Power outage: 1.5 hours

How did you do that? What did you use to convert to 120 VAC?

 

That's what it's all about! I bet you find yourself secretly wishing for power outages.

Good stuff.

Do you know if anyone has supplied just the 12 volt system with a deep cycle battery or some set up?. I don't mean a plug system in for the main battery but just to supply the 12v side. I have done this on my van and got a good mileage increase. MetroMPG (Darin at ecomodder) did an A-B-A test and got a 10% FE increase. It would not be as big a difference in the Prius because the dc-dc and engine are more efficient, than an alternator and typical ICE engine but it would be interesting to try if it can be done.

 

http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-iii...shooting/68837-12-volt-battery-elearnaid.html

 

That is very interesting. Most of our power outages in my area are the result of hurricanes. Some can be rather lengthy. This is nice to know that I have a backup UPS sitting in my driveway.

 

Sorry about going OT.

Not what I meant. Perhaps I'm not being clear. The main battery supplies the DC-DC converter which supplies power to charge the 12V battery and to supply all the other electrical needs of the car. Lights, computers, fuel pump, ignition, fans, steering, AC, etc. All that power could be supplied by a separate pack that you charge at home like I do with my van. This would remove some of the power demand on the ICE and so would improve MPG. This would be simpler and much cheaper than a main pack plug in system because it only has to supply 12V or 13.5V. I was wondering if anyone has done this before.

Back on topic...sort of... That's a darn sight cheaper set up than the $50,000 natural gas gen set someone ordered to be installed here on Bowen Island to power their entire 4500 square foot house during power outages, only to find out later that there is no natural gas on the island, only propane by truck. Concrete base poured, wired in, fenced, bolted down, not returnable, not convertible. They found out when the gas fitter arrived to do the final task of connecting to the gas lines. It's hard being rich.

The best parts about using the Prius over a portable gen set...Quieter, much lower emissions, automatic start-stop, no jerry cans.

 

Consider the load on the 12V bus when the car is operating. Its probably around 60A, even more when you have electrical accessories running like the rear window defroster, the electric cabin heaters, etc. The DC to DC converter fuse is 100A so that provides the upper limit on the amount of current the system is expected to provide.

The 2G Prius 12V battery has an Ah rating in the mid-30s while the Classic battery is rated around 28 Ah. Typically you don't want to discharge a battery more than 50% to promote long life. Hence you would need four Prius-sized 12V batteries to provide one hour's worth of driving time.

You would have to install many 12V batteries to provide continuous 60A current over several hours if you did not have a provision to recharge the batteries while the car is running. Now the car is starting to look like one of those electric vehicle conversions where you've got many 12V batteries installed, along with the associated weight of that design.

 

I'll start a separate thread.

Sorry about the hijack, Bob.

 

Bob,

Do you know of any reason that your testing would not have the same results with the Gen III?

Dwight

 

Would I be safe in assuming you mean't natural gas?
Propane is refered to as LPG here.

 

Oops. Yes, I meant natural gas. (goes back to edit...)

 

I don't see your new thread, but I think I know what you're talking about. This company Solar Electrical Vehicles, originally had a system where the solar panels recharged the 12V battery only, in theory lessening the load on the main traction battery, so it would only need to run the wheels, not the fans, lights, etc. They claimed a 10% improvement in fuel efficiency. There was some debate here at PriusChat a year or so ago if that claim was legit.

Apparently they've been enable to extend this to power the traction battery as well, directly powering the vehicle and giving a better performance boost (although you can't drive 30 miles a day on sunlight, as might be implied by a casual reader looking at their bullet points - it would take several days of sunlight to get enough power for that, but if you plug it in, it will go 30 miles on the batteries only).

 

I'm looking into putting a pure sine-wave inverter on my 2006 Prius.
This one in particular: Pure Sine Wave Power Inverter 600 watt - DonRowe.com

Seems like a good price for 600W sustained, 1KW peak. Since it has overload shutdown, I'm thinking I wouldn't need an extra fuse to protect the Prius system, unless the overload shutdown wouldn't be fast enough.

I don't need a big system, just enough to power the fridge if necessary, but I want a pure sine wave to run a laptop on camping trips and such. Also, I understand the pure sine wave uses less power on some motors than a modified sine wave source. Since I've gone around with a Kill-a-watt to measure most of my appliances, I don't want to throw those numbers out the window with a different sine wave, and find out an appliance I thought I could power now I can't.

So my question is, am I overlooking anything with this inverter? I would also need the cables to the battery (shorter is better), and a way to mount it if carrying it around, but that's about it I think.

I'm going to review your Prius UPS site again and do some more research before plunking down dollars on it (my Christmas present).

 

After reading the various sites and threads about this, it just seemed too easy, but most people are trying to tap into the HV battery and going for >1KW systems, which is definitely more complicated. Also, at least at this time, I'm not using your remote-control system, although it's a nifty idea. I'll just have to make sure I don't have the inverter on when the car is off.