Friday, November 1, 2013

Inverters

Ahhh, the smell of freshly perked coffee!! A hot dinner, YES!!! Eggs and oatmeal on a cold morning, mmmm.

Simple pleasures that the non-trucking public take for granted.

Even in theses modern times, most semi-trucks come with a bunk, a few shelves, and little else. Somehow, they forgot that the monkey behind the wheel needs fuel just as much as that cat under the hood. Then again, maybe it's a great conspiracy with the truck stops who are in such a hurry to provide us with the latest greatest health killers on the market, like Micky D's.

Real restaurants with truck parking are getting scarce.

And the cost!! 3 meals a day at an average of $12 a meal for a total of  a whopping $252.00 a week add $1.00 a cup for coffee (I drink three a day), and you have spent $273 a week or about 1/3 of the average drivers paycheck. Who can afford it?!

Well, good news! There is a solution. Get an inverter.

Most companies will install an inverter for you, if you ask nicely. If you are an O/O then you should know how to instal one yourself. Be sure it is installed correctly or you may kill you batteries or cause a fire. That being said, what size and brand should you get?

Regarding size, it all depends on what you plan to run on it. For a 900 watt microwave, you will need at least a 1500 watt inverter as it will pull right about 1100 watts or so. My coffee pot pulls 670 watts while it is perking and about 60 watts to keep the coffee hot. When I say 1500 watt rating on the inverter, I mean continuous operating watts, NOT peek watts. The peek watts can only be maintained for a short time before the inverter overloads and shuts down. Most appliances pull a larger amount of wattage during start up, which is why the peek wattage is important. My opinion is, if your start up pull is greater than your continuous wattage, the inverter is too small.

Regarding Brand, get the best you can afford. That being said, let me tell you about the one I purchased a month ago.

The one I bought is the Whistler Pro-2000W (pictured above). What I liked about it was the price at $149.00 which is about $100.00 to $50.00 less than a comparable model at the truck stops. So far it has preformed like a champ. This past Sunday I cooked a weeks worth of chicken breast and pork chops in my 900 watt microwave and didn't have a lick of trouble with it overheating although I did have to run the big motor as my APU couldn't keep the batteries sufficiently charged under that much demand.

Already the Whistler Pro-2000W has paid for it's self and provided hot meals and fresh brewed coffee. I highly recommend it.

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