WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

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For the past, well, decade really, my mom
has worked from home.

00:00:03.779 --> 00:00:07.700
And about a year and half ago, she and my
dad moved to the country, surrounded by farmland

00:00:07.700 --> 00:00:10.080
roughly a two hour’s drive from Chicago.

00:00:10.080 --> 00:00:14.360
Her most recent work setup includes a RAP,
which essentially creates a dedicated, hardwired

00:00:14.360 --> 00:00:19.130
VPN connection over the Internet, so as far
as her computer and desk phone know, she’s

00:00:19.130 --> 00:00:21.240
still at an office in Chicago.

00:00:21.240 --> 00:00:25.520
She occasionally makes trips into the office,
but for the most part works here.

00:00:25.520 --> 00:00:29.349
Now in the past few months, for some reason
the electric service at their house has gotten

00:00:29.349 --> 00:00:30.980
a little unpredictable.

00:00:30.980 --> 00:00:35.280
They’ve never been without power for more
than a day, and usually less than 8 hours,

00:00:35.280 --> 00:00:38.700
but in the last month there have been two
power outages.

00:00:38.700 --> 00:00:41.140
And they’ve happened during her working
hours.

00:00:41.140 --> 00:00:42.610
Which kinda sucks.

00:00:42.610 --> 00:00:47.120
Actually, it really sucks, because depending
on the circumstances of the day, she might

00:00:47.120 --> 00:00:51.620
have to hop in the car and take a two hour
drive to work at the drop of a hat.

00:00:51.620 --> 00:00:53.820
So today, I’m gonna fix that for her.

00:00:53.820 --> 00:00:57.280
Now before you suggest so, they do have a
portable generator.

00:00:57.280 --> 00:01:02.150
But the generator lives in a shed, and takes
time to set up--plus, it’s cumbersome and

00:01:02.150 --> 00:01:04.720
too heavy for my mom to move by herself.

00:01:04.720 --> 00:01:09.320
And regardless, their generator produces a
really dirty and noisy power output, which

00:01:09.320 --> 00:01:11.780
some electronics really don’t like.

00:01:11.780 --> 00:01:15.780
Since all of this equipment belongs to her
company, she’s real leery on plugging any

00:01:15.780 --> 00:01:17.420
of it into the generator.

00:01:17.420 --> 00:01:18.640
And I don’t blame her.

00:01:18.640 --> 00:01:23.680
We know from experience with the generator
and a small uninterruptible power supply that...

00:01:23.680 --> 00:01:27.720
well the UPS didn’t find the generator’s
output safe enough and wouldn’t pass its

00:01:27.720 --> 00:01:29.260
power through.

00:01:29.260 --> 00:01:31.700
And it never worked correctly after that.

00:01:31.710 --> 00:01:36.990
So what we’re gonna do is use a deep cycle
lead acid battery as a temporary power source.

00:01:36.990 --> 00:01:41.520
A pure sine wave inverter on the battery will
produce a clean output that hopefully won’t

00:01:41.520 --> 00:01:42.720
bother her setup.

00:01:42.720 --> 00:01:47.030
And to recharge the battery, we’ll simply
use an automatic car battery charger, as after

00:01:47.030 --> 00:01:51.230
all a 12v lead acid battery is pretty much
universal in how you charge it.

00:01:51.230 --> 00:01:56.630
But, that doesn’t mean all lead acid batteries
are the same--no they are not.

00:01:56.630 --> 00:01:57.900
I’ll explain shortly.

00:01:57.900 --> 00:02:02.000
I want to add here that this process was done
with expediency in mind.

00:02:02.000 --> 00:02:06.229
My mom elected to buy this inverter on Amazon
and have it overnighted to her, and we would

00:02:06.229 --> 00:02:10.140
just pick up a battery at Menards that day
(I was due to visit them).

00:02:10.140 --> 00:02:15.350
The inverter is great--no qualms there--but
the battery is less than ideal.

00:02:15.350 --> 00:02:17.620
This is a marine deep cycle battery.

00:02:17.620 --> 00:02:21.490
As far as batteries go that you can just buy
at a hardware store, this is the closest to

00:02:21.490 --> 00:02:22.709
the best kind.

00:02:22.709 --> 00:02:25.890
But it’s probably not going to last for
too many charge cycles.

