Originally posted by xxcalbier
there are other ways to do this even more primitive yet with which all you need is a fire to heat and you can move water from lower to upper container and then use that water to turn a wheel but this post could go on with how many net ways you can do this .using nothing but one way valves pips and metal containers and a fire even a wood fire or a garbage fire .and with this rig you could move thousands of gallons a day easy

I love this idea. to move water between two ponds or storage areas, like a mini hydro-electric damn.
Any desire to get this into the form of a plan (drawing) with a parts list, calculations, diy build instructions etc?

My guess is the standard alternators and batteries in cars would be really really useful, but as one poster pointed out, getting 110V (or 240V in Europe,Asia,Australia etc) is not a case of simply wiring 10 or 20 of them together with speaker wire

Having instructions on how to do stuff like this, to keep a standard 110/220V fridge or water pump working rather than rampaging across the countryside looking for 12V DC appliances would be preferable

How does one make a DIY inverter from spare car parts?

Well, I do not think an inverter would handle a refrigerator anyway, I do not believe it would be able to handle the initial current draw during start up. Refrigerators are terribly inefficient and quite honestly you would be wasting your precious resources powering one. There are more conventional ways of keeping things cool such as wine cellars, etc.

For the most part, inverters are not going to power a major appliance, and even if they can handle the draw, it would be a terribly inefficient way to power them.

As for water pumps, well we can return to the automobile again, almost all the cars today have 12 V DC fuel pumps. Run water through them for enough time to clear the gasoline out of them, and you have yourself a water pump.

If you need to turn something with a motor, how about using the power steering pumps in automobiles, they are basically hydraulic pumps.

Originally posted by Dreamwatcher
Well, I do not think an inverter would handle a refrigerator anyway, I do not believe it would be able to handle the initial current draw during start up. Refrigerators are terribly inefficient and quite honestly you would be wasting your precious resources powering one. There are more conventional ways of keeping things cool such as wine cellars, etc.

For the most part, inverters are not going to power a major appliance, and even if they can handle the draw, it would be a terribly inefficient way to power them.

Maybe I'm mistaken, but don't many people power their house by connecting a solar array through an inverter and then sticking that into the house circuit instead of the mains line?

Thanks for clarifying.

One other agenda of the thread is to get a clear idea of what we might need to purchase NOW as a community and what can be cobbled together if and when needed.

Maybe a few decent commercial inverters is a good idea, if this is going to be one of the key pieces of the puzzle in getting a rudimentary power source to interface with contempory electronics.

Also, if you are only looking to power electronics, there is really no need for an inverter with a little bit of study.

All the electronic devices in your house convert AC to DC and down step normally around 12 volts. A voltage regulator further refines the power to the exact voltage needed.

All that would be needed is to wire you 12 volt supply into the secondary side of the devices power supply and there will be no need for a inverter for these types of devices.

Just study power supplies a bit so you can recognize the primary and secondary side of a power supply, and learn to solder.

since the criteria here includes what to buy before a possible 'shtf' scenario, i
would stress that one will need to decide what appliances would be essential and
what would be deemed useless. it would not bode well within a community or single
dwelling that family a is running a dishwasher and washing machine when the rest of the community may
only wish a lighting circuit and possibly recharging for music players.
think about the appliances. toaster will be too much draw on any generating system.
electric kettle again too much draw.
after many years designing and installing stand-alone pv systems and instructing the owners of what
is acceptable and what is not, i have seen the results of abuse. burnt out inverters,
too much power usage with multiple appliances used at the same time.
if a system is built with total load taken into consideration ensuring that the
storage (batteries) and inverter systems are running below 40% at any given time,
the set-up should last many years.
thixotropic gel batteries are far better than lead type for draw as too much draw
from a lead battery will buckle the plates and degrade the capacity until it fails.
pure sine wave inverters are expensive whereas simulated inverters are good as long
as they are not pushed with too much electrical draw.
consider what is essential, what you want from the system and then sit down when
the load is equated into coin.
regards fakedirt.