Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

She bypasses Adelaide, breathe sigh of relief.

Not taking the mickey, it was in honour, the thought of copping the flack she has over this was what prompted me to get the back up system. Besides she wouldnt have enough cider reserves for a trip that long

I'll be in Alice Springs in July, not that far from there

Bazz, I was going to ask, what size battery and such did you get and how much were they please?

Jaymie Havent got the battery yet. I think I may be able to get a deep cycle from Work, but not till next week. will let you know

I've read this thread a few times now, but many of the links are dead so it's tough to figure out what some of the equipment is.

Can someone take me through this part by part/process by process? I'm familiar with UPSes because I'm a computer geek, but if I were to make an airpump backup out of golf batteries, how would I do that? I'm in the US, btw.

Here's what I understand:

Buy two 6v deep cycle golf batteries and set them up in series.

Somehow attach a 'trickle charger' to them to keep them charged when the mains electricity is on.
(my parents have a charger they use to recharge their car battery when it dies. Is this what you're talking about?)

Either-
Buy a 12v air pump.
OR
buy an inverter, and then plug in a standard air pump.

OK, what's an inverter, and how does it work? I assume it switches the the electricity from DC to AC (that I understand), but then does it also boost the power so a normal thing I'd plug into the wall would work with it?

How do you get the system to only work when the mains go out? Some kind of switch? I have no idea what is going on here, or where to get such a thing.

And what am I missing here?

I'm slowly working my way through "Solar Power for Dummies," but it doesn't have much detail on this stuff. All it says about inverters is "inverters take the low-voltage, high-current signals from the PV panels and change them into 120VAC, which is directly compatible with grid power."

Does that also apply to batteries? Most solar inverters are $$$, is there a different option?

(I'm not currently looking at solar for my AP stuff, but I know the power stuff is similar).

Thanks very much. Hopefully this will be useful to other non-sparkies on the board...

A trickle charger is often a small and sometimes smart device that only provides 1 or a few amps to slowly charge the battery and will not over charge it.

An inverter uses the buck boot principle to raise the DC voltage to square, modified square, or sine wave ac at 120 volts. If the inverter is rated 300 watts it will provide 3 amps of 110 volt wall plug type ac while drawing ~30 amps(not perfectly accurate) from the battery at 10-14 volts.

The most simple way I know of to make it work when the power is out is to get a 110 volt coil single pole double throw relay and wire the coil directly to the wall plug, then connect the inverter ground to the battery and then run the inverters positive wire to the NC (normally closed) contact and then wire the battery + to the common pole of the relay. When powered up the wall current will activate the relay and open the connection for the inverter. Then when power fails the relay will close and power up the inverter.

Ok, the dc is connected across an inductor then when current gets high or at a interval of time the magnetic field around the inductor/coil is max strength. The batter connection is switched off and the magnetic field collapses vary fast and because voltage is a function of magnetic line of force cutting through a conductor and how fast its done the the coil will release a short duration spike of high voltage energy (often over 300 volts). This pules is sent through a diode (to catch it and keep if from returning to the coil) and collected in a capacitor where the voltage is monitored once it reaches a voltage of about 116-120 volts then the charging circuit is stopped until the voltage falls low enough to need more charging. Now, another circuit takes this high voltage dc and "inverts" it back and forth the produce a ac wave (sine,square, stepped square waves). This is the power that you can use just like from a wall plug.

I dont think you need a solar power inverter that phase matches power back to the grid. Go to harborfreight or walmart ect and get a cheap inverter rated for the amount of power your pump requires.

Hey all - I have one of these to use on the yacht that I am building. It is really good and might be worth considering for those that might be concerned with longer power outages - you can run a lot of equipment off this beast and for $260 its cheap insurance. Keep your fridge, freezer and TV going too! http://www.soldsmart.com.au/l3.aspx?goo ... 4dce045a1d

Karen

If your familiar with UPS why not try and get a hold of a secondhand good one, then just run external batteries (some even have seperate units). they do the switching inversion and charging all in one unit. You can pick them up for very reasonable prices.