00:02:25.890 --> 00:02:29.240
Here, let’s explain a bit about lead acid
battery chemistry.

00:02:29.240 --> 00:02:33.041
Hold up--if you’re a newcomer to the channel
and are just looking for how to do this, go

00:02:33.041 --> 00:02:35.370
ahead and skip to this time.

00:02:35.370 --> 00:02:39.500
On this channel I like to explain a lot about
how stuff works, and I totally understand

00:02:39.500 --> 00:02:41.120
if that’s not why you’re here.

00:02:41.120 --> 00:02:43.660
Lead-acid batteries are incredibly simple.

00:02:43.670 --> 00:02:50.310
They are the oldest type of rechargeable battery,
invented in 1859 by French physicist Gaston Plante’.

00:02:50.310 --> 00:02:55.260
Their construction is quite basic--two plates,
one lead and the other lead dioxide, are submerged

00:02:55.260 --> 00:02:58.150
in a bath of sulfuric acid which serves as
the electrolyte.

00:02:58.150 --> 00:03:02.750
When it’s fully charged, the acidity of
the electrolyte solution is very high, thus

00:03:02.750 --> 00:03:07.160
there are a lot positively charged hydrogen
ions floating around, as well as negatively

00:03:07.160 --> 00:03:09.150
charged sulfate ions.

00:03:09.150 --> 00:03:13.400
Now I won’t get into the chemistry specifics--I’ll
save that for another video--but energy in

00:03:13.400 --> 00:03:15.690
the battery comes mainly from the acid.

00:03:15.690 --> 00:03:20.300
The sulfate ions will react with both the
negative and positive plates to form lead

00:03:20.300 --> 00:03:25.610
sulfate, and the hydrogen ions react in the
positive plate with oxygen atoms to form water.

00:03:25.610 --> 00:03:29.610
The more concentrated the acid is, the more
charged the battery is.

00:03:29.610 --> 00:03:32.400
Conversely, the more lead sulfate that appears on the plates,

00:03:32.400 --> 00:03:34.780
the more discharged the battery becomes.

00:03:34.780 --> 00:03:37.740
And this is where we get into the nitty gritty
of battery types.

00:03:37.750 --> 00:03:42.819
There are two basic categories of lead-acid
battery; deep cycle, and SLI which stands

00:03:42.820 --> 00:03:45.080
for Starting, Lighting, and Ignition.

00:03:45.080 --> 00:03:51.500
Essentially an SLI battery is a car battery,
and these are absofreakinlutely terrible at

00:03:51.500 --> 00:03:53.180
being deep cycled.

00:03:53.180 --> 00:03:57.890
If you just buy a car battery for backup power,
you’ll be lucky if it lasts a dozen cycles

00:03:57.890 --> 00:03:59.450
before it’s dead.

00:03:59.450 --> 00:04:02.319
And that’s because of how they are designed
and constructed.

00:04:02.319 --> 00:04:07.000
Car batteries need to be able to produce an
enormous surge of current for the starter motor.

00:04:07.000 --> 00:04:11.130
To get more current, you need a large surface
area on the plates of the battery.

00:04:11.130 --> 00:04:16.180
And with limited room, this surface area is
created by making the plates small, numerous,

00:04:16.180 --> 00:04:18.249
and sort of like a sponge.

00:04:18.249 --> 00:04:22.870
These spongy plates are great at producing
tons of current, but they limit the battery's

00:04:22.870 --> 00:04:25.479
ability to be discharged and recharged.

00:04:25.479 --> 00:04:29.849
See as the battery discharges, the plates
don’t just get coated with lead sulfate.

00:04:29.849 --> 00:04:34.819
They become lead sulfate--just as a rusty
piece of metal isn’t covered in rust--the

00:04:34.819 --> 00:04:36.800
metal has turned to rust.

00:04:36.800 --> 00:04:39.169
And lead sulfate isn’t a good conductor.

00:04:39.169 --> 00:04:44.210
If you let a car battery get discharged too
much, the spongy plates can sort of get clogged

00:04:44.210 --> 00:04:45.879
with the lead sulfate.

00:04:45.879 --> 00:04:50.099
The more this happens, the less current it
can pass, and then it can’t be recharged

00:04:50.099 --> 00:04:52.900
to reform the lead and lead oxide.

