chouchou
Member
When i wire up a cigarette lighter and plug in 150 W inverter it keeps blowing 20 amp use. When I plug in cigarette lighter in the lighter works fine. Any suggestions?
INVERTER
- Thread starter chouchou
- Start date
Danny
Well-Known Member
Check the polarity? Centre should be positive.
pappaecho
Well-Known Member
Does it blow it instantly or after a time?
If instantly it may be that the initial current draw is greater than the 20 amp fuse, as 150 watt is about 13 amps so you should be OK.
Have you tried the device connected directly to a battery?
Another thought... I had a cigar lighter socket on the boat which failed when using a pump which pumps up the Avon dinghy. It was rated at 16 amps and got very hot when the pump was in use. The pump only draws 9 amps.
Solved this particular problem by buying " banana" gold plate plugs and sockets from Maplin. These gems allow you to plug the said banana plugs into them but also has a terminal which takes spade connectors and at a push bare wires, and does not overheat! Perhaps you should try the inverter on a say a car cigar socket to see what happens - if it works OK there, then maybe the socket on the boat, like mine is suspect.
I also got rid of another cigar socket on the boat because plugging in even things like DVD audio players gave problems with poor contacts, and in this case it was clearly the plug which was of very poor quality
If instantly it may be that the initial current draw is greater than the 20 amp fuse, as 150 watt is about 13 amps so you should be OK.
Have you tried the device connected directly to a battery?
Another thought... I had a cigar lighter socket on the boat which failed when using a pump which pumps up the Avon dinghy. It was rated at 16 amps and got very hot when the pump was in use. The pump only draws 9 amps.
Solved this particular problem by buying " banana" gold plate plugs and sockets from Maplin. These gems allow you to plug the said banana plugs into them but also has a terminal which takes spade connectors and at a push bare wires, and does not overheat! Perhaps you should try the inverter on a say a car cigar socket to see what happens - if it works OK there, then maybe the socket on the boat, like mine is suspect.
I also got rid of another cigar socket on the boat because plugging in even things like DVD audio players gave problems with poor contacts, and in this case it was clearly the plug which was of very poor quality
roly_voya
Well-Known Member
This is probably due to some big capacitors in the inverter charging up, you get the same problem with switch mode chargers. You could try using slow blow fueses or as the last person said some form of plug in terminal. The invert does not need a fuse but the wiring to it might - especially the cig lighter, they are very poor quality conections and can easily overheat.
Spyro
Well-Known Member
Possibly just a faulty invertor, I had one do the same thing, it was puting a full short circuit across the socket.
