12 volt power inverter to charge batteries from my car?

[skiptv]

This discussion keeps popping up. So here is some real world answers as my job has me out in the field on remote locations daily. Power Inverters are the absolute worse thing you can buy to charge your drone batteries. If you do not leave your car running, you risk killing your Car Battery. An inverter as all of you know changes the DC in the Car too AC. The Electric Charging of a Drone Battery is taking AC Current and Converting it to DC current. So with the Inverter, You are going from DC to AC then from AC to DC. So completely inefficient. A better solution a Much better solution is to get a Battery Field Charger like the Energen Drone Max. You charge it over night and it will charge 4 Phantom Batteries at the Same time and doing that 3 times, or it will charge one Phantom Battery 8 times, you can also charge your controller, tablet or phone. You dont run the risk of killing your car battery or frying you Phantom Battery with a voltage surge off your inverter, Sure it cost way more than a cheap inverter, but didn't just spend $1800plus on your Drone?
https://www.amazon.com/Energen-Dron...pID=41jKiaD8k4L&preST=_SX342_QL70_&dpSrc=srch

 

[Skyler King III]

Can any of you guys recommend a power inverter to charge drone batteries from my car what are you using ?? any help is appreciated
What are the power requirements for an inverter to charge the Drone batteries?

I know and understand that. I said cools much quicker for safe charging because it makes sense that it's safer(er) to charge batteries in 70*s-80*s air than at 90*s-100*+...
The event I was talking about, the battery wasn't hot when I plugged it in (so it did start charging) but it stopped charging before fully charged because it did get hot enough for the safety to kick in IE un-safe...

I recommend using the Goal Zero yeti 400 lithium. That even without a power source will charge numerous batteries and a controller. However you can plug that into your 12 V cigarette lighter in your car and provide power to it if the yeti was not a ready fully charged it can charge and, well I should say it can be chargeD And also charge at the same time. In my particular case I use is Goal Zero solar panels to fully charge my yeti devices so I don’t need to connected to anything when I’m charging my batteries

 

[tcope]

Power Inverters are the absolute worse thing you can buy to charge your drone batteries.

So with the Inverter, You are going from DC to AC then from AC to DC. So completely inefficient.

Are you saying that it is the worse thing just because it is inefficient? If so, why is that so bad? If your vehicle is running anyway, where is the harm? You are not making use of the electricity generated anyway in that case.

 

[MtManDavey]

Lots of discussion here, with many adding technical notes. Here is my approach...

I like keeping my two P4P+ batteries charged after each job, which may use one or both batteries, depending on much flying I do to capture multi-acre properties for real estate listings. I get really good flight time out of each battery, no less than the specs published by DJI and always gets me complete coverage for a given job. If only one battery was used, switch them out to keep them both well exercised.

The other issue is not just charging the batteries, but also keeping the controller battery charged, which I did not see as part of this discussion but as a self contained + controller, uses more battery than a controller with external phone or tablet, which have their own source. My issue becomes how to charge "on the run" if I have more than one job in a day.

Several years ago, I bought a marine grade 12 VDC to 110 VAC 700 watt inverter to supply emergency power from a 105 AH marine grade battery to run my ham radio station if power goes out, and for other uses. With a new set of ham and public service radios going into my vehicle, I am installing a Blue Sea marine grade fuse block for 6 each 30 amp circuits, using 10 gauge wire directly from the battery to the fuse block. I can feed the inverter from the fuse block, and charge a battery and controller while driving, while engine running. I don't have time or energy to deal with a dead battery. My OEM DJI charger gives a complete charge for one battery and controller within 45 minutes. I can live with that.

Regarding the discussion about heat build up in the battery, I find the battery to be fairly warm after flying for 20+ minutes, so always let it cool off outside the drone after flying. Even living in Sacramento Valley summers, I don't find that ambient temperature per se is an issue, more the internal heat from use, so I do my best to take care of one of the most important camera systems I now use, my primary reason for owning the drone.

 

[psbmt1]

The Yeti 400 is the answer, you can use it for other stuff and when you buy a new drone it will still work...It is great

 

[MotorCycle-Man]

The Yetis $449.00
Yeti 400 Portable Power Station / Solar Generator | Goal Zero

 

[ribjig]

$17.99, no issues for 1+ years;
charges if car running or not...

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51y6DTgnjrL._SL500_AC_SS350_.jpg

 

[Harleydude]

Can any of you guys recommend a power inverter to charge drone batteries from my car what are you using ?? any help is appreciated
What are the power requirements for an inverter to charge the Drone batteries?

My business partner just installed a 3,000 watt inverter in his SUV (I believe it's rated @ 1500 watt continuous), which is way overkill. But if you're "droning" professionally as we are....MUCH better to have "too much" than not enough. The math is pretty simple:

DJI has a number of charger's for their birds. However, the OEM chargers tend to be 100 watts (Mavic 60 watts(?)). I have a 180 watt charger for my Inspire 1. The M600 Pro has a 600 watt charger than charges 6 batteries in parallel instead of series. But we also have laptops and iPads and other peripherals we charge/run out in the field. Since this is the P4 forum, I assume you use a 100 watt charger.

I believe this is the model my partner purchased:

https://www.amazon.com/VertaMax-Inverter-Cables-Remote-Control/dp/B06XPRJ1HB/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1532194570&sr=8-3&keywords=car+charger+3,000+watt

On my recommendation, he had installed at a car stereo shop. From a strictly electrical point of view, these things are almost exactly like a sub-woofer power amp. So it seemed logical to let a car stereo place install it. I think they charged $288 for the installation and they did an excellent job. My partner was able to expense it into a large job we have coming up.