00:04:52.900 --> 00:04:55.479
Another common occurrence is called shedding.

00:04:55.479 --> 00:04:59.779
Again due to the spongy nature of the plates,
the expansion and contraction as the lead

00:04:59.779 --> 00:05:04.599
plate becomes lead sulfate and is turned back
to lead through recharging can actually cause

00:05:04.599 --> 00:05:10.029
bits of the plate to fall off, thus limiting
not only current passing ability but also

00:05:10.029 --> 00:05:11.029
capacity.

00:05:11.029 --> 00:05:15.330
But normally, a car battery will stay almost
completely charged all the time.

00:05:15.330 --> 00:05:19.780
The starter will only run for a few seconds,
then once the engine is running the alternator

00:05:19.780 --> 00:05:22.030
will swiftly replenish that charge.

00:05:22.030 --> 00:05:26.960
Ordinarily, the battery is hardly cycled at
all, and very little lead sulfate forms anywhere

00:05:26.960 --> 00:05:27.960
in the battery.

00:05:27.960 --> 00:05:33.039
Thus, it’s typical for a car battery to
last 5 years or more, but may only survive

00:05:33.039 --> 00:05:35.809
a few episodes of leaving the headlights on.

00:05:35.809 --> 00:05:40.119
Deep cycle batteries, on the other hand, have
big, thick, solid plates.

00:05:40.119 --> 00:05:44.690
With limited surface area, they can’t produce
monstrous surge currents, but they can tolerate

00:05:44.690 --> 00:05:48.400
much more lead sulfate building up without harming
the battery.

00:05:48.400 --> 00:05:52.610
They’re less susceptible to shedding due
to the non-porous nature of their plates,

00:05:52.610 --> 00:05:56.409
and in general are more specialized and a
bit more expensive.

00:05:56.409 --> 00:06:01.379
Due to their inability to create surge currents,
they aren’t used as a car battery but instead

00:06:01.379 --> 00:06:06.539
for things like golf carts, battery backup
solutions, and some early electric cars used

00:06:06.539 --> 00:06:08.779
them as their main source of propulsion power.

00:06:08.779 --> 00:06:12.550
For this project, we’re using a compromise
battery.

00:06:12.550 --> 00:06:16.749
There is a subset of batteries called marine
batteries, and within that subset there’s

00:06:16.749 --> 00:06:19.360
a subsubset called marine deep cycle.

00:06:19.360 --> 00:06:21.330
That’s what this is.

00:06:21.330 --> 00:06:25.061
These batteries have thicker and stronger
plates than an ordinary car battery, but they

00:06:25.061 --> 00:06:27.289
can still provide a generous surge of current.

00:06:27.289 --> 00:06:31.649
I chose this battery because it was A) Readily
available and B)

00:06:31.649 --> 00:06:32.649
cheap.

00:06:32.649 --> 00:06:38.220
A whopping $89, however a $7 core charge was
placed on top of that because I didn’t have

00:06:38.220 --> 00:06:40.219
a used battery to return.

00:06:40.220 --> 00:06:45.320
Speaking of, did you know that lead acid batteries
are among the most recycled things in the world?

00:06:45.320 --> 00:06:49.920
Everything in here can easily be recycled
and purified, with only the paper separators

00:06:49.929 --> 00:06:52.810
between plates being impossible to recover.

00:06:52.810 --> 00:06:57.779
Because of that core charge, people are incentivised
to not throw their batteries into landfill,

00:06:57.779 --> 00:07:02.509
and battery manufacturers have a steady supply
of used batteries to condense into their constituent

00:07:02.509 --> 00:07:04.849
parts and make new batteries again.

00:07:04.849 --> 00:07:10.289
It is almost certainly the case that this
battery was once many other batteries, with

00:07:10.289 --> 00:07:14.520
the materials having hopped from car to car
and from boat to boat.

00:07:14.520 --> 00:07:19.660
Look at that, society coming together to solve
a problem and no one’s complaining about it.

00:07:19.660 --> 00:07:20.460
Great job.

00:07:20.460 --> 00:07:23.360
So first, we want to determine what our needs
are.

00:07:23.360 --> 00:07:25.319
And I was going on an estimate.

