I have been using  a 650va  Superb UPS for more than  3 years now.  The beauty of Inverter/UPS is that  once you start to use it, u can never stop.

I bought the UPS in 1998 and later dumped it (thank God I did not throw it away) so when it was time to get a 1 KVA  inverter for N28,000  I had a rethink  and got a 50ah battery charger instead for  20k and a 100ah deep cycle battery for 22,500.

Since then I use the ups with the battery fully charged for  4.5hrs every evening  with my
21" 90 watts TV,
25 watts decoder and 2 15watts cfl bulbs

the above loads are used continuously  with other bulbs coming on n  off  

NOTE: once the UPS blinks,  the TV and decoder is turned off by 11.30 and  2 standing fans in the bedrooms are turned on  with all lights off till 6am in the morning and the  UPS will not blink.

I still use it to  blast music  for about 1 hour before I leave home for work.

With the 50ah battery charger, it takes approximately 5 hours to get fully charged. and with my 2.5kva generator I can charge the battery with the freezer on and  while I watch TV and recouping almost 100% of what i spent to buy the fuel used to run the gen.

That it the beauty of inverter. Even when you are on gen, you are still saving money spent on fuel.  between Oct 2009 and Sept.2010, my street was in total darkness and  my inverter was the saving grace from the heat and noise.

IF YOU CANNOT AFFORD TO DO IT BIG TIME, JUST TRY MY STYLE.

A brand new UPS goes for about 5k  in computer village and you can get a technician to use soldering iron to disable one leg of the tiny speaker that beeps that annoying sound.  You will know when the battery is low because the light will start to blink continously and  not at intervals.

PS: my battery still gives thesame output till date.

If you want more info on INVERTERS and SOLAR ENERGY on Nairaland,   click https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-390522.0.html

and learn from the masters of the game. You will be amazed what u will find.

I have been using a locally built inverter in the last 5 years (don't know the size) and it has been very reliable, it powers conviniently 3 fans, tv and energy saving bulbs and atimes it works 18 hrs non- stop. All that i have done was to call the guy and change the batteries twice.

for price http://www.rolofcomputers.com/html/inverters_ups.html\
for load calculation and advice call 08098733709 for free
for installation call 08098733709
juo

for those who want to buy external charger, think of over charging, it can kill your battery. there may be no regulator in some external charger

juo
TWO things you have to consider in buying external charger
1 semi automatic this will indicate and give alarm when its fully charger
2 fully automatic this will regulate to trickle charge. i mean to float charge and keep it charge for use anytime you need to use it

if this is missing then you will have to get meter to monitor rate of charge if you know how to do it.

some will go and buy ordinary charger

Quick calculation on the load terminologies.
KVA->Kilovolt x Ampere which is power (Watts) so more like KiloWatt. 1KW=1KVA.
Before U use anything check the manual for the power requirements. The reason why NEPA charges faster is because NEPA supplies increased voltage and generators do not. To boost NEPAs voltage use a stabilizer.


from the above i want to do some clearity on it

1kw is not 1kva kva rating is higher that kw rating 1kva /1.6 = kw=625watt
i disagree that nepa charger charging faster , i want to tell you that a generator with a constant output of 220v charger faster than a nepa that is 200v cos i draw 25amp some times when when my battery is flat with my 2.5kw generator.

actually to boost nepa you can use up to 5kva stabilizer to boost i agree with that

@femiolorun we are not talking about theory but practical. even 200v nepa will charge faster than gen of 220v. the thing there is volts and amp.
nepa produces higher amp than gen no matter how big

fully charged 200ah battery with gen may be 6hrs can last 7hrs
fully charged 200ah battery with nepa may be 4hrs can last 9hrs

what is the deference? = amp

i have done this practical in my house

Good stuff

maybe you have to check what your gen is supplying remember i stresses that voltage eguation, if i tell you a 200amps deep cycle discharged to 7.3volt took only 1.5hours to charge with 25amp charger from a generator of 218volt and if you have a nepa that supply less you will not achieve that? will you believe?
the Good things abt this stuff is that ability to charge back your battery with little hours

let me add that the amp is what you are draining out and must need to be refill by charging

