vehicle charging

[flecc]

Certainly true in Australia - nearly 100% I expect, small amount of hydro. I thought Europe had a lot of nuclear power though, and Europe was big into wind and wave power too?

France is mostly nuclear powered, about 78%, the rest mainly hydro/wind etc, and they export huge quantities of nuclear power too.

But here in the UK it's very different, a maximum of about 20% is nuclear, a mix of our own and imported from France through a cross-channel link. Some 3% and rising comes from wind and there are tiny contributions from hydro/tidal/solar etc. The remaining 75% or so comes mainly from coal and gas, though we are now bulk importing wood chips for some of our coal burners in order to cut harmful emissions.

 

[stevieb]

sorted now
spoke to the technical service dept at maplin
a pure sine wave generator invertor(not to be confused with a modified sine wave generator) is the only one that can be guaranteed not to damage any sensitive electrical equiptment.
also the issue of nearly having to double the output of a standard inverter does not apply to a pure sine wave one .
so basically if you require 500watts when using ac mains in the house then the same applies with a pure sine wave generator , although they recommend the 600watt model so as its not right on the limit.
hope this info is of use to others and once again thanks to all that pointed me in the right direction so i knew where to start with my research
atb
stevie

 

[drsolly]

Don't waste your time with all that stuff. Get a generator.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Portable-Super-Silent-Suitcase-Petrol-Generator-0-7KVA/400601921036?_trksid=p2045573.c100033.m2042&_trkparms=aid=111001&algo=REC.SEED&ao=1&asc=20131017132637&meid=6982320937949955067&pid=100033&prg=20131017132637&rk=4&rkt=4&sd=181410688586

Or even better; attach a small petrol engine directly to the bike. Then you can get rid of the electric motor and heavy batteries, and eliminate the inefficiency of the intermediate conversion in the chain petrol->electricity->kinetic energy. You could all it a "moped".

My preferred option is to have another battery.

 

[smee]

sorted now
spoke to the technical service dept at maplin
a pure sine wave generator invertor(not to be confused with a modified sine wave generator) is the only one that can be guaranteed not to damage any sensitive electrical equiptment.
also the issue of nearly having to double the output of a standard inverter does not apply to a pure sine wave one .
so basically if you require 500watts when using ac mains in the house then the same applies with a pure sine wave generator , although they recommend the 600watt model so as its not right on the limit.
hope this info is of use to others and once again thanks to all that pointed me in the right direction so i knew where to start with my research
atb
stevie

Yes, like I said, mains can just supply any extra needed due to poor power factor. I think you are fairly safe assuming the charger has pf of 0.5 or better, so the 180 VA charger I think you have, will be most happy with a 500 watt inverter.

The question still remains for me, is the typical bike charger "sensitive electrical equiptment". My initial guess would have been no, at least, not more so than a laptop running of a similar charger/power supply.

Still, certainly safe with proper sinewaves - but it will cost more I expect.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

A 600w inverter will take 50 amps! That would have to be wired directly to the battery and as close to it as possible. Don't even think about plugging it in to your cigar lighter.

 

[stevieb]

yes that is correct
the inverter i have mentioned doesn,t have the ability to connect directly into cigarette lighter.
it is designed to be wired as you have mentioned d8veh.
but thank you for mentioning this because i ommitted that .
another battery is also a good idea but i would probably pay more for that than an inverter.

 

[peerjay56]

Don't waste your time with all that stuff. Get a generator.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Portable-Super-Silent-Suitcase-Petrol-Generator-0-7KVA/400601921036?_trksid=p2045573.c100033.m2042&_trkparms=aid=111001&algo=REC.SEED&ao=1&asc=20131017132637&meid=6982320937949955067&pid=100033&prg=20131017132637&rk=4&rkt=4&sd=181410688586

From that same ebay listing:
"Please Note: This is not an Inverter Generator. Its not suitable for use with sensitive equipment like Computers or TV's"

 

[Deleted member 4366]

.....but OK for ebike chargers.

 

[trex]

Some people go for overkill. The f factor of a battery charger is 0.99 . On top of that, a battery charger works with a wide range of voltage and frequency - read the specs on the charger label, they'll cope with anything between 110V - 250V, 50Hz to 60Hz (and way beyond). Typically, a battery charger uses 85VA input for 78VA output, so why do you think you need a 500W converter?

 

[stevieb]

thought i had this worked out and as i,m not in a hurry to rush out to buy an inverter i,m happy to have the suggestions keep comming.
perhaps the question i should have asked is ;
what methods of charging a bike battery have people actually used on a regular basis on a vehicle and had success with.
the generator solution is a valid one if it is ok for a battery charger but not applicable in my case because i want to do the charging whilst on the move and don,t fancy a generator running in the back of my van while i,m driving along.
i certainly don,t want to go for overkill but the advise i have been given seems to to make sense to me as an amatuer.
if anyone has used a much cheaper less overkill method then i would be more than happy to adopt this
thanks

 

[Yidakipaul]

Check this out from Aus.
http://glowwormbicycles.com.au/store/e-bike-parts-and-accessories/batteries-and-chargers/car-e-bike-battery-charger-12v

 

[trex]

a bit of a rip off. This one costs less than USD15.
http://www.fhy-power.com/EN/Channels/Products/showDetail.asp?objID=2776

 

[SAD12]

I'm no electronics specialist but have performed some experiments with charging my battery from the van. My first effort was with a cheap inverter from ebay. £35 last year rated at 1200w. I had bought it to use an electric toaster (700w), which it did quite well. Then I used it to charge the bike battery and it seemed to cope with that very well, although the batteries in the van (2x100ah) really couldn't cope comfortably with more than two to three charges without needing to be recharged. As I like to go and stay somewhere for a few days off grid I got a dc-dc converter (again off ebay) and did some comparative measurements. Charging the bike battery using the converter (the amps can be varied) at 41.7v and 5amps out of the 12v supply resulted in a gentle but consistent charge. Using the inverter and the standard charger used 8.8amps. Without going anywhere I was still going to have to charge the batteries so I've now got myself a 100w solar foldaway panel. Last Saturday was a lovely sunny day so I charged the bike battery from the van using the inverter while putting in 5.5amps of power from the sun. The van batteries declined to, but stayed at 12.25v. Then, when the charging had finished the batteries were replenished back to full capacity making it back to 14.4v before the panel controller slowed it all down. My experiments suggest that the battery in a bike is not that sensitive?