00:07:25.319 --> 00:07:30.770
This setup uses a laptop in a docking station
and two 20 inch monitors, but there is also

00:07:30.770 --> 00:07:35.879
a power supply for the RAP, her phone, the
Google WiFi router (though that could be turned

00:07:35.879 --> 00:07:40.979
off if required), and the actual DSL modem,
so while the computer and monitor are probably

00:07:40.979 --> 00:07:45.490
the bulk of everything, there are a lot of
small loads that might add up.

00:07:45.490 --> 00:07:50.069
I basically just assumed 100 watts would be
enough, and let’s roll with that.

00:07:50.069 --> 00:07:54.569
Annoyingly this sort of battery usually isn’t
labeled with a helpful figure like amp-hours

00:07:54.569 --> 00:07:56.219
or watt hours.

00:07:56.219 --> 00:07:58.939
Instead it has a stat called reserve capacity.

00:07:58.939 --> 00:08:03.749
Now I simply picked the largest battery they
had among this selection, and I didn’t yet

00:08:03.749 --> 00:08:05.589
know what RC meant.

00:08:05.589 --> 00:08:10.899
So after some googling, I learned that a battery’s
reserve capacity is the time in minutes that

00:08:10.900 --> 00:08:16.000
it can sustain a discharge rate of 25 amps
before it drops to 10.5 volts,

00:08:16.020 --> 00:08:17.699
which is pretty dead.

00:08:17.699 --> 00:08:24.219
This battery’s reserve capacity is 170,
so 25 amps over 170 minutes is about 70 amp

00:08:24.219 --> 00:08:29.129
hours, and since this is a 12 volt battery,
that means it has a capacity of about 850

00:08:29.129 --> 00:08:30.249
watt hours.

00:08:30.249 --> 00:08:34.200
This was good, as I had estimated her setup
would use about 100 watts, and it should just

00:08:34.200 --> 00:08:36.690
barely get her through an 8 hour day.

00:08:36.690 --> 00:08:41.760
But, another fun feature of lead-acid battery
chemistry, is that its capacity will go up

00:08:41.760 --> 00:08:43.530
the slower you discharge it.

00:08:43.530 --> 00:08:48.800
So while this battery may only be 850 watt
hours with a 300 watt load, cutting that load

00:08:48.800 --> 00:08:53.210
down to a third might boost the capacity into
the kilowatt hour range.

00:08:53.210 --> 00:08:55.480
If we’re real lucky, with a slow drain,
we might get

00:08:55.480 --> 00:08:58.820
1.1 or 1.2 kilowatt hours out of this thing.

00:08:58.820 --> 00:09:00.540
So, we’ve got a battery.

00:09:00.540 --> 00:09:06.340
But now we need a way to convert the 12V DC
into the 120V AC that her stuff uses.

00:09:06.340 --> 00:09:08.850
That’s what inverters are for!

00:09:08.850 --> 00:09:14.080
These devices will boost the voltage and continually
invert the phase up and down to create A/C

00:09:14.080 --> 00:09:16.170
current from a DC source.

00:09:16.170 --> 00:09:20.310
If you’re running electronics, you definitely
want a pure sine wave inverter.

00:09:20.310 --> 00:09:24.600
This will replicate the sine wave pattern
as seen in true A/C power.

00:09:24.600 --> 00:09:28.610
Cheaper inverters will simply throw spikes
up and down, which many modern power supplies

00:09:28.610 --> 00:09:32.080
can tolerate, but which probably isn’t great
for everything.

00:09:32.080 --> 00:09:35.370
In choosing an inverter, we went extraordinarily
overboard.

00:09:35.370 --> 00:09:39.220
I basically combed through reviews for my
mom on Amazon, and while there was a much

00:09:39.220 --> 00:09:43.380
cheaper inverter that would have done the
trick, it had some lackluster reviews indicating

00:09:43.380 --> 00:09:46.540
it might overheat, so we went with this enormous
beast.

00:09:46.540 --> 00:09:49.450
You never know, it might truly come in handy
someday.

00:09:49.450 --> 00:09:51.880
And we also need a way to charge this battery.

00:09:51.880 --> 00:09:56.120
For that, we’ll use an automatic car battery
charger that my parents already had.

