Bongo Fury

scanner wrote:

missfixit70 wrote:Depends how much you're gonna use it, around £90 for a decent 1000w inverter, big enough to boil a small kettle, run a small hairdryer, straightners, chargers etc. As I said it's worked for Freewheeler for years, more than paid for itself by now, don't knock it till you've tried it

You can buy a 1000w gennie for about that and far more efficient, even more than running the engine to keep 1000w going.

I think by the time you'd got the generator out, hooked it up, got it started (pull cord only for £90!) the folk with the inverter would have finished their coffee and washed up! It's horses for courses - for a few minutes and inverter is best, if you are running for hours then a generator is the best bet.

Aethelric wrote:

scanner wrote:

missfixit70 wrote:Depends how much you're gonna use it, around £90 for a decent 1000w inverter, big enough to boil a small kettle, run a small hairdryer, straightners, chargers etc. As I said it's worked for Freewheeler for years, more than paid for itself by now, don't knock it till you've tried it

You can buy a 1000w gennie for about that and far more efficient, even more than running the engine to keep 1000w going.

I think by the time you'd got the generator out, hooked it up, got it started (pull cord only for £90!) the folk with the inverter would have finished their coffee and washed up! It's horses for courses - for a few minutes and inverter is best, if you are running for hours then a generator is the best bet.

Yep and they could probably have fried bacon & eggs on the inverter as well.

I have an inverter and a generator and can see the point of both - but really worry about the current drain and inefficiency of the inverter, ever felt how much heat one pumps out?

Inverters are quieter though.

Freewheelers inverter runs virtually cold for what they use it for, I'm sure if you were to use it for prolonged periods under heavy load it'd get hot, but that's not what's being talked about here, the original post was about making a quick cuppa.

missfixit70 wrote:Freewheelers inverter runs virtually cold for what they use it for, I'm sure if you were to use it for prolonged periods under heavy load it'd get hot, but that's not what's being talked about here, the original post was about making a quick cuppa.

I think I'll go with the flask option, and wait for my gas hob to go in and use that to boil the kettle - it seems the quicker (by far) option. Thanks for all the input guys.

By the way - anyone want to buy a 12v kettle????

hembramacho wrote: By the way - anyone want to buy a 12v kettle????

Stick it on ebay as a "Bongo" kettle......................

scanner wrote: Yep and they could probably have fried bacon & eggs on the inverter as well.

I have an inverter and a generator and can see the point of both - but really worry about the current drain and inefficiency of the inverter, ever felt how much heat one pumps out?

Inverters are quieter though.

Typical inverters are around 90-95% efficient, but that still means that if you are pulling out a kilowatt that the poor old inverter is absorbing 50-100Watts, which is a lot (almost as much as the 12V kettle which is the subject of this thread). At a kilowatt they will be taking about 90Amps, about half the current that the starter motor takes. However as long as the cooling in the inverter is adequate, and the fan inlet and outlets are not blocked, and the heat can escape, they are designed to cope with it. A good leisure battery should laugh off heating enough water for a couple of cups of coffee, especially if the engine is running. The battery will be topped up again after 10 minutes of driving.
I would worry about using a high power inverter without a leisure (or at least a secondary) battery though.