To stress test it, I had him run a 1500 watt hair dryer through it for 5 minutes. He said it held up great.

I'd say the power inverter is worth not having to lug around that 3,000 watt gas generator.

D

 

[offroadpyro]

Wow all that information.All you need to do is buy the car ccharger.It works awesome charges two batteries and controller in about an hr.Cost was like $35.00 bucks.I have a 1000 watt inverter but the car charger works faster than the home 120 volt charger.It's a easy plug it in and by the time I change location my batteries and remote all charged.

 

[DOC 1500]

My business partner just installed a 3,000 watt inverter in his SUV (I believe it's rated @ 1500 watt continuous), which is way overkill. But if you're "droning" professionally as we are....MUCH better to have "too much" than not enough. The math is pretty simple:

DJI has a number of charger's for their birds. However, the OEM chargers tend to be 100 watts (Mavic 60 watts(?)). I have a 180 watt charger for my Inspire 1. The M600 Pro has a 600 watt charger than charges 6 batteries in parallel instead of series. But we also have laptops and iPads and other peripherals we charge/run out in the field. Since this is the P4 forum, I assume you use a 100 watt charger.

I believe this is the model my partner purchased:

https://www.amazon.com/VertaMax-Inverter-Cables-Remote-Control/dp/B06XPRJ1HB/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1532194570&sr=8-3&keywords=car+charger+3,000+watt

On my recommendation, he had installed at a car stereo shop. From a strictly electrical point of view, these things are almost exactly like a sub-woofer power amp. So it seemed logical to let a car stereo place install it. I think they charged $288 for the installation and they did an excellent job. My partner was able to expense it into a large job we have coming up.

To stress test it, I had him run a 1500 watt hair dryer through it for 5 minutes. He said it held up great.

I'd say the power inverter is worth not having to lug around that 3,000 watt gas generator.

D

500 installed sheeesh ... I'll do it myself

 

[BlackBeauty11]

I see the options for the Yetis 400, and the Energen DroneMax for 4 battery charges or less.

But what would you go with if you needed to charge say 10 more batteries in a single day?

 

[Vexed]

Can any of you guys recommend a power inverter to charge drone batteries from my car what are you using ?? any help is appreciated
What are the power requirements for an inverter to charge the Drone batteries?

Only buy the genuine DJI car charger, aftermarket chargers will destroy your battery and your drone will fall out of the sky

 

[Vexed]

I see the options for the Yetis 400, and the Energen DroneMax for 4 battery charges or less.

But what would you go with if you needed to charge say 10 more batteries in a single day?

You would buy 10 seperate genuine DJI car chargers with 1 to 10 12v adapters. You would tgen need to buy a fire extinguisher and have it in the vehicle for safety or your car may catch fire as you will be draining more amps than the car battery can handle. I suggest a duel battery setup

 

[DOC 1500]

Hey guys I got my power inverter in the mail today about an hour and a half ago. The one pictured in post
# 29... hooked up the supplied alligator clamp wires to the inverter, connect to the battery, car not running , used my DJI single battery white charger and charged two batteries one at a time . The one had two lights the other one had one light , took a little over an hour to charge both of them. The inverter has a digital display which I noticed the voltage never dropped below 12.2 the whole time charging both batteries, and actually the voltage reading went up a little. I never did start the car. So far I'm pleased with my purchase.
This inverter is going to be a game-changer out in the field. I don't have to worry now about running out of batteries even though I have three.
Also forgot to mention but a good point, the inverter never really got that warm the fan never came on to cool it.

 

[MackeyC34]

Question, using a typical cigarette lighter charger for our batteries (in my case P3 4K), about how long to a full charge from, let's say, a 35% starting point?

 

[umanbean]

Question, using a typical cigarette lighter charger for our batteries (in my case P3 4K), about how long to a full charge from, let's say, a 35% starting point?

The factory charger that came with my P3 Pro is rated at 17.5v @ 5.7A

The P3 cig lighter charger I bought from Amazon is rated at 17.5v @ 5A

So, everything else being equal, the cig lighter charger would take about 12-14% longer than the factory charger.

 

[Manxmann]

Can any of you guys recommend a power inverter to charge drone batteries from my car what are you using ?? any help is appreciated
What are the power requirements for an inverter to charge the Drone batteries?

Why mess about ? Get the DJI charger, I did & find to be excellent, I can charge RC & battery at the same time.
Suits me just fine.

 

[The Phantom]

They said on an Ask Drone U podcast that you need to buy a "Full Sine" inverter. Others will shorten the life of the battery. Can anyone expand on why a partial sine wave inverter would hurt a battery. Oops. I did not see Post #39 before asking this question. Thanks

With "Full sine wave" do you mean pure sine wave or?
And with "partial sine wave do you mean modified sine wave or?

 

[The Phantom]

Why mess about ? Get the DJI charger, I did & find to be excellent, I can charge RC & battery at the same time.
Suits me just fine.

Well first of all an inverter that is a few hundred watt is often cheaper than an original DJI car charger, especially if its an modified sine wave inverter.
Secondly an inverter can be used for other things as well, and not only for charging one specific type of DJI battery.

 

[With The Birds]

With "Full sine wave" do you mean pure sine wave or?
And with "partial sine wave do you mean modified sine wave or?

If your nitpicking- modified square wave = partial sine wave is probably the best place you will end up keeping these semantics having any factual basis.