00:09:56.120 --> 00:10:01.270
This is a relatively slow charger, only putting
out 6 amps, but that’s 72 watts and will

00:10:01.270 --> 00:10:05.570
be enough to recharge this battery from empty
in 16 hours or so.

00:10:05.570 --> 00:10:10.410
If there were an extended power outage, the
charger could be run from the generator overnight.

00:10:10.410 --> 00:10:13.380
But having a slow charger is probably a good
thing.

00:10:13.380 --> 00:10:18.200
See, you do have to worry about hydrogen production
when the battery is being charged.

00:10:18.200 --> 00:10:20.800
Ordinarily very little hydrogen is produced,

00:10:20.800 --> 00:10:23.440
in fact ideally close to none should be produced

00:10:23.440 --> 00:10:27.930
and the bulk of hydrogen would come from a
battery being overcharged, which this automatic

00:10:27.930 --> 00:10:29.640
charger should prevent from occuring.

00:10:29.640 --> 00:10:35.000
But, even if it were to overcharge the battery,
the amount of hydrogen generated is directly

00:10:35.000 --> 00:10:38.400
dependent on the amount of current being pushed
into the battery.

00:10:38.400 --> 00:10:43.000
I ran the numbers and determined that in order
for hydrogen to reach dangerous levels in

00:10:43.000 --> 00:10:48.940
this room with 6 amps of charge current, it
would require about a month of overcharging.

00:10:48.940 --> 00:10:51.270
So clearly, that’s not a concern.

00:10:51.270 --> 00:10:56.070
However, I did alter course for safety--I
was planning on situating the battery on a

00:10:56.070 --> 00:11:01.150
small cart, but its partially enclosed top
could trap hydrogen and potentially create

00:11:01.150 --> 00:11:02.800
a small explosion risk.

00:11:02.800 --> 00:11:04.820
So I went to work setting things up.

00:11:04.820 --> 00:11:08.980
This battery has threaded studs to mount cables
to in addition to standard lugs.

00:11:08.980 --> 00:11:13.980
We’ll use the studs with the supplied cables
from the inverter, but I did add a large fuse

00:11:13.980 --> 00:11:16.030
for short-circuit protection.

00:11:16.030 --> 00:11:19.700
The inverter could theoretically pull 125
amps continuously

00:11:19.700 --> 00:11:22.560
(though the battery could not sustain that for very long)

00:11:22.560 --> 00:11:24.640
so I looked for a fuse above that rating.

00:11:24.640 --> 00:11:28.410
Now, I’m only adding this for protection
from a short circuit.

00:11:28.410 --> 00:11:32.400
The inverter has built-in protections of its
own, but in case something metal should get

00:11:32.400 --> 00:11:37.510
lodged behind the inverter, or some other
stupid thing causes a dead short, those 600+

00:11:37.510 --> 00:11:39.760
cranking amps need something to stop them.

00:11:39.760 --> 00:11:41.800
But then, I added this little guy.

00:11:41.800 --> 00:11:44.700
This is a battery level monitor and voltage
indicator.

00:11:44.700 --> 00:11:48.840
This is really neat, it can support different
battery chemistries and voltages, but came

00:11:48.840 --> 00:11:52.120
preconfigured for a 12v lead acid battery.

00:11:52.120 --> 00:11:55.580
Now it’s showing that percentage based on
the battery’s voltage reading.

00:11:55.580 --> 00:11:59.570
This will give you a relatively good indication
of charge, but it means that if there’s

00:11:59.570 --> 00:12:04.720
a load on the battery, thus dropping its voltage,
the reading also drops.

00:12:04.720 --> 00:12:09.780
Additionally, whenever the battery is being
charged, the reading will jump to 100%, as

00:12:09.780 --> 00:12:13.310
the charger gives the battery a higher voltage
when charging.

00:12:13.310 --> 00:12:18.580
However, it will still serve as a useful indicator,
as after its initial drop, that percentage

00:12:18.580 --> 00:12:20.760
will steadily drop as it discharges.

00:12:20.760 --> 00:12:24.440
Best of all, pressing the button turns on
the backlight, and pressing it again will

00:12:24.440 --> 00:12:26.630
change to an actual voltage reading.

00:12:26.630 --> 00:12:31.070
The specs on this thing indicate that it draws
112 microamps when idle.