Tips in purchasing and maintaining your inverters:
It’s interesting as well as commendable the kind of seasoned knowledge that people have on inverters just for the fact that they use it. A well maintained inverter system makes it durable.
- Always go for the best deep cycle batteries regardless the cost, go for American batteries if u can. Egs of good brand of batteries are Sukam, deka
- It’s better to have redundancy in terms of batteries than to drain them, there are load calculations that guide the amount of batteries required in an inverter system but note that draining batteries will dramatically shorten their lifespan.
- And talking about the inverter capacity, do not overload your inverter, normally it’s better not to go above 70% of the inverter capacity. The calculation could be done to know what load you can use by checking the total rating of the appliances against the inverter capacity.
- If you can afford American inverters like magnum, you are sure of some protective features which enhance the lifespan; if not Indian inverters have proved to be also ok from experience, eg Nexus. dont have much experience on nigeria inverters though.
You can call me for load analyses and other directions you may require. I’m an electrical engineer for inverter and solar power.
And in case you are considering been independent of PHCN by taping into the free energy of the sun, contact me on email: abayomitalk2@yahoo.com

Those Deep Cycle batteries are not seen in Jos and I want to believe if one sees one it must be Chinese-made. I think I will order from Lagos. Oladepo aiigh? I've 800-1200Watt of Inverter, chinese-made and I want to use 200AH deep cycle now on or 2x100AH battery (connected in parallel) because the Inverter is 12V. Am enjoying my present 160AH Dry Cell battery connection and output but I know from day1 that deep cycle battery will serve me better. I hope the latter won't damage my inverter.It is Chinese and okay.

The latter as you have said will not damage your inverter if it has enough cooling system and enough vent to make it cool dool, also connection in parallel is good but make sure the positive is taken from the first battery and the negative is taken from the second battery this will allow equal useage both in voltage and internal resistance

I'm really appreciative of people who are willing to share their personal & professional experience as regards any topic. Does anybody have an idea, how much should I expect to spend on the Inverter & the Battery, (buying & Installation) to power these items below consistently for 8--10 hours daily.

1. (2) 2HP Split Air-conditioner.

2. (2) LCD TV's.

3. (1) Stand Alone Fridge.

4. (1) Freezer.

5. (1) Home Theater.

6. (2) Ceiling fans.

7. (1) PC & printer.

8. (6) Light Bulbs.

Thanks guys.

House i've got additional info here:

some pple are asking for the good brand: i am not sure if mine is the best but i use Genus.
(over 2yrs now)

It is very easy to maintain, if it stops working make sure u can tell the last thing u did b4 it stopped. simply bring out the fuse (the type used for stablizers) it is sold for N20, and replace it, it will continue to work.

It takes 5hrs for my 1.5KVA and 150amps battery (one battery) to be fully charged (it shows green light when fully charged) and i use it for 8hrs on the load equivalent to what ( I better pass) gen can carry.

so if you charge for 2hrs, u can use it for up to 4hrs, but if u reduce the load, u can use it for longer time.

Usage period depends on the load added. it doesn't spoil easily like i've read on this thread.

In my area, we dont ever have light, so i use 2.5KVA gen to charge it. when u r connecting i think it is better to put ur inverter on neutral, when u switch off from NEPA and GEN then the neutral point will be for inverter (in-case u have other pple in the house that will operate the inverter).

Doyin4real:

Can a UPS be used in place of an INVERTER?

Yes it can be converted if you have a background in electrical issues. : - 600VA UPS, if you want to change it so that it will run as an inverter.

Converting a UPS to standalone Inverter

You don't really NEED a schematic to do this, of course depending on the inverter. There are a few general tips I can give you on performing this conversion:
1. This is the most important. Establish the battery voltage of the internal battery. If the battery is in it, look at it for markings indicating it's voltage. If it's 12 volts you're golden. The UPS I converted (TrippLite Internet Office 500) uses a 12v battery with an operating range from 10 to 15v. This is ideal for automotive use because that's roughly the range you have with a car battery when in use (at least mine, when it's running it's usualy 14.5 to 14.7, off usualy around 12.5).

2. Establish that the UPS can easily be turned on without an initial 120v input. This is accomplished on the TrippLite by switching the power switch to on and pusing the test/mute button. This enables the UPS and switches it to battery voltage.

