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pathfinderstu

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Hi, locked down here in sw Turkey and only allowed out of house with official permission, surviving on beer and Netflix , as in the 65+ age bracket ….locked the wife in a cupboard the other day but lost the key, I must remember to have another look for it tomorrow.....apart from that I want to test out some new 12 v electronics I have for a new boat supposed to be arriving from Jeanneau in July....a GPS, etc....my question is I have an old 12v mains adaptor I would like to power them at home with ...on it says output 12v......100mA. (1.2VA max) connected it to a voltmeter and it shows 15.5V power....do you think this would be safe to use on the electronics ? Thanks.
 
100mA isn't a lot! Why not just buy a small motorbike/lawnmower batt, or use any other suitably sized 12V rechargeable battery source, alongside a cheap charger and off you go.

There are many many other options inc buck-boost power supplies and all that but I'd personally keep it simple.
 
I'm not an electrician but I would guess it's floating a bit high due to lack of load. Connect something that actually pulls power and it will almost certainly drop down closer to 12v.

In any case, if the electronics are intended to be connected to a boat 12v supply then they ought to cope with even a true 15v, since this might be encountered during battery charging.

Whether the 0.1A is enough depends on how much power the new toy needs. Should be in the manual, and possibly marked near the power inlet.

Pete
 
Chart plotters typically use much more than 100mA though the new ones are better, indeed much electronics eats into battery life on boats. However as others have said the voltage with no load is higher than when on load. 15v is within expected range of supply, afterall my system charges at 14.2v and any device will hav some tolerance.

Your only problem is you might overheat your little charger and I am confused from the posting as to whether its 100mA or 1.2A. Give it a go unless charger is vital kit in which case take it steady. I use the 9v or 12v power packs from my old internet hubs and modems to run boat electronics at home
 
mjcoon said:
Oh, dear, I should have noticed that!
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You were probably looking at the post on a phone while I had the benefit of a nice big iPad!

Prob all irrelevant anyway as his wife will kill him when she gets out of the cupboard :)
 
dom said:
100mA isn't a lot! Why not just buy a small motorbike/lawnmower batt, or use any other suitably sized 12V rechargeable battery source, alongside a cheap charger and off you go.

+1 ...... Then you know you are running on a good DC supply at the correct voltage. These plug in cheap power supplies can give out all sorts of rubbish waveforms on the DC supply. I wouldn't risk my expensive, new equipment on them.
Either that or wire it to a cigarette lighter plug and go and do it in the car, if it's only to prove they power up ok.
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Your alternator gives out a rubbish spiky rectified supply and batteries do very little to smooth it. Any boat or car electronics has capacitors across the input to give smoothing so dont worry too much about spiky output from 12v chargers. Those good for internet hubs modems or external harddrives will have more than enough oomph and smoothing to meet your needs. Your 100mA charger probably has enough smoothing but cant supply the 2 or 3A you need
 
Thanks guys I leave electronics alone and too late to start learning now ..I really just want to upgrade the software on my chartplotter fish finder, so need to be indoors for my internet connection , so will try the one I mentioned...and there was something else I was going to do to
today and I can't remember....Cheers.
 
As others have suggested, most marine kit will tolerate a wide voltage range but check the specs. For example my Raymarine plotter says it needs 10.7v to 32v but it does also say there is a 12v and 24v version so I assume the working range for a 12v one is 10.7 to 16v.
However, 100mA is not much. My plotter says it needs 4A.
 
Giblets said:
Shouldn't that be "if"! :ROFLMAO:
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Lol, I was doing a spot of self-isolating in front of the TV on Saturday, whereupon my wife pulled me out and made me cut the lawn :(

Perhaps I‘ll ask if there’s room in that cupboard for her too ?
 
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