00:12:31.070 --> 00:12:35.601
That’s practically negligible, and will
perhaps cause the battery to lose 1% of charge

00:12:35.601 --> 00:12:37.260
over a few months.

00:12:37.260 --> 00:12:41.000
You’ll also notice that
this is connected straight across the battery.

00:12:41.000 --> 00:12:45.770
It would be wise to fuse this as well, however
it’s fairly likely that there is a fuse

00:12:45.770 --> 00:12:47.160
on its circuit board somewhere

00:12:47.160 --> 00:12:51.980
(even if it’s just a resistor or something that’s not “supposed” to be a fuse)

00:12:51.980 --> 00:12:54.740
and even if
there wasn’t one, these thin wires would

00:12:54.740 --> 00:12:56.800
quickly melt in a dead short scenario.

00:12:56.800 --> 00:12:59.020
Thus, I’m not worried about it.

00:12:59.020 --> 00:13:01.210
So now, this setup is pretty much done.

00:13:01.210 --> 00:13:05.040
After putting on the charger long enough for
it to switch to float charging mode, I lugged

00:13:05.040 --> 00:13:07.260
the battery and inverter down to her workstation.

00:13:07.260 --> 00:13:12.780
I also finally used a kill-a-watt to determine
the actual draw of her workstation.

00:13:12.780 --> 00:13:15.120
Hopefully it’s 100 watts or less.

00:13:15.120 --> 00:13:19.480
Amazingly, everything here only draws around
52 to 55 watts!

00:13:19.490 --> 00:13:24.040
It occasionally spikes to 70 watts, but even
if we take that as a worst-case figure (plus

00:13:24.040 --> 00:13:28.780
this will account for the 10 to 15% loss in
the conversion from the inverter), this battery

00:13:28.780 --> 00:13:34.710
will now easily pass 12 hours of backup time,
and with an average of 4 and a half to 5 amps

00:13:34.710 --> 00:13:38.040
being drawn from the battery, it may be even
more.

00:13:38.040 --> 00:13:42.551
This extra capacity also means the battery
won’t be as deeply cycled in a day, which

00:13:42.551 --> 00:13:43.950
will prolong its useful life.

00:13:43.950 --> 00:13:46.120
To use this is really simple.

00:13:46.120 --> 00:13:50.320
Everything is already plugged into a small
uninterruptible power supply, but this is

00:13:50.320 --> 00:13:54.020
really small and can only realistically provide
20 minutes of power,

00:13:54.020 --> 00:13:56.320
maybe an hour if we got super lucky.

00:13:56.320 --> 00:14:00.920
However, it means that in the event of a power
failure, everything is seamless.

00:14:00.920 --> 00:14:04.740
If the power goes out, everything in her setup
will remain powered on.

00:14:04.740 --> 00:14:08.930
To switch to the large backup supply, all
you need to do is unplug the power cord of

00:14:08.930 --> 00:14:13.480
the UPS from the wall, and plug it into one
of the outlets on the inverter.

00:14:13.480 --> 00:14:19.090
After you switch the inverter on, the UPS
will say “hey, that power looks OK”, and

00:14:19.090 --> 00:14:22.300
it switches back to what it thinks is normal
AC power.

00:14:22.300 --> 00:14:26.630
At this point, the entire setup is running
solely from the large battery.

00:14:26.630 --> 00:14:31.000
This should provide at least a full day’s
work of backup power, and possibly 2 if the

00:14:31.000 --> 00:14:35.279
slow drain boosts the battery’s capacity
up to 1.2 kilowatt hours.

00:14:35.279 --> 00:14:38.350
When the power comes back, just switch off
the inverter.

00:14:38.350 --> 00:14:42.610
The UPS will kick back into action briefly,
but after plugging it into the wall, it will

00:14:42.610 --> 00:14:44.520
be on true AC power again.

00:14:44.520 --> 00:14:49.350
Then, just grab the car battery charger, hook
it up, and after an overnight charge the battery

00:14:49.350 --> 00:14:50.420
will be full again.

00:14:50.420 --> 00:14:54.000
If there’s a prolonged power outage, the
battery charger could theoretically become

00:14:54.000 --> 00:14:58.440
an indirect power source for the inverter,
using the battery itself as a large buffer

00:14:58.440 --> 00:14:59.610
or ballast.

