Back up power

[Bad Wolf]

I was reading with inertest all of the ideas for backup power to run our boilers. I thought I had found the solution in the Tripp-Lite APS line of inverter/charges. These units operate as a UPS, passing house current though when online and switching to the inverter when the power goes out. There is a charger to maintain and recharge when the power comes back on. I thought this would be ideal providing instant backup, and allowing me to run the generator intermittently, to run the pump and recharge the battery bank.

However I called Tripp just to double check before purchasing a unit. The said the in order for their charger to work it had to have a computer grade wave form, otherwise it would damage the charger. I’m sure my Troy-bilt portable generator is not producing computer grade power.

Guess what I could do is unplug the unit before firing up the generator but it kind of spoils things not being able to recharge the batteries. I suppose I could lug them up one at a time to charge directly off the generator but its only charging at 10 amps, hardly enough to put back what I’ve taken out.

Has anybody actually used a Trip-lite unit with a generator?

 

[rvtgr8]

I purchased a propane generator to back our system up with a battery start. I do not know if this is ideal, but we have a lot of power problems during inclement weather.

 

[atlarge54]

I was reading with inertest all of the ideas for backup power to run our boilers. I thought I had found the solution in the Tripp-Lite APS line of inverter/charges. These units operate as a UPS, passing house current though when online and switching to the inverter when the power goes out. There is a charger to maintain and recharge when the power comes back on. I thought this would be ideal providing instant backup, and allowing me to run the generator intermittently, to run the pump and recharge the battery bank.

However I called Tripp just to double check before purchasing a unit. The said the in order for their charger to work it had to have a computer grade wave form, otherwise it would damage the charger. I’m sure my Troy-bilt portable generator is not producing computer grade power.

Guess what I could do is unplug the unit before firing up the generator but it kind of spoils things not being able to recharge the batteries. I suppose I could lug them up one at a time to charge directly off the generator but its only charging at 10 amps, hardly enough to put back what I’ve taken out.

Has anybody actually used a Trip-lite unit with a generator?

Darn I was hoping to hear you installed and tested a Tripplite inverter/charger. Mine is due to be shipped Jan. 19th, I hope to test and report results shortly. Luckily I was planning to increase run time by charging the batteries via an outside source, auto or tractor. I did see Walmart had 125 amp/hr batteries for $78 less sales tax.

 

[DaveBP]

Greg,
back before central power came out our way, I had a small photovoltaic setup at our cabin using a generator and small inverter to backup the PVs. When the generator was running (to run the water pump and washing machine) the battery bank was charging just fine. This was a Trace inverter/charger (now Xantrex, I think) but it wasn't state-of-the-art by any means. I would just try it.

When power goes out here and I revert to my 24 year old Honda generator (many hours on this baby) my computer works. There may be some CYA factors in Tripp's reply.

 

[Redox]

I agree with Dave. TL is just absolving themselves of any responsibility if it doesn't work out. "Computer grade power" seems to be a marketing term and doesn't really have a definition as different computers will tolerate varying power conditions. The charging portion of the UPS is probably more tolerant of poor power than the UPS is. In other words, if the power is good enough for the UPS to switch back to utility power, it should be good enough to charge the battery.

One thing to watch out for when adding batteries to a UPS is internal heat. The UPS is only designed to provide power for 10-20 minutes and is limited by the battery capacity. The heat sink on the inverter may not be big enough for a longer run. I have a 75AH stack on an old APC UPS and the heat sink doesn't have a cooling fan and would get very hot. I ended up cutting a hole in the side and putting a small muffin fan on it to keep it cool. It keeps my computer and entertainment on for hours now, but the battery life monitor doesn't like it!

Chris

 

[Northwoodsman]

I have purchased a TripLite 750VA/450 Watt inverter that I plan to use to use with (2) Deep Cell batteries for back-up of my EKO40 System.

I currently have my house electronics hooked up to an older TrippLite unit and have used my Porter Cable ("non-computer grade wave form") generator several times over the last 5 years or so with no problem. I'm assuming most people have inverters/UPS but do not supply them with the special type of power that TrippLite stated to you.

I would say that TrippLite is just trying to protect themselves by saying this statement.

On another note, nofossil gave me a heads up that his inverter itself does not supply true sine wave power to his EKO25 and that he had noticed that the blower on the EKO runs slower when operating on 12V to 115V inverted power than when running directly off of 115V line power. I talked to an electronoics friend of mine yesterday and he told me that this should not damage the blower.

Any feedback on this issue is welcome !

Finally, I see that your making you own solar panels. Do you have any information you could share with us at this point? I am going to make my own solar panels come spring and thus am always looking for information.

Thanks,

BC

 

[stee6043]

I agree with Dave. TL is just absolving themselves of any responsibility if it doesn't work out. "Computer grade power" seems to be a marketing term and doesn't really have a definition as different computers will tolerate varying power conditions. The charging portion of the UPS is probably more tolerant of poor power than the UPS is. In other words, if the power is good enough for the UPS to switch back to utility power, it should be good enough to charge the battery.

One thing to watch out for when adding batteries to a UPS is internal heat. The UPS is only designed to provide power for 10-20 minutes and is limited by the battery capacity. The heat sink on the inverter may not be big enough for a longer run. I have a 75AH stack on an old APC UPS and the heat sink doesn't have a cooling fan and would get very hot. I ended up cutting a hole in the side and putting a small muffin fan on it to keep it cool. It keeps my computer and entertainment on for hours now, but the battery life monitor doesn't like it!

Chris

I agree. Many of the APC UPS units (such as the Smart-UPS 1500 I use) have a "Voltage Trim" feature designed specifically to deal with over or under voltage, brown outs, dirty power, etc. I think a generator would run these types of units just fine.

 

[DaveBP]

One caveat for those using computer UPS systems with a bigger automotive type battery for more run time.

The sealed batteries they are designed to use require a different floating voltage once they are charged than do open-capped automotive style batteries. They may not last as long or the UPS charging circuits may not be able to cope with the larger battery.

There was an excellent link by mpilihp to detailed info about this sort of stuff in a recent post.

(broken link removed to http://www.windsun.com/Batteries/Battery_FAQ.htm#Battery)