I have a 5000 watt power inverter I want to mount in the Jeep, anyone have suggestions? I need to run cables from the batter to the interior mount point rather thick battery type cables.

I'm curious: what, exactly, do you propose to run with that inverter for the approximately 9 minutes until it sucks your battery completely stone cold dead?

At full tilt, that inverter will probably draw about 460 amps. I suggest half-inch copper bars, not some puny wires.

That's even bigger than my generator!

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2006 Sport, GDE FT Eco Tune, Custom Trans Tune
2015 Ram 1500 Big Horn EcoDiesel, GDE Hot Tune

you mean besides forget it!!

for wire..parallel 4/0 wire would just a start..on both leads

I doubt you'd get 9 minutes( at 5000w) on the little battery in the jeep..forget the alternator helping..

why do I say this..

well I run a 3000w inverter in my work trailer..for running saws and such..
its uses 4/0 wire about 2' total length..from an group 8D battery..and 3 Jeep batteries in size..
it'll run a microwave long enough to cook lunch about 5 minutes..

good luck let us know how it works out.

-dkenny

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84 BB school bus, DD8.2L turbo ->the transmission died..too expensive to fix..it'll be heading to the scrap yard..4/11)..Bus gone to Scarp 8/23/11
06 Liberty CRD
'99 dodge ram 2500 quad cab, 4x4, 24v
all Biodiesel powered when its warm enough

5000 peak, 2500 continuous, there's not a single generator in New England to be sold in a retail store.

can't imagine why there aren't any generators...

You will be fine with just regular 4 gauge or 2 gauge cables (like good jumper cables)

IF AND ONLY IF you aren't going to be insane and try to pull the actual rating from that bad boy. If you are looking to use laptop chargers and small consumer electronics or a medium sized TV, you will have plenty of power. The CRD alternator and the battery is capable of running a full size 8-cup coffee maker (I've done it on a film set) but that is about the limit. The battery alone cannot support more than about 10 amps at 120 volts, or 1200 watts. Remember the equation: watts = volts times amps. The wattage NEVER CHANGES for any device, where volts and amps vary opposite each other. Big amps needs big cables. For 1200 watts at 120 volts, that is 10 amps. At 12 volts... Now you are asking 100 amps! See the problem?

Don't try to exceed 1200 watts of demand, and you will be fine no matter which inverter you use.

Stay safe up there, that goes for everyone. This storm doesn't look like anything to trifle with.

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Proud supporting vendor of LOST Jeeps
TRAVELING CRD TECH. I come to you!
Need help? Just ask! I've taken it apart more than most.
Email jeep [at] maincomputer [dot] com - BOARD MESSAGING IS BROKEN
Over 225 CRDs currently driving with my valves, timing belt, rockers, or ARP Studs.
Bad noises = REALLY bad things.

2500 Watt's continuous !! Have you L.O.S.T. you ever lovin' mind?
IF your battery doesn't spontaneously combust, your alternator will.

Wouldn't surprise me if this "experiment" didn't "take-down" other electrical items too.

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Dennis
Considering sound advice, invent your own solutions
CRD

Must be due to "Sandy", little too late to plan for then inevitable. Hunker down, put the Libby in a shelter !

Oh yea, cross your fingers......

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Dennis
Considering sound advice, invent your own solutions
CRD

All I got to say is "hang on to your butts"

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With enough fabbing, time & $, it's certainly possible.
That being said, it's like boinkin' your sister...just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

worked marvelously, I'll get some 2 gauge at the marine store this week and mount it behind the back side panel

Of course not. They've been snapped up by folks about to be out of power for days. I'm sorry, guy, but the tiny battery in your Jeep just isn't gonna be of any use. And my estimate of 9 minutes did not include allowance for the fact that such heavy draw's run the battery down very wastefully, create a huge amount of heat, and shorten the time substantially.

I wouldn't hook that puppy up even to charge your cell phone, for the simple reason that it is going to waste a huge amount of power doing it. Much better to use a small inverter, maybe 400 watts max. Or even better, one of those 12 volt USB charger things. Either will be much less taxing on the Jeep's battery.

That is a misconception Naturist - larger inverters do not draw any more power than smaller inverters (quite the opposite is sometimes true) because the inverter is simply CAPABLE of passing that much power - that power still needs to go somewhere.

Think of it like this: The inverter is a giant battery and you can run either a tiny flashlight or a big floodlight. One of these will burn for only a few minutes, the other will go for days and days. The actual coils and circuitry in the inverter is reasonably efficient, and doesn't use much power itself to run. In a larger inverter, the circuits are usually much better quality, which equates to more efficient and less power used just to run the inverter.

In all cases - The battery is ONLY DELIVERING the raw wattage that the load requires, plus whatever wattage the inverter needs for its circuits. A 400 watt load is a 400 watt load, no matter the voltage it is delivered at. If your battery is rated at 70 hour capacity - that is according to a not-really-standardized test where a (IIRC) 5 amp load is connected to the battery, and they time to see how long until it is drained. That would be a 60 watt load (5 amps times 12 volts) and it could run for 70 hours (in a perfect environment) for a total wattage of 4.2 Kw.

These numbers are merely for an example. I like batteries that are rated in Watt-hours, which tells me thusly: A 45 watt hour battery can deliver 45 watts for 1 hour... Or some lesser amount for a longer time, not to exceed the equivalent 45 watts for 1 hour.

All about battery power... Now you know watts up.