00:14:59.610 --> 00:15:03.529
The dirty energy coming from the generator
would be converted to DC power, and when the

00:15:03.529 --> 00:15:07.420
inverter switches it back to AC, it will be
clean as a whistle.

00:15:07.420 --> 00:15:12.030
This charger might even be enough, as 6 amps
works out to 72 watts.

00:15:12.030 --> 00:15:14.130
However, it would be pretty close.

00:15:14.130 --> 00:15:17.300
A larger battery charger might be desired
for this purpose.

00:15:17.300 --> 00:15:20.860
But using this with a generator isn’t really
the point.

00:15:20.860 --> 00:15:25.181
If that were the point, then a wiser investment
is a generator with a built-in inverter, which

00:15:25.181 --> 00:15:27.400
can safely power electronics.

00:15:27.400 --> 00:15:32.950
Rather, the goal of this setup is to provide
immediate, easy, and convenient backup power

00:15:32.950 --> 00:15:35.000
that will last at least a day.

00:15:35.000 --> 00:15:39.780
For most power outages, this battery will
be all that’s needed to get my mom through it.

00:15:39.780 --> 00:15:44.540
One last thing before I sign off--this brass
lug on the inverter should be grounded.

00:15:44.540 --> 00:15:49.570
Right now, when on battery power, none of
this equipment has a connection to earth.

00:15:49.570 --> 00:15:54.570
This isn’t necessarily an abhorrently dangerously
scenario, but to be safe a ground lead should

00:15:54.570 --> 00:15:56.040
be attached here.

00:15:56.040 --> 00:16:00.140
We could attach a lead to the ground wire
inside this electrical box, or we could use

00:16:00.140 --> 00:16:01.980
an adapter like this.

00:16:01.980 --> 00:16:05.680
Whichever you choose, make sure it actually
has a good ground connection.

00:16:05.680 --> 00:16:08.210
Thanks for watching, I hope you enjoyed the
video!

00:16:08.210 --> 00:16:12.730
Lead-acid battery technology may be wicked
old, but it has some compelling applications

00:16:12.730 --> 00:16:14.130
such as this.

00:16:14.130 --> 00:16:17.180
But remember, this battery won’t last many
cycles.

00:16:17.180 --> 00:16:21.060
It doesn’t have to, as it will probably
only get a discharge a few times a year if

00:16:21.060 --> 00:16:25.720
that, but if you want to regularly charge
and discharge a lead-acid battery for energy

00:16:25.720 --> 00:16:28.980
storage, you want to choose a better battery.

00:16:28.980 --> 00:16:33.240
Golf cart batteries, which are usually 6 volts
and thus require a pair to be wired in series

00:16:33.240 --> 00:16:36.010
to get 12V, are a good start.

00:16:36.010 --> 00:16:40.020
The solar power community seems to favor Trojan
batteries for longevity.

00:16:40.020 --> 00:16:44.750
I’m planning on making some videos analyzing
the costs and lifespan of deep cycle lead

00:16:44.750 --> 00:16:49.589
acid batteries versus lithium ion for stationary
energy storage, because the winner may be

00:16:49.589 --> 00:16:51.660
less obvious than it seems.

00:16:51.660 --> 00:16:55.800
But for now, thank you to everyone who supports
this channel on Patreon, especially the fine

00:16:55.800 --> 00:16:58.200
folks who have been scrolling up your screen.

00:16:58.200 --> 00:17:02.720
With the amazing support of people just like
you, I’ve been able to turn Technology Connections

00:17:02.720 --> 00:17:06.549
from a weird hobby into my full-time job.

00:17:06.549 --> 00:17:09.769
And there are big projects just around the
corner.

00:17:09.769 --> 00:17:12.660
If you’d like to pledge some support to
the channel to help it grow, please check

00:17:12.660 --> 00:17:14.300
out my Patreon page.

00:17:14.300 --> 00:17:17.100
Thank you for your consideration, and I’ll
see you next time!

00:17:17.940 --> 00:17:21.360
♫ do do do do do do ♫

00:17:22.760 --> 00:17:25.580
♫ a jazzy sax ♫

00:17:26.400 --> 00:17:29.320
♫ some piano and drums chime in ♫