Tech

Nattery Backup - with style

Here are some pictures of the Battery Backup box that I mentioned on the net... It started out as just a vague idea, - a way to run multiple rigs on a single 20Amp power supply w/battery backup and to also have a battery that I can use for portable operation. The idea was to wire a distribution box directly to the battery and have the battery backup feature of the supply replenishing the battery whenever energy is drawn out of it. If at some point, the power requirements of the rigs exceeds the capability of the supply, the battery acts as a booster to provide the needed energy the supply can not. Once the power requirements fall below what the supply can handle, the supply then works to replenish the energy removed from the battery. I have tested this by transmitting on two radios at the same time (One on HF and the other on 2M), with an effective power draw of around 30amps, works great with none of the rigs dropping out. I will be doing some tests were I turn the supply off to see what kind of runtime I can get out of it running 50 - 100W on HF phone for doing Portable operation. This just started out as something simple, but it ended up morphing into this... Uses a small 35AH Lead Acid battery for now, has USB charging also.... It will also support the addition of Solar Cells and Solar Charger for Portable operation, may be a future enhancement... Here are some pics I took earlier, with only one rig connected. The power meter still needs a little more configuration... Ed - KD8YQQ