Electronics & Appliances Best Posts in Thread: Extended use UPS/Solar Batteries?

Final update. Replaced my APC UPS 650 (325 watt modified sine wave inverter, 3 amp charger, with 9 Amp/hour battery) with a 1,000 watt pure sine wave inverter, 30 amp charger, and a 170 Amp/hour battery.



size comparison

 

The best thing you can do is GROUND your house, it is not that hard and will save you from having to play the plug unplug game all the time!!!! Go to your electric store and buy a grounding rod best size to get is 20’ it will come in 2 10’ Pieces with a coupler. Go to your fuse box and go 1m out from the house and drive the rod into the ground. Those of you with cement everywhere will have to do some extra work, i.e. drilling a hole!!! Also you will need 6 gauge wire... measure from your fuse box out to the rod and leave about 12” for mistakes!!!! For those with cement open your fuse box and pull the inside cover off so you can see the back side, drill a hole usually on the side at the bottom to run the wire through.... make sure there are no other wires around the ground wire or you might get a jump.

For those with dirt same applies, you will need a grinder with a mason cutter, wide size, to put the wire in later. Drive the rod into the ground outside and for those with cement you will need to chip out a square hole connect the wire to the rod and cut your line with the grinder again MAKE SURE THERE ARE NO OTHER WIRES AROUND!!!! For you line to the house use the grinder to cut the cement so you can cover it back up later!!! For the cement guys the reason for the square hole is for the ground wire connector to go in once you have cut the cement, if you use a wide cutter blade you are going to have to make a few cuts to get it the size of your wire!!! And chip it out deep enough to cover up the line later. Now run the wire through the hole and find a place on the back side of the panel there is usually one there with a holder that no one knows what it is for, well its for the GROUND wire!!!! Connect it to the back panel and then start putting the wire in the Chanel you cut with the grinder down the wall to the ground!!! Again for those with cement you will have to chip out more, for those with dirt just dig a Chanel to the rod and make it about 12” deep to keep you from hitting it later. Cut about 8” of the plastic covering off the cable and wrap it around the rod and then put the cable holder on it to keep it connected!!!! Same for the cement guys!!!

Even if you are in a brownout your house still has power, just a bit, so if you are hit by lightning, electricity will always take the path of least resistance and follow the ground wire to the rod. You may see fire works but at least you know it went outside and did not damage anything inside!!!! I hope that helps some of you..

Also if all you are wanting is to be able to run a few things just get 1 or 2 solar panels and set u up a small solar bank, u can use old car batteries to store your power. And if they are dead but still have a little voltage in them u can sometimes revive them, just by cleaning them out, there are a bunch of videos on YouTube about doing it. And you can get am MTTP controller from Lazada for less than 500p to control the charge..

If there are enough of you that want to do this go to made in China and they will give u a quote on the # of panels you need, a lot of the big places want $12 to 20 bucks a panel and if u get a pallet of them delivery is free! And I think now we have free trade with them so no import tax!!!

Just something to think about, Goose out

 

I don't know if you are interested in buying anything for testing your receptacle polarity but the simplest way to test is with a polarity tester. I have owned simpler ones than this but this is the first one that came up on Lazada and I copied it just so you could see it. I too have seen receptacles with reversed polarity even in the same circuit. It is not uncommon but is not desirable.

 

If you know how to use a voltmeter to check outlet voltage you can check both grounded (3 prong) and ungrounded (2 prong) outlets. *Warning/Disclaimer - this can be dangerous, don't do it if you don't know how to use your voltmeter. Don't touch probes to anything but specified testing points.*

Grounded - check prong to prong to check voltage, then move one side (I always move left side 1st) to the ground. If you see the same voltage the right side is live, check by moving probe from right side to the left, voltage should drop to zero, left side is neutral. Prong to prong shows voltage, live prong to ground shows voltage, neutral prong to ground shows zero.

UnGrounded - Prong to prong shows voltage, live prong to air (do not touch to anything, including you) shows a volt or two, neutral prong to air (do not touch to anything, including you) shows zero.

 

Combination of a few things starting with duration of most common brownout I have been dealing with and convenience. For about the last year, 4 or 5 times a week we have a 5-15 minute brownout. My UPS cover me for about 10 minutes. By the time I decided it was a longer duration outage, setup, started and warmed up a generator it would be time to turn it off. Just a waste of time and inconvenient. Thus I started thinking bigger battery and adding running a fan.