Hamish

Try sticking a power tester on that genset and find out the hz and voltage under load. Some are a little iffy.

Havent got that sort of test equipment - but it runs all my stuff fine.

Try one of these the're ony $40
http://www.jaycar.com.au/productView.as ... &SUBCATID=

OK, so today we had an outage lasting from 8am until 2pm whilst Energex replaced a power pole.

I left work early to look after my sick family and got home at about 1.30pm. I checked my 500L FT with 20 silvers and they were struggling and gasping for air at the surface. I started to panic and was about to head down to my local battery joint for a fix when the power came back. I switched the pump timer to manual and luckily saved all the fish from suffocating. The plants didn't look great either, but I reckon they'll be fine.

So, time to get my backup system happening. First of all, as a quick fix, I've hooked up my UPS (http://www.apc.com/resource/include/tec ... U3000RMI3U) to the system until I sort out something better. I'd be keen to see how long this UPS can power my 70W pump for. If it's not good enough, I'll probably hook it up to an air pump as a stop-gap approach.

Any comments on how appropriate this UPS is for my 70W pump would be appreciated! I'm actually testing it now to see how long it lasts.

Now, I'm keen to set up a charger > battery > inverter (or 12V pump) system. However, I'm not sure what equipment I need. I assume a deep-cycle battery will be required, but don't know what model. Also, I have no idea what sort of charger I would need. I've got a very good inverter and electrician friend gave me, so that's covered - hence, I don't mind keeping it all 240V.

Any suggestions (including models, supplier and cost) would be most appreciated. Keep in mind I want this to be a totally automatic system, that can work when nobody is home to take action.

PS - any suggestions on air pumps to use as a longer lasting alternative would also be handy.

Just thought I'd report back on my UPS findings.

I ran the 70w pump continuously from ~6.15pm to ~10.30pm before the UPS ran out of charge. Hence, about a solid 4 hours. Given I run a 30min on/60min off cycle, I reckon I would get anywhere from 10 to 12 hours out of this. Certainly good enough for most outages before I could take remedial action (i.e. petrol generator). Therefore, I think I can survive for now until the UPS batteries deteriorate (dunno how long they'll last!).

I am an electrical engineer, so this backup supply stuff is up my alley.

I would like to have solar panels when the price lets me. Meanwhile I have setup a backup system that has all the components that I would use with solar panels. Solar panels can feed a charge controller that not only keeps your batteries charged with optimal use of the solar energy, but also runs periodic 'desulfanating' cycles that equalizes the cell voltages and rejuvenates the batteries plates. Batteries last twice as long with this treatment. Mine is a very nice one that handles 40amps of solar panels and it cost $110, but I have seen 9amp units for $60. Goggle for 'solar charge controller' or go to a solar panel web site of your choice to find these. I do use two 6volt golf cart batteries in series. I got these at SAMS big box store for $60 each. Inverters are sold everywhere now for use in cars, campers, cabins, etc. Harbor Freight has some and so does SAMS and Home Depot and Lowes. Remember that inverters with larger rated watts also use up more power just operating themselves. You would want one that has a rating about twice your planned load. In my case a duty cycled 70 watt pump and a full time 60 watt air pump and a 12 watt controller computer. So I use a 300 watt inverter. Sometimes equipment does not like the stepped sine wave that cheap inverters produce rather than sine waves. In my case, the pumps and computer are OK with it. That saves a lot of money (sine wave is considerably more expensive). Do not just do the math on watts/amps for battery life. Remember that the inverter is eating some of your battery and pumps use different power using this stepped voltage rather than sine wave. In place of the solar panels, I run a 24 volt/20amp power supply I plug in house power. That is a bench supply used for electronic work. I got mine at www.mpja.com under single output power supplies. You might want the 'FS-320C24' 24volt/12.5amp supply for $24.95. Only use 24 volts into a charge controller setup for that voltage input (most of them are). The proof is in the pudding (what the hell does that mean?). Anyway just disconnect the plug from the wall and see how long it runs. In my case it was just over 8 hours.

My approach is a bit complicated, but it has the advantage that I am solar ready when the price comes in range. If you have any questions, please ask.