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I have a landcruiser / prado (2020) in Europe with a plug in the back that has 220V and 150W. Can I somehow increase this wattage to 800-1000W so I can plug in a spot removal machine?

My car has 2 batteries, so I feel like it should be able to output some power. I am not sure if its LiFePo4 or lead-acid or something else.

Is an inverter able to do that? Will this damage the batteries in any way? How do I limit the damage to the battery (for example not deep discharging).

I just want to run it for 30-60 minutes.

Why did they put a plug in with such high voltage, that can't even run a rice cooker? Its basically the same wattage as the lighter plug in the front.

brhans
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user1721135
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3 Answers3

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Yes, you could theoretically run a higher wattage connection to run your spot removal machine. Can you do it to the outlet you are trying to utilize right now? Not without a new inverter and new wiring (thicker gauge) from the battery. You'd be better off to leave what is there in place and run new wiring and a stronger inverter. You'd also want to run the vehicle while doing this, because an automotive 12v system with wet lead/acid batteries in it doesn't really have that much reserve capacity, nor will it stand up to the constant charge/discharge cycles they'd be put through. You need deep cycle batteries for this.

A much better option would be to get some type of portable power bank which can be charged separately and then used as needed. The main reason I say this is, if you, for some reason believe you can run the spot remover off of the batteries in the vehicle and then get a little carried away and completely run your batteries out of power, you'd be left stranded. A portable battery bank may run out of power, but if it were to happen, you'd still have battery power in your lead/acid batteries to start the car.

Pᴀᴜʟsᴛᴇʀ2
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Yes, you can, BUT:

  1. The pair of batteries in LandCruiser (in theory) contains ~1800Wh of energy, of them the usable amount is ~700Wh. If your load is e.g. 700W, this amounts to running it for less than 1 hour.
  • These batteries really don't like to be deeply discharged. Deep-cycle batteries do exist, but at a price.
  • Modern cars tend to keep their batteries in 50-70% state-of-charge for fuel economy reasons. This also limits the available energy.
  • You have to be able to start your engine. This requires ~15% of the energy in the batteries left. The more, the better, esp. as the batteries age.
  1. An option is to leave the engine running while using the electricity. You may not like the exhaust fumes around.
  2. You will need a way bigger than the original inverter, mounted somewhere near the batteries. In a tightly-packed engine compartment of a modern car, this can prove challenging. The car warrranty may suffer as well.
  3. An ampere-hour counting battery monitor is also advisable.
fraxinus
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Why did they put a plug in with such high voltage, that can't even run a rice cooker?

I suspect the reason is so people can charge their electronic gadgets, particularly laptops, easily.

Laptop charging was until recently, a mess of different connectors (some standard some proprietary) and proprietary methods of signalling to the laptop how much power the supply could deliver. "Car chargers" running of 12V did exist, both units specific to one manufacturers charging system, and "Universal" units with a bunch of interchangeable tips, one of which might suit your laptop but they weren't something most people owned and unless you made careful comparisons beforehand it was far from gauranteed that a "universal" charger would work with any particular laptop.

In recent years, USB C has helped improve the situation but it's still far from ideal. USB C has many different modes voltage/current combinations. Virtually any USB charging port will charge a phone or tablet (though sometimes slowly), but laptops tend to be fussier about what modes they will accept. A basic USB C cable will only support up to 60W (20V 3A), higher power modes require special "electronically marked" cables. There are also still many laptops in use that don't support USB C charging.

All this is to say that often the easiest way to charge a laptop in a car was and to some extent still is, to use an inverter to step the cars voltage up to "mains" and then to use the power supply that came with the laptop to step that back down to what the laptop wants. Still a separate inverter, and a heavy cord to power it

An obvious way to make this even easier and more convenient for customers is to integrate the inverter in the vehicle. Then people can just plug in their laptop without buying any special stuff.

Larger inverters absolutely do exist, but they cost more, take up more space and require heavier cables to supply them (and connect them to the outlet if the outlet is not part of the inverter). Use of a larger inverter may also require installing larger batteries and a larger alternator to avoid problems with draining the batteries and/or it may require keeping the engine running while using the electrical equipment.

Ultimately, auto vendors have to tread a fine line between providing the features customers want and keeping the cost and fuel-economy of their vehicles in check.

Some EVs now support "vehicle to load", a special adapter is plugged into the charge point on the car, and the charge circuit in the car reconfigures itself as an inverter. This allows high power to be delivered cheaply because it's reusing mostly the same electronics as charging the car, and because the batteries operate at a much higher voltage.

Peter Green
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