Charging Batteries on a boat

[Wallie78]

Hi Guys,

I'm doing some boat work and I am told there is a 'small 240V' inverter aboard and a 12V. When they they 'small' should I be checking the output of it before assuming it will charge my inspire batteries?

It's 12 days on a boat so praying it works!

Thanks,

 

[SanCap]

What kind of a boat is it?

 

[Wallie78]

Just a 40ft catamaran but I am told there is a 'small 240V' inverter installed?

 

[SanCap]

Just a 40ft catamaran but I am told there is a 'small 240V' inverter installed?

40 Ft Cat, certainly it has to have a 110 volt generator, that supplies power to a refrigerator or microwave??

 

[Wallie78]

This is what it has on board

Galley
Refrigeration 135 litre chest fridge
Freezer 60 litre chest freezer
Oven Yes
Deck BBQ Yes
Microwave No

 

[SanCap]

This is what it has on board

Galley
Refrigeration 135 litre chest fridge
Freezer 60 litre chest freezer
Oven Yes
Deck BBQ Yes
Microwave No

I guess you will be at the mercy of the 240 volt small inverter. My next suggestions would be to buy more batteries

 

[Wallie78]

Yep that's what I thought! Thanks for your help...If they are telling me it's small 240v Inverter, how can I check if it's possible to charge? Can I ask for a wattage to know if it will charge batts?

 

[unyks]

Yeah the inverter has usually a label where you can see how powerful the device is. The small DJI charger is sucking ~10A for 2hours (I have a display in my car), pretty thirsty in my opinion, never tried the big charger. Got the car charger a few weeks ago but didn't tested it yet but I hope it is more effective (makes no sense to transform 12V > 230v > 26V)

If they don't have a inverter and solar panels instead you should verify their battery capacity!

Chris

 

[Kilrah]

Might want to get the car charger to avoid the unnecessary conversion?

Buy Inspire 1 Series - Car Charger Kit | DJI Store

And yes more importantly you should figure out what the power source is, if it's solar you can pretty much forget about it entirely unless it's got ridiculously huge capacity (maybe take your own generator then?).

 

[JJ_2016]

The 100W charger does draw 1.4A @ 240V AC. You then need atleast a 336W inverter. Doesnt need to be very expencive if you need to buy a new inverter. Square wave sine does the job and you dont need an pure sine wave inverter.

 

[unyks]

The 100W charger does draw 1.4A @ 240V AC. You then need atleast a 336W inverter. Doesnt need to be very expencive if you need to buy a new inverter. Square wave sine does the job and you dont need an pure sine wave inverter.

I always try to prevent telling someone that he is wrong but my experience is different. I have a 150W inverter in my car, possibly the cheapest one VW could find on the market for a 90k€ Van but it works well with the 100W charger, don't think about using the 180W charger if you don't want to to see little clouds of smoke coming out of the housing. If i charge my batteries the displays of my solar and battery computer are telling me (those are pretty accurate) that the DJI charger is sucking up to 10A per hour, in total for 1 charge of a TB48 around 16Ah (that includes the 12V to 230V conversion). That's pretty heavy. On the upcoming weekend i'm going to test the car charger to see if works more effective.

With 6 batteries, a fridge, usual charges of my mobile devices and lights in the night, i need a pretty sunny day with 200W solar panels to stay independent without a external power source.

Chris

 

[Dobmatt]

Yep, you're right, Chris ... You need a plenty of juice to charge Inspire or Phantom batteries in field. I've just build a 2-channel charger, using step-up DC/DC converter modules, and this sucker will heat 14 AWG wires easy, draining up to 20A from lead battery. It charges two TB48's depleted to 15% in 64 minutes though. Luckily I have 24V/225Ah battery system on my boat, supported by 1KW solar panels array, so no worry here. But for an average car battery I wouldn't recommend charging with similar DJI device during camping ... You may end up with no chance for boost next morning.

 

[Black Sky]

You will have to run the engine (even if its a sail cat it will have a engine) a fair amount to charge. We went through this on a trip to BVI when we were "credit card captains". You just have to plan charge times.