Michael Askin wrote: > Blimey - you going to be running a washing machine on that inverter? > (Without wanting to run your engine!).
Maybe; not finally decided yet whether or not I'm putting the washing machine back on board. But it is nice to be able to use anything I want to (including a 2Kw fan heater which we ran all evening when it was too windy to use the diesel stove) without having to run the engine :-) The reason for the large capacity is that I have lived aboard for 7 years and was frustrated by how much the need to run the engine pretty much every day restricted my life as I had a job which meant that I might be called to work away at very short notice. It was frustrating to come home to a cold boat with everything in the fridge having gone bad because the batteries were dead. They also didn't last very long. This way I can disappear for up to 4 days at a time without a second thought and without putting the batteries through a deep discharge cycle. The boat is now completely 24V (except for a 12V starter motor on its own battery recharged via a DC-DC converter) and I'm running a massive 260A alternator which runs the engine pretty hard at full output (we've seen it instantaneously hit 300A output shortly after starting which is a serious load. Its early days yet but it looks like I can run the engine for about an hour every other day and keep the system fully charged. I have a nice monitoring system that tells me the exact state of the batteries so I know when I need to run the engine and for how long at a glance. The electric motor idea was briefly discussed (not too seriously I hasten to add) as apparently I have enough capacity for this. If I use the diesel engine to charge the batteries and the electric engine to propel the boat (not necessarily at the same time) would I be allowed to carry on using red diesel? Steve NB Bream
