Do we need an inverter?

[bennyyorkie]

Cant figure out if we should be buying an inverter, and if so, what wattage. Am getting the electrics and gas done next week so putting a bit of thought into it now. The van has 2 batteries, its own and a leisure battery.
We are thinking to use:
-Fridge
- halogen oven 1400w
- charge mobile phones
-laptop (for watching netflix and charging)
-TV
-mini vacuum

(although when is another question....not sure which of these appliances would work well off the inverter, particularly the oven...dont want to drain the battery and will be hooking up to a campsite at least half the time)

Not sure of much else, but from looking on the forum quite a few people use electric blankets, toothbrushes, hair dryers etc.
Maybe we dont need an inverter at all? Wont be using it for a hair dryer or electric kettle and we suspect wont be getting a microwave.
Bit confused to be honest

 

[thebriars]

1. Mobile phones, charge from USB
2. Electric toothbrushes, electric razor, charge from USB
3. Laptop 12v universal laptop charger.
4. Hair dryer. Haircut solves the problem.

Electric blanket. Never needed one, use the timer facility on the heating, just like at home, stays on low at night and goes to normal temperature at getty-up time.

1400w halogen oven will flatten the habitation battery in less than an hour. Forget it.

 

[68c]

Sorry, no chance with the halogen oven, it would hammer the battery in minutes. We only use our inverter to charge ebike batteries. Perhaps the laptop, toothbrush and hair dryer would be the only reason you need one, everything else either runs off 12v or 5v through a USB plug. You can probably find a car charger for your laptop. So; do you need one? Do you use anything that can only run on 240v and does not draw too much current?


Edit, sorry 'thebriars' beat me to it whilst typing. As they say.

 

[bennyyorkie]

1. Mobile phones, charge from USB
2. Electric toothbrushes, electric razor, charge from USB
3. Laptop 12v universal laptop charger.
4. Hair dryer. Haircut solves the problem.

Electric blanket. Never needed one, use the timer facility on the heating, just like at home, stays on low at night and goes to normal temperature at getty-up time.

1400w halogen oven will flatten the habitation battery in less than an hour. Forget it.

Stupid question: the items that run in USB...are they also running off the battery when on the road or off grid...just not through he inverter?

 

[Stealaway]

I use mine almost entirely for a large 230v smart TV and sound bar. Never for any form of heating

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[thebriars]

Stupid question: the items that run in USB...are they also running off the battery when on the road or off grid...just not through he inverter?

USB is 5 volts. Either fit USB sockets to run off 12v, or use adaptors to plug into cigarette lighter socket. Current consumption negligible.

 

[autorouter]

Batteries just don't have the capacity to store large amounts of energy. A typical leisure battery is 100Ah, so as it's 12 volts it holds 12 x 100 = 1200 watt-hours of energy. That's 1.2 kilowatt-hours (kWh). It weighs about 25kg.

LPG contains about 46MJ/kg, and since 1kWh=3.6MJ, there's about 46/3.6 = 12.8 kWh of energy in each kilogram of LPG.

A 6kg gas bottle (weighing about 16kg) contains 6 x 12.8 = 77kWh of energy. Compared to 1.2kWh for a battery, you can see why energy-intensive processes like heating, water heating and cooking are best done with gas rather than electricity from a battery.

It's not impossible to run an inverter. Many people have over 250Ah of battery capacity, and run a microwave, coffee machine and a hairdryer from an inverter. These use power in short bursts. Some people have 200 to 300 watts or more of solar power, and run an electric fridge. But gas is the way to go otherwise.

 

[Speve]

You would be better off investing in a second leisure battery and some solar to charge them after that you can start considering a pure sine wave inverter as you will have some extra capacity