Cigarette socket inverter?

[Purrfecttune]

Hi all

We recently completed our first long duration trip (France/Spain) and tried staying off grid asap.

Our 2020 Swift 674 came with a standard battery and 100w solar panel and we managed quite well, with the only complication being after we were parked up during a dust storm and could only manage two or three days at a time before managing to clean the solar panel. In the meantime, we had to stop for an occasional top-up at a campsite or CampingPark for a recharge. (Have since bought a microfibre mop with extending handle so that I can clean it from the cab sunroof).

Very happy, but; we both have e-bikes and therefore need to schedule in relevant stops to charge them.

So my question is; is there an inverter that works off of the cigarette lighter socket so that we can charge the batteries while travelling? Or do we need to consider something expensive? (We don’t need an inverter for anything else).

 

[Carpmart]

The current draw of an inverter off, at best, probably 2.5mm2 wiring on a cig socket is not really suitable to charge Ebike batteries via an inverter.

A small inverter cabled directly to your habitation battery is your best bet. 300w if charging individually would be fine. 500w would allow you to charge both together from your hab battery.

The problem is, unless you have a significant way of getting Amps back into your hab battery, you will end up quickly with a depleted hab battery.

 

[Googlebot]

I think the wattage is too high to run them from a cigarette lighter as well.

Go for a decent make though, I had a cheapie that killed a charger and cost me much more in the end. Pure sine wave, I like Victron.

 

[suavecarve]

Hi all

We recently completed our first long duration trip (France/Spain) and tried staying off grid asap.

Our 2020 Swift 674 came with a standard battery and 100w solar panel and we managed quite well, with the only complication being after we were parked up during a dust storm and could only manage two or three days at a time before managing to clean the solar panel. In the meantime, we had to stop for an occasional top-up at a campsite or CampingPark for a recharge. (Have since bought a microfibre mop with extending handle so that I can clean it from the cab sunroof).

Very happy, but; we both have e-bikes and therefore need to schedule in relevant stops to charge them.

So my question is; is there an inverter that works off of the cigarette lighter socket so that we can charge the batteries while travelling? Or do we need to consider something expensive? (We don’t need an inverter for anything else).

The inverter and increased solar and battery is the answer long term, however, dependant where you were in Spain and France there are several free charging points and you probably passed many of them (especially if you were cycling on via verdes or voie vertes).
It took us a while to work out what they were and how to abuse them to the best of our ability

I am yet to find an all encompassing map which covers these freebies. Most of them you have to take your charger with you and leave it locked and secured, some you attach it to your bike, some you just lock the battery, but if you have Bosch batteries then there are several places that have Bosch batteries and you leave your battery with them (tourist information shops) and you come back and it is charged, Along the Danube last year there were several at bars along the route which can turn out expensive but a Danube pub crawl is quite realistic

For whatever reason the Bosch map link doesnt work but each region seems to. Here is an example for the Vaucluse and I know Luberon has similar and these are beyond what you can find. https://www.provence-cycling.co.uk/charging-bosch/offer-104-2.html

I really need to find out how to do a symbol search on mapy.cz and I can create a map for them relatively easily

 

[suavecarve]

Edit/ Thought I sussed a map but actually failed

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[suavecarve]

Success.

Within mapy.cz in their search function put "e-bike charging station" (without the quotation marks) and then select the "category"
It will be better to have already downloaded the map of the area before you go abroad to save data

Here is the result

 

[Purrfecttune]

The current draw of an inverter off, at best, probably 2.5mm2 wiring on a cig socket is not really suitable to charge Ebike batteries via an inverter.

A small inverter cabled directly to your habitation battery is your best bet. 300w if charging individually would be fine. 500w would allow you to charge both together from your hab battery.

The problem is, unless you have a significant way of getting Amps back into your hab battery, you will end up quickly with a depleted hab battery.

That’s what I thought

Being nearly four years old we will upgrade our hab battery when it needs replacing

 

[StillGoing]

I use a Victron Phoenix 12/375 to charge my eBike. It only uses about a third of the capacity so it should be ok for charging two e-bikes at once. Do check the rating of your chargers before you buy.

 

[nicholsong]

If you fitted a B2B (DC-DC) that would put a large charge into the hab batteries while driving and maybe enough to charge the cycle batteries and still give you full hab batteries at end of trip, according to how far you were driving.

Some calculations would need to be done on size of B2B against draw of cycle battery charger.