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Proud supporting vendor of LOST Jeeps
TRAVELING CRD TECH. I come to you!
Need help? Just ask! I've taken it apart more than most.
Email jeep [at] maincomputer [dot] com - BOARD MESSAGING IS BROKEN
Over 225 CRDs currently driving with my valves, timing belt, rockers, or ARP Studs.
Bad noises = REALLY bad things.

Good post, just clarifying some nomenclature.

actually it is a 1500 watt continuous , 3000 watt peak.

My understanding is our stock alternator puts out 1920 watts, as long as I am running the engine and not exceed the 1500 watts on a steady state I should be good.

I was able to run the fridge and freezer, which concerned me the most, for about 2 hours till I got power back.


In the future I'll be using this to running a single power tool at a time or air compressor when I am in the boat yard or on the side of the road with a busted trailer

Just to clarify an alt does not produce watts, it produces amps. Our alts produce 150 max. I've actually clamped mine at 142 at 2000 rpm.

I'm late on chiming in on this thread. Op I hope everything is working out alright. This is def possible. Just remember, it takes power to make power.

Just wondering how you ran the wires I run a 3000 watt stereo system and I have (2) 0 gauge runs of power and (2). 0 gauge runs of ground from the battery under the hood to my battery bank in the rear. I ran them in random holes along the frame and brought up through a hole right behind the driver seat.

Nothing will catch on fire. Yes you run the risk of shortening the life of your alt and stock battery if your constantly pulling on them and dropping voltage. Once a month I always disconnect my batts and put them on a 2 amp trickle charge overnight

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2005 Crd Silver Limited- arps, rockers, 7v etechno's, egr deleted, v6 airbox, metal cac's. Yeti's stage 2 tune. Euro TC, Ram tcm, pml transmission pan, facet lift pump

thanks, I will be running 0 gauge from the battery terminals to the back , I haven't initiated the work as I was down in NJ cleaning up our house down there.
Do you use deep cycle batteries in your bank in the back? I was planning on using at least 1 12 volt deep cycle as the buffer to the Jeep electrical system, I'd be interested in what type of switch you put between the deep cycle and the charging system.


Bill

Pictured are my batts. They are xs3100's. Up until about 2 months ago they were the strongest 12 volt battery available.

I don't use any kind of switch or isolator. If your still running the red top it's a deep cycle so there is no need. All the batts will rest and charge at the same voltage. There are however some certain ways guys like to pull from a battery bank but for what your doing it really doesn't matter.

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2005 Crd Silver Limited- arps, rockers, 7v etechno's, egr deleted, v6 airbox, metal cac's. Yeti's stage 2 tune. Euro TC, Ram tcm, pml transmission pan, facet lift pump

Another thing just to give you something to think about.

Say your alt does 150 amps and during the cold mine charges at 14.7.

150x14.7=2205 watts

Now in a perfect world electronics would be 100% efficient. But they are not. Most higher quality amp are around 85% efficient. Which means an amp will only turn the total amperage it receives into issuable watts. So 2205x .85=1875
I'm not familiar with inverters so I couldn't tell you how efficient they, but if I had to guess they are prolly less than audio amplifiers.

You also gotta consider what all the factory electronics suck up and as an alternator heats up its efficiency will go down thus resulting in less amperage it produces. I assume u would be also idling the jeep while running the inverter. I don't know what our alts do at idle but I would guess its around 75 amps.

This is kinda off topic but when I was in college I used my truck(f-150 at the time) to power my fraternities homecoming float using a 4000 watt inveter it had lights all over it and a 1500 watt amp powering some tower speakers. This was a constant draw for about 2 hours. I had a 240 amp alt and 2 extra batts added. My voltage would drop to the low 13's at idle but when I sped the truck up it would hold the voltage.

What kind of inverter is it? Vector??

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2005 Crd Silver Limited- arps, rockers, 7v etechno's, egr deleted, v6 airbox, metal cac's. Yeti's stage 2 tune. Euro TC, Ram tcm, pml transmission pan, facet lift pump

Um, Geordi, thanks for the lesson in electricity, but it is a bit misplaced. I'm quite aware that a 400 watt load is a 400 watt load regardless of whether it is being fed from a 400 watt inverter or from a 4 million watt inverter. My point was that drawing 5 kW from a Jeep starting battery is a bad idea. I made that point only because lots and lots of people seem not to be able to conceive of not being able to draw 5 kW forever from such a tiny source. This is where we get folks wanting to plug their CRD block heater into the starting battery to keep the engine warm for their 8 hour shift at work. Which is where it sounded like the OP was headed.

And actually, that 400 watt load might actually draw 440 watts due to the 400 watt inverter's built in inefficiency. And it might prove to be 450 watts, or 500 watts if you use a very much larger inverter simply due to the fact that those things draw a little current all by themselves, even if nothing else is running. Inquire of the power supply makers, you'll find that inverters, constant voltage transformers, and actually lots and lots of similar devices are most efficient at or nearly at their rated capacity. Get far off that capacity, and they lose a little bit.

Naturist, watts can never be drawn. Watts is a unit of measurement to determine output of a device. (amps x volts) and it always fluctuates

Now the argument of which size is more efficient is debatable. Only solution to that is buy different sizes, clamp them and there ya got the results.

But I would say no matter the size, at idle(no load) the inverters pull less amps than the headlights. It's up to whatever he is trying to power, the load it will pull from the inverter

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2005 Crd Silver Limited- arps, rockers, 7v etechno's, egr deleted, v6 airbox, metal cac's. Yeti's stage 2 tune. Euro TC, Ram tcm, pml transmission pan, facet lift pump