Battery Charger

?? How do you manage to do that with a Prius?

 

Does the Prius need only enough juice to boot the computers? If so, would one of those little solar panels be enough to start a dead car? (in the daylight, of course

 

I've only had the Prius for two weeks now. I imagine I will continue to lock my keys in the wife's mini-van though.

 

Not enough amps, unless you get a big one or live on the sun.

Tom

 

Re: Battery Charger and Preventing Sulfation

I heartily recommend everyone check out the small but effective BMW charger which does the job and prevents battery sulfation (which is really what you are trying to do - keep the battery condition optimal - not have pumps and other "extras").

Enough said..

 

Oh my god. Who the hell does that, and why? I've been jumping cars for 30+ years, and have never had the urge to do that.

 

Re: Battery Charger and Preventing Sulfation

Not *quite* enough said. Got a link?

 

Wow, you are the first person I've heard of jumping another car from the Prius. I'm really surprised it worked w/o blowing anything up! I think the fuse in the dc:dc converter is only rated at 100A if I remember right, and I wouldn't think the little battery in the Prius would be good for much more than that either.

Rob

 

When using jumper cables you MUST make the last connection a negative connection and you must make it away from the battery. Never make the last connection anywhere near the battery, especially near the dead battery which may have just had a high discharge from trying to start the car. A high charge or discharge will cause a release of hydrogen and oxygen gas, so don't connect a cable which completes a circuit in the gas cloud. Hydrogen burns very well especially with extra oxygen around.

 

You'd be surprised how many folks do that. When I had a company truck to drive, I offered to jump start an older guy at a parking lot once. I made the mistake of not checking up on him while I hooked up the cables on my end

I assumed he was following the accepted hookup sequence. I turned around to see him holding the two cables, which he touched to make a spark. So I asked him Wth are you doing?

"Oh, just making sure we have a connection"

There was no damage to the truck but I've always been leery of offering help. With the jump start box, if it fries that at most I'm out around $90

 

Here's an interesting problem I may be facing:

I would like to have the Zhang Heng indoors for display, with the lights and sound running. In my experience, this will drain the 12 v battery in 1 - 2 hours.

How would I hook up an external 12v supply (probably powered from wall current) to have things running indefinitely?

 

Just get yourself a "battery tender" (Batterytender.com - Home of All Your Charging Needs). It comes with a cable you can permanently install to the fuse box under the hood, and plug in/out as needed. Get the larger unit (3 Amp as I recall), and it should be able to power your "stuff" without draining the battery. The battery tender won't overcharge the car and won't damage the electronics.