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I have an enclosed trailer I tow with a GMC Yukon that has the trailer towing package. From time to time it would be nice to have 110v at the track to, say, run a drill or lights, or watch TV.
Rather than spend on a generator, I was thinking about one of those 12v DC to 110v AC power inverters. For extended use, I would start up the truck and let it idle.
Has anybody done this and if so do you have any thoughts / comments / advice?
Rich, a racing friend has one of those deals he hooks up to his tow rig. I have watched TV with him but never asked about drilling holes or other stuff. I'll give him a call monday & give ya his 2 cents.
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David
My only experience with one of those things is use with my street Miata in Christmas parades where lights are required. I found that it sure overheated the alternator and ate up the battery with just a few strings of lights. Modern battery appliances would seem to be the way to go.
Go to the RV store and get a battery isolator (charges the rv battery from the alternator but does not allow the accesories to drain the vehicle starting battery), put in a additional deep cycle battery or two and run the inverter off of it/them. That way you won't have to worry about burning up your alternator or overheating the engine in the truck while it idles away. If you really want to go high tech green, mount an industrial strength solar panel on top of the trailer to keep the batteries charged up.
[This message has been edited by jhooten (edited January 24, 2004).]
I have one for use in my RV, I also have a generator. I have a 1200W inverter and run it off of 2 12V deep cycle batts. I can tell you that they will pull down a battery pretty quick...quicker then you would think. They work great but do suck the power. If you want to run drills and stuff I would suggest a higher wattage unit, But the higher wattage the more power they pull from the batt. and some will require 2 12V batt.
Look at the devices you wish to run. Take the AMPS and mulitiply it by the Voltage. That will give you watts. Keep in mind anything with a motor (VCR, Blender, Drill, Grinder, etc) takes more power (Watts) to start than it does to run.