Power Inverters

you must be an electrician. Very kool thanks for your help. hated the class room but I sure could snake a wall. Pull wire bend pipe, Cut in old work boxes, you name it I could do it.

Keenly said:

ONCE AC IS TRANSFORMED INTO DC IT WILL NOT WORK IN A TRANSFORMER

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Not *exactly* true. If you rectify AC its not a steady DC signal. You need the smoothing cap to take out that 50 or 60 Hz, pulsing for lack of term. There is a portion of the sine wave when there is no current, until the forward voltage of the diode is reached.

If you sent a DC square wave into a transformer, it would still work. They do their thing when the field collapses.

thanks for the info. this is why i like riu knowledge knowledge i now have some

Loki7 said:

No, it won't work. First, you can't "create" power. Going from 110v AC to 12v DC back to 110v AC will cost you energy. And your lights will still draw 1000watts (or whatever wattage they are) ....

It looks like this (wall) 110v 9amps -> (to DC) 12v 83amps -> (inverter) 110v 9amps -> (lights) 1000watts.

That 83amps on the 12v leg is what makes it a deal breaker in the terms of doablity... but you wouldn't want to anyway...

-Loki

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Then whats an amplifier do? Like in car stereo.

Now im confused because i remember learning that you can only convert energy. Lifes a bitch though, aint it?

skippy pb said:

Then whats an amplifier do? Like in car stereo.

Now im confused because i remember learning that you can only convert energy. Lifes a bitch though, aint it?

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You are exactly right, you can only convert energy. An amplifier adds energy... Makes a weak signal stronger by adding energy... which is converting in a way, but no new energy is created.

-Loki

.........It makes sense...now

I have a large 50 amp 12v power supply that i power cb equip. With . It could be used to power the large inverter but these larger power supplies do cause a jump in my electric bill .i know i talk on the cb less than i run my grow lights and i notice th cb usage on the bill not the lights. Hope this makes sense.

even if it did power the inverter it woldn't be powerfull enough to handle a 1000w and it wouldn't make any sense. read previouse ass ripping. lol

winkdogg420 said:

I have a large 50 amp 12v power supply that i power cb equip. With . It could be used to power the large inverter but these larger power supplies do cause a jump in my electric bill .i know i talk on the cb less than i run my grow lights and i notice th cb usage on the bill not the lights. Hope this makes sense.

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That's a big psu... 600 watts... What'd that cost you and where'd ya get it?

-Loki

BigBudBalls said:

Not *exactly* true. If you rectify AC its not a steady DC signal. You need the smoothing cap to take out that 50 or 60 Hz, pulsing for lack of term. There is a portion of the sine wave when there is no current, until the forward voltage of the diode is reached.

If you sent a DC square wave into a transformer, it would still work. They do their thing when the field collapses.

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sure but you would be turning your source on and off and on and off and i dont think anyone wants to sit around and do that (cause i doubt anyone here knows how to make a square wave generator)

yeah i am familiar with ripple you could have just said ripple =)

throw in a nice bridge rectifying diode and maybe a 2200uF capacitor to take out some ripple and you pretty much have dc, though most of the time there will always be some milli volt ripple

Loki7 said:

You are exactly right, you can only convert energy. An amplifier adds energy... Makes a weak signal stronger by adding energy... which is converting in a way, but no new energy is created.

-Loki

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Wait, so why couldn't one be hooked up to a lighting system?

Other then the fact that its on the DC thingy. But like generally why couldn't that work.

skippy pb said:

Wait, so why couldn't one be hooked up to a lighting system?

Other then the fact that its on the DC thingy. But like generally why couldn't that work.

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what hes saying is and amplifier takes a signal... call it signal A

in order to amplify it

it needs signal A and power source B to add the extra power to the signal to achieve the wattage desired

youd need a secondary source to get the full wattage to power your lights

simply put there is no way around the laws of physics to save money

skippy pb said:

Wait, so why couldn't one be hooked up to a lighting system?

Other then the fact that its on the DC thingy. But like generally why couldn't that work.

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Its a loss. Anytime you convert, you lose energy to the conversion. Think of it as a tax.

BigBudBalls said:

Its a loss. Anytime you convert, you lose energy to the conversion. Think of it as a tax.

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could not have said it better myself

take any light bulb for example

your converting electricity into light

something like 10-20% of the power your putting in your bulb is lost as heat

Keenly said:

could not have said it better myself

take any light bulb for example

your converting electricity into light

something like 10-20% of the power your putting in your bulb is lost as heat

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Great minds think alike (and us too!)

You have that backwards for a typical tungsten bulb. Closer to 8% goes to making light, the rest to heat

This is also why LEDs are so efficient. The less heat for a given light intensity makes them efficient.
People talk about electrical heating as not being efficient. It is from an energy standpoint, but not from my wallet's view. Almost all of the electricity goes to making heat. Nearly nothing wasted.

I heard a thing on why LEDs weren't the lighting savior. Made perfect sense, just wish I remembered *why*.

skippy pb said:

Wait, so why couldn't one be hooked up to a lighting system?

Other then the fact that its on the DC thingy. But like generally why couldn't that work.

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Im pretty sure I asked this before now and bigbud gave me the answer haha.
Well I learned a shit load, today.

Thanks guys !!!!!!!!

skippy pb said:

Im pretty sure I asked this before now and bigbud gave me the answer haha.
Well I learned a shit load, today.

Thanks guys !!!!!!!!

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Happy to help!

(the eleccost link in the sig can help ya too)

Keenly said:

could not have said it better myself

take any light bulb for example

your converting electricity into light

something like 10-20% of the power your putting in your bulb is lost as heat

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lol i like my version better


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420weedman said:

let me put it in stoner terms for you... your 110 outlet grows the weed
your buddy(power inverter) says hey im goin by 110's house to pick up some stuff .. you want any ? .. you say sure and hand him some money

your buddy(inverter) gets the stuff and says damn i need to smoke a joint... ill take a little out of my bag and some out of koolhands and get FuKd up ! ..im not takn that much he will never know !

so he hands you your bag and your happy to smoke it... but you would be smokin more if you just went to the dealer and bought it your self.

you do the set up as you've stated .. youll continue giving $ to ur friend get u weed and hell continue smoking it for you !

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This exact scenario exists today in a UPS (uninteruptable power supply) available for your computer today. And yes, they cost a small % of power to use. The only scenario I can think of that this would save money would be if you had a power meter that measured when you used your power and you could buy it at a time when it would be cheaper than when you use it. The cost of the equipment needed to run a 1Kw light for even 12 hours would be astronomical, and you would put a very taxing load on them which would kill the batteries in a short amount of time.

Best bet would be to find an alternative power source, wind, solar, hydro etc and supplement your power requirements with this. Why not run the rest of the house on alternative energy and just use the grid for the grow room? This should help you stay in a cheaper level of power usage and have reliable power for the grow.

By adding this equipment you complicate your setup and drastically increase your chance of failure. Remember that with indoor power = weed.