Wednesday the 19th of February, 2010
Boating at home again in the snow. It's snowing again. Weirdest winter I can remember. It must be global warming. HA. Maybe we need to burn some bad coal or let some old freon out of some tanks to stop the snow.
This picture is of the 2500 inverter I bought from Craigslist. It is going to be a great addition to Liquid Therapy. I have dual 30amp power connections on the boat. One power cord is currently exclusively the heat pumps. The other is all other 120V power. I will be using this with the shore power cord feeding the normal 120v stuff on the boat. This inverter has a flawless transfer switch. I checked it out in my den. Yep couldn't wait to check the inverter out after FEDEX dropped it off. Rolled it straight from the front porch to the den and had batteries and wires strewn about the den floor in no time. I connected a cord simulating the shore power cord to the source connection. I connected a socket to the load side of the inverter to simulate the 120v boat wiring. And, then simulating a huge 8D battery I used a wimpy lawn and garden battery. Everything powered up fine. At first I used a lamp to simulate the boat load. I unplugged the source power and could not tell the inverter had take over. Plugged the fake shore power (simulated shore power) cord in and the power switched back with not a blink. So to increase the load I got my wife's hairdryer. It ran fine and when I unplugged the shore power cord the wimpy battery ran the inverter heavier load for a few minutes before the inverter shut down due to the battery getting too low. This thing is great. I intend to power the inverter with the two 6v golf cart batteries that I currently use for the 12v house battery circuits. I will have three 12v systems when I get everything configured.
(1) STARTING BATTERY 8D size.
(2) HOUSE 12V SYSTEMS 4D size (after the existing 2 paralleled group 24 batteries die)
(3) INVERTER two 6v Trojan Golf Cart Batteries connected in series.
The existing battery charger works out well as it can charge 3 independent battery banks. I'm contemplating moving the charger's 120v source to the power cord that feeds the heat pumps. That way when we go visiting marina's I can get by with just one 30amp cord for the heat pumps and the battery charger. The inverter battery will be charged by the charger and the inverter will supply all the 120v power normally provided by the 2nd shore power cord. It has always irked me that the transient marinas charge $3.00 or more for each shore power cord. The one that supply the heat pumps uses a fair amount of energy, but the other cord may run nothing greater than a microwave and the hairdryer a few minutes. The inverter will easily supply what the 2nd cord would.
 I am wondering what the 55amp alternator on the engine is going to think of all this battery load. Might need a larger alternator.
I am installing a BlueSea "add a battery" management switch
( http://bluesea.com/products/7650 ) for the starting and house batteries. The output of this switch sends current to the starter on the engine. I will leave this switch in the 8D position all the time. I can also select the house battery for emergency starting. What is really nice about this switch is that it has a relay that connects the starting battery and house battery together once the engine alternator starts charging. So, while the motor is running it charges the starting and house batteries. When you cut the motor off, the relay drops and isolates the starting and house batteries. That is so much better than trying to remember to switch a battery switch to the "both position" while running and then remembering to move back to 1 battery when you cut the motor off. Forgetting the manual switch and leaving it in the "both position" while anchored out leaves you discharging the house and starting batteries. Hopefully you remember to move the switch before BOTH batteries end up discharged and the motor is unable to start. YIKES!
 So, this leaves me with the inverter batteries out of the motor charging loop. I have another 2 position manual switch that I will use tie the inverter battery to the house battery in the both position. If I forget to switch this off when anchored, the worst thing that would happen is the house and inverter batteries would be pulled down together. I'd still be able to start the engine. 
So, that's my boating from home today with the snow outside. Had to get outside and Susan and I built a snowman. Had't done that in a long time.
Later