Posted by Karl S. on August 2, 2003, 1:11 pm
A few years ago, you could expect to pay about one dollar per watt of
inverter capacity, so when I found a used 600 watt Heart inverter to put
in my tent-trailer for less than $200, I was a happy man. Then just a
few days ago I was shopping at Costco and found a Chinese-made 1000 watt
inverter for $70.00! I don't recall the brand name, and it was re-named
by the importer anyway, but it got me wondering. Have prices gone down
that much in the past decade?
I haven't done much pricing of such devices for a while, since my last
Real Goods catalog came in the mail. That was years ago.
What would be a good source for mail-order home-power stuff these days?
Karl S.
Posted by GLC1173 on August 2, 2003, 2:09 pm
Karl wrote:
>What would be a good source for >mail-order home-power stuff these days?
Just drive to the nearest big <I>truckstop.</i> They have inverters in all
capacity ranges - as truckers use these bigtime.
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Posted by Bob Adkins on August 3, 2003, 7:56 am
>A few years ago, you could expect to pay about one dollar per watt of
>inverter capacity, so when I found a used 600 watt Heart inverter to put
>in my tent-trailer for less than $200, I was a happy man. Then just a
>few days ago I was shopping at Costco and found a Chinese-made 1000 watt
>inverter for $70.00! I don't recall the brand name, and it was re-named
>by the importer anyway, but it got me wondering. Have prices gone down
>that much in the past decade?
>I haven't done much pricing of such devices for a while, since my last
>Real Goods catalog came in the mail. That was years ago.
>What would be a good source for mail-order home-power stuff these days?
I bought a 1500W inverter from Sam's Club for $175. That's 8.5 cents per
watt.
A little later, I saw a Coleman 2000W inverter for $239. That's 8.3 cents
pre watt. Drott!
Bob
Posted by Dale Farmer on August 5, 2003, 12:14 pm
Richard wrote:
> >
> > I bought a 1500W inverter from Sam's Club for $175. That's 8.5 cents per
> > watt.
> >
> > A little later, I saw a Coleman 2000W inverter for $239. That's 8.3 cents
> > pre watt. Drott!
> I sure wish we had those kind of prices here in Canada. I work for a major
> hardware store chain that sells several modified square wave inverters from
> the little 150 watt models up to a 1500 watt (3000 watt surge) model
> complete with meters, low voltage disconnect, and cooling fans. The latter
> one retails at $599 Canadian and my cost on it is $470 Canadian. Ugh!
> But then, the true sine wave units are pushing the price of square wave
> inverters down all the time.
Keep an eye out for larger size old computer UPS units. While the batteries
are usually shot after about two years, the front end is usually in good shape.
Replace the batteries with an appropriate voltage battery bank and charge
it via another box.
--Dale
Posted by Ross Mattson on August 7, 2003, 3:45 am
Try Canadian tire stores. They have a selection of invertors up to 1750
watts, for $299.00. They have their own
brand name on them, but the housings look very familair to one of the more
popular brands. This model is equipt with
a fan , digital voltage readout etc.
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