseconds.. Inductive loads can have a startup surge of several seconds..
Induction motors can present a very large inductive voltage spike back INTO the inverter, cheap inverters (MSW AND INCLUDING LOW COST PSW) may not be able to handle these voltage spikes.
Sure, you can over buy on a cheap inverter like a 2000W to get around the short surge time but you are not going to be happy when that inverter fails at the wrong time due to it seeing the inductive voltage kick back.
It is your rig so do what you want.
