BrockWI
Well-known member
I finally got to try this out last night. I have a Xantrex Prowatt SW2000. I have the inverter connected with 24" #2 welding cable and big beefy jumper cable clips. I turned the leaf on in park, with the parking break on then connected the positive to the positive on the battery, then connected the negative to the body of the top part of the motor. I turned on the inverter to find it sitting at a nice, 13.2v. I connected up a 1650w electric heater starting first on low at 600w, the voltage dropped a bit to 13.0v and I let it sit for a few minutes checking the connection to make sure nothing got warm. Then I turned it up to 1650w, to my surprise the voltage still only dipped to 12.8v and some of that is likely due to the #2 wire and clips. Again I ran it for about 5 minutes and nothing got warm.
So I think this a great back up to my backup. We have 18kw of flooded lead acid batteries (8 L-16's) with a xantrex 6048 that produces 6000w at 240vac powering most of the load in the home (not electric dryer or evse or geothermal). Typically I charge the batteries via 3kw of solar and the inverter has a sell mode that supports any down stream loads with excess power. I can also charge the batteries via a Honda 2000i and a 120vac to 48 charger, an iota DLS-54-13 and had been using an idling car as backup with the smaller inverter but now I have another "silent" power source.
I doubt I will use it much, but it's nice to know I have it and nice to know if someone else is without power I could just pull up and run an extension cord
So I think this a great back up to my backup. We have 18kw of flooded lead acid batteries (8 L-16's) with a xantrex 6048 that produces 6000w at 240vac powering most of the load in the home (not electric dryer or evse or geothermal). Typically I charge the batteries via 3kw of solar and the inverter has a sell mode that supports any down stream loads with excess power. I can also charge the batteries via a Honda 2000i and a 120vac to 48 charger, an iota DLS-54-13 and had been using an idling car as backup with the smaller inverter but now I have another "silent" power source.
I doubt I will use it much, but it's nice to know I have it and nice to know if someone else is without power I could just pull up and run an extension cord