So now it is a generator like you mentioned which is impractical for short duration brownouts, requires maintenance and attention to age of fuel, and is noisy vs automatic battery system, no maintenance as it charges when there is power and provides power when there is not, will not last an all day brownout like the generator but will cover 99% of the brownouts we do have.

Each system initial outlay 20k-25k with the generator requiring maintenance, oil and fuel, the battery system should be good for 5+ years before needing a new battery.

 

OK YOU WANT TO REPLACE YOUR SMALL BATTERY WITH A LARGER ONE SO YOU HAVE MORE TIME. THE ONE THING YOU MUST CONSIDER IS WHETHER OR NOT YOUR INVERTER CAN HANDLE THE HEAT LOAD OF AN HOUR OR TWO OF OPERATION. MOST UPS'CANNOT. THEY BURN UP FROM OVER HEATING SO IF YOU WANT TO TRY I SUGGEST YOU INVEST IN A CHARGEABLE FAN SO IT CAN TRY TO COOL DOWN THE INVERTER AND WHEN YOU WIRE THE CIRCUIT FOR THE NEW BATTERY REMEMBER TO PUT AN INLINE FUSE SO THAT IF THE INVERTER SHOULD SHORT OUT IT DOESN'T BLOW UP YOUR BATTERY. I HAVE THOUGHT OF DOING THE SAME THING BUT DECIDED I SHOULD BUY A BETTER INVERTER FOR THAT OPERATION. ALSO REMEMBER THAT A LARGE BATTERY SUCH AS YOU ARE SPEAKING OF IS SIMILAR TO A CAR BATTERY AND IT REQUIRES VENTILATION AND SHOULD BE KEPT AWAY FROM FLAMES SINCE MOST PRODUCE HYDROGEN GAS DURING OPERATION. ALSO THE INVERTER CIRCUIT IS NOT CAPABLE OF CHARGING IT WHEN IT IS LOW, YOU NEED AN AUTOMOTIVE BATTERY CHARGER FOR THAT. TO DO SO WOULD BURN OUT THE CHARGER CIRCUIT. SORRY TO PUT COLD WATER ON A GOOD IDEA. PLEASE FORGIVE THE CAPS BUT I AM HAVING EYE PROBLEMS. CHARD

 

You shall find the Holy Grail at Robinson's downtown. Go downstairs to the Hardware store and look along the window displays from outside the store. You shall find what you seek as it is surely still there and not found by some other foreigner. And the reason is: It bears a 20,000 pesos price tag.

 

So how long will a> 120 amp hour flooded deep cycle will last? hooked up to a PLDT modem? A month.
I use an inverter to hookup my modem, I can then can use 220v appliances, Fans, TV etc.

 

It took a while but I finally got around to buying a solar panel, battery and a voltage regulator from a motorcycle.

This didn't take long to become a tale of 'the best laid plans of "Mice and Men'. (John Steinbeck).

My knowledge of solar panels turns out to be a lot less than I thought. Technical details for the voltage regulator and solar panel don't seem to be readily available. The solar panel failed so I quickly surrendered having a solar charger.
Two meters of black and red speaker wire and some 5 peso alligator clips from Bernardo's and Bob's your uncle.
My Honda XRM 125 will charge my 12 volt 9 amp hour battery from 0% charge (11.00 volts) to 100% charge (13.00 volts in about 2.5 hours. I jammed the throttle open with a bit of wire so the bike was on a fast idle. If you need the proper connector to plug into the modem just cut off the cable from a cheap power supply. (be careful to get the correct polarity to the modem)

The good new:
Phil Products modem draws 295 ma (o.295 amps) so my 9 amp hour battery will allow me internet access for about 30 hours. I tested out the modem operating from the battery for 30 hours and it worked as planned.
An ordinary motorcycle battery is about 800 pesos and would last for about 10 hours.
For a mere 1000 pesos you can have internet all day.

My next plan is to buy a 12 volt to USB adaptor so I can charge my phone during a brownout. On a side note; it will take about 1.0-1.5 amp hours out of the battery to charge a flat cellphone.