12Vdc Inverter for grain mill

 

I picked up a 115 vac grain mill via internet, and had intended to run
it on
our el-cheapo 500 watt inverter from Sam's.  Well, when mill arrived
and I tried it in regular electric outlet, the darn thing sounded like
a 747 jet engine taking off.  Much to my surpise (I should have
checked before buying the darn thing) the motor is rated at 1000
watts.  It's a Blendtech Kitchen Mill.

Question:  Will most small kitchen appliances like mixers and
such work on a modified sine wave inverter?  For the above grain mill,
what size inverter would you recommend.  Any brand names you care to
suggest?

What other kinds of household appliances can you run with the modified
sine wave inverter?  I'm thinking of maybe buying a 1500 watt, or
would you go larger?

Later, when finances permit, we plan to purchase a pure sine wave
inverter.

 



   Anything with a brush-type "univrsal" motor will run just fine.  Otherwise,
it all depends and you simply don't know until you try.  For example, our main
refrigerator will run on some inverters but not on others, while our little bar
refrigerator seems to run on anything.


     Me too, but until then we are gradually adding a 12-volt wiring system to
the house.  It is convenient to always have lights, even in the middle of a
power outage and even without running a generator or inverter.

Vaughn

 

Hello Vaughn;

I wonder what inverter you settled on?  There are hundreds of brands
to choose from, and what size did you settle on for the modified sine
wave, the one you run your little fridge with?

I found the SELSUM 11 watt lamps really put out a lot of light for the
wattage.  They draw about 0.8 amps at 12 volts, and are hard to look
at directly they put out so much light.  I plan to try one of their 7
watt lights next for comparison.

Do you put just 1 each 12V light in each room, or are you trying to
light up the whole place with the low voltage?  

I also tried some 8w long flourescent fixtures with the 12v ballast,
and they draw about 0.8 amps also, but they are not as bright as the
Selsum lamps, but are not hard on the eyes and give a softer type of
light.

I'm just getting started, getting prepared for the "crunch" time
ahead.




On Tue, 12 Jan 2010 08:45:11 -0500, "vaughn"

 



   At this point, I have decided to run my fridge off of the generator only.  To
be practical for the fridge, I would need a much larger battery bank, so it is
cheaper to just plan on running the generator a bit longer each day during power
outages.  My main inverter is an ancient Tripp-Lite, but I seldom use it.  It
can plug into my transfer panel the same as my generator.

I will look into those.  As I wrote in another post, I have been using the Feit
13-watt lamps.

I started my little system with just outside lighting.  I use the Feit lamps in
ordinary porch light fixtures.  I now have 12-volt lights in 2 rooms, which
serve as our "everyday" lighting in those rooms.  I will soon install one
fixture in our kitchen, which will serve mostly as emergency lighting.  I also
plan to install one in our laundry room, which is also where the fuse
box/transfer panel resides.  Each place where I have a lamp, I also have a
12-volt outlet for charging laptops, and running battery TVs etc.  My home is
typical Florida slab/concrete block construction with the additional barrier of
no access to the attic, so running new electrical circuits is a real problem!  I
doubt that my 12-volt system will ever reach every room in the house.


They are also expensive!


 Where I live we have a built-in "crunch time" every year.  We call it
"hurricane season".

Vaughn

 

On Wed, 13 Jan 2010 08:08:28 -0500, "vaughn"



It would be a lot easier and significantly cheaper to do what I've
done here in my cabin.  I installed a sub-panel and divided my loads
into vital and otherwise.  My "vital bus" (to borrow a nuke plant
term) is powered by a 1kW UPS with 24 hours' worth of batteries and a
quick charger.  I got the batteries as pulls from electric buses. They
were down on peak current capability but almost at full capacity for
low discharge rates.  I have room for a lot of 'em :-)

On the vital bus are my lights (all 120 volt CFLs), the fan in my wood
stove and my computer stuff.  There is an outlet in each room on the
vital bus, designated by a red receptacle, in case I need to plug in a
portable light or a guest needs to run something like a CPAP machine.

My UPS takes 24 volts in which greatly relieves the current demand on
the batteries.  Peukert doesn't bite nearly as hard.  I'm looking
around for a 2 or 3 kW UPS but so far, the ones that I've found run on
high voltage DC.  I have a 3 kW unit but it uses 96 volts from the
batteries.  I don't quite have enough batteries to power it properly
:-)  I'd like to have my refrigerator and freezers on the vital bus.

I have a 5.5kW Generac Quiet-Pack generator that runs my whole cabin
with the exception of the heat pump.  I've found that I can run the
generator for 4 hours total a day in two shifts and maintain my
freezers and charge the UPS batteries.

I'm about to install an auto-transfer 8kW propane fired generator
because I'm tired of schlepping gasoline up the mountain and paying
road tax on the fuel (or having to do the paperwork to get the
refund).  Because of the high winds we have here, power outages
lasting 24 hours are a monthly affair so my system gets a lot of use.

John