Outlander PHEV's 1500W Inverter: Pure Sine Wave!

[twosout]

As I don't have the inverter, sadly, I'm not likely to see why. The little 12V battery would not have enough oomph (power) to drive an inverter, so the source is bound to be the main battery.

[Ridfenfun]

[/quote]
I would guess it takes power from the main drive battery. It doesn't work in accessory mode, it only works when the vehicle is switched on (i.e. the engine can kick in if the battery charge gets low). And if you go underneath the cargo mat and look at the 12V battery, you'll see why.[/quote]


Can you save me the trouble of going under the cargo mat; I'm assuming you mean the 12 volt battery is quite small???

[aucklander]

I am sorry if this is a really newbie question! I've just bought a japanese import Phev - it's a 2005 model and has a 1500w output that I believe (!) is 100v. I live in New Zealand where power is 240v. Can someone point me to a device that i need to be able to convert this power to run a small fridge (for camping) or should it 'just work'

Thank you so much!

[littlescrote]

or should it 'just work'

Depends if your fridge is designed to work on 100V.

Also, what frequency is the Japanese inverter, as half of the country is 50Hz and the other is 60Hz. Your fridge may not care.

[Daniel77]

I installed already the inverter, you don’t need diagrams for connecting the inverter, is easy, you need to connect to aux battery and is located in the boot. If you open the first half you can see the negative , 5 screws and you can take the cover and access the aux battery. I recommend one inverter over 2000w continue if you want to use 1500w without to have problems bigger is better but not to big to match the size with the space . My inverter is 2500 continues and 5000w peak and if i use 1500w not even starting the cooler. The car supporting 2200w without problems ( this is the limit) . 2000 is really ok. I used 2500 for short period but I don’t recommend for longer time.

[twosout]

I'm sure you could put an inverter across the auxiliary battery and it would "work".
BUT
A 1200W inverter will draw 100A and 2400W one, 200A (keeping the arithmetic simple).
You'd need a similar fuse and some hefty wires, too.
A problem will arise, I fear, if you consume more than half the capacity of the battery (which I'd imagine to be rather modest) because Lead-Acid doesn't tolerate that kind of thing.
I don't know how the aux battery is charged (from the main battery?) or at what rate, but I don't think it will be at the rate required to compensate to support the large inverters suggested. (But Mitsubishi do it, somehow.)

[littlescrote]

I'm sure you could put an inverter across the auxiliary battery and it would "work".
BUT
A 1200W inverter will draw 100A and 2400W one, 200A (keeping the arithmetic simple).
You'd need a similar fuse and some hefty wires, too.
A problem will arise, I fear, if you consume more than half the capacity of the battery (which I'd imagine to be rather modest) because Lead-Acid doesn't tolerate that kind of thing.
I don't know how the aux battery is charged (from the main battery?) or at what rate, but I don't think it will be at the rate required to compensate to support the large inverters suggested. (But Mitsubishi do it, somehow.)

All good points. Having a flat Aux battery is a disaster in these. Ideally you'd wire the inverter via a battery guard to prevent current draw at too low voltage, but getting one that would handle that current would not be cheap/easy (you could always do it via a contactor).

Mitsubishi do it on the factory fit one by tapping off the Drive battery, not the Aux battery. Doing that safely is another level as doing it on a 12V system presents no real dangers to the user/installer (despite the high current, that is irrelevant to shock hazard, it's the voltage/potential that drives a deadly current through the resistance of the body, and 12V cannot drive a high enough current to be harmful).

[pfffuv]

When I bought my 2019 SEL in the USA, I didn't do my research well enough and believed the Mitsu salesperson who told me it had the 120v inverter that the GT model has. I had visions of grandeur of running my house fridge from the car during a power outage, and was a bit deflated when I found only a cigarette lighter outlet (they didn't even include the heater coil element, would have been appreciated by my kids so they could light up their spliffs on road trips.)

Obviously, I am not too smart... and thus I don't understand all the technicalities of installing an inverter, and you'll have to forgive me for asking the simple question: what is problem with just using one of those common 12v cig lighter plug inverters on the 12 v outlet in the trunk?

I get it that my fridge has too high a surge for the 500W inverters you'd pick up at Costco, but can that little 12v outlet handle a more substantial inverter without resorting to custom wiring? Does that 12v outlet take power from the drive batteries or just from the miniature ICE battery?

Thanks-Sven

[twosout]

There are two things to consider:
1. The power of the inverter must be adequate for the item you want to use with it and the wires used must be large (thick) enough to cope with the current. 1200W = 12V x 100A! 100A requires very thick wires from a 12V source to the inverter. The wires will only be rated for 10 or 15A, I would guess.
2. The capacity of the source must be adequate for what you want to do. The tiny 12V battery may only contain 1/2kWh of useable power. Not only that, the battery will not tolerate such abuse. If you could connect to the Lithium battery, it would be entirely different: It has much (,much) more capacity and can tolerate high levels of discharge. Sadly, the 12V sockets draw from the 12V battery.