3. Locate the alarm buzzer or speaker. This should be pretty easy to find if you know what one looks like (take a look at a PC mainboard or two, often it's a little black cylinder about 1/3" in diameter with a small hole in the top. Remove the speaker, or disable it. Pretty simple. If you're fairly profficient with a souldering iron you can de-soulder it, otherwise just rip it off the board with a pair of pliers (remove all of it, right down to two stubs poking up from the board). If you want to replace it later on, say you want to convert it back to a UPS it's pretty simple.

These are really the main concerns when performing this conversion. If the battery voltage is different you will need to construct a power regulator to get the desired output from your car battery. If you cannot get the UPS to turn on without being plugged into household current, you'll need a schematic. If you can't find the alarm speaker you'll be listening to it go off constantly (unless you want to put it in your trunk or something).

One other thing you might want to do: Add a fan. Power inverters use their casing as a huge heatsink. Most UPSes are encased in plastic and aren't as well cooled. They don't have to be since their time spent as an inverter on a desktop is usualy less than 15 minutes. You may, if you want to get really involved, and be really safe, is to locate the MOSFET transistors within the unit and replace their heatsinks with a larger heatsink that you can attach a fan to. Depending on how long you want to use the UPS as an inverter per session this might be a definite concern.

Let us know how successful you are and share your experiences.

suv welldone even as a female you know what it entail but i guess you ar a technical person,

for enhyss
i will ask do you want to run all those stuff at the same time and what hours do you really want to run those stuff? this will give you and idea of what to buy

@enyhss
1. 7.5 KVA Sukam (120V) 350K
2. 200ah x 10 = 46k each x 10 = 460k
3. wire =15k
4. installation =20k
350k+460k+15k+20k= 845k
rough estimate.
budget 900k for that it may be higher or lesser depending on the model

femiolorun:

suv welldone even as a female you know what it entail but i guess you ar a technical person,

for enhyss
i will ask do you want to run all those stuff at the same time and what hours do you really want to run those stuff? this will give you and idea of what to buy

Thanks for your response. I'm pretty certain most of them would run concurrently except maybe light bulbs, PC and the ceiling fans might run half the time stated earlier.

JUO:

@enyhss
1. 7.5 KVA Sukam (120V) 350K
2. 200ah x 10 = 46k each x 10 = 460k
3. wire =15k
4. installation =20k
350k+460k+15k+20k= 845k
rough estimate.
budget 900k for that it may be higher or lesser depending on the model

Thanks for your response. Few questions here; how many kva generator would be required to charge the battery conveniently . 2ndly, somebody mentioned Magnum brand as regards the Inverter, what do you think? & finally are these batteries 6v or 12v 200ah? Your e-mail address & or cellphone # might be useful too If you don't mind.Thanks again.

@Guyman02 650v ups can only charge a battery of about 12v/10ah. 24v/18 if is more than this the battery will not charge. apart from apc 12v/12ah, 24v/24ah. not the Indian made.
ups can only drain but can't charge anything above 30ah

@SUV: Any dealer address/contact for the Genus Inverter. Am in Lagso state. Many thanks!

is 12v
for load calculation and advice call 08098733709 for free
post your load for calculation ( for free)

why wasting 900k on inverter so i see it, thats reming me i once saw an inverter installed for 1.5m and all it could do is to back up for only 3hours, so what is the usefullness to nigerians, the funnest thing abt this so call expensive inverter is that once they are down hardly will you able to put them back to work, for house use and you have ac to run what you will need will not pass 6kva. for load chart i will paste for free by tomorrow so that you can do the assignment your self and know the rating you will order for.

kshow1:

I have been using a locally built inverter in the last 5 years (don't know the size) and it has been very reliable, it powers conviniently 3 fans, tv and energy saving bulbs and atimes it works 18 hrs non- stop. All that i have done was to call the guy and change the batteries twice.

Many do not realize this. To them, if it is not foreign and expensive; it is not real. Our clients that we build inverters for have been using it for more than five years without complaints except to add more batteries in order to make it serve longer since they can no longer imagine living without power inverter.
We also make it very affordable and install ourselves to avoid problems by your electricians. We give one year warranty (though for five years now we've not had clients bothering us except asking our products for friends).
Our office/workshop is at Alagbole~Ajuwon (0806.060.6166).
'Segun Olawoye.

problem with locally made inverter is, if the inverter is 24v. it drains the battery till 18v before cutting off. therefor killing the battery. so on with the rest

JUO:

problem with locally made inverter is, if the inverter is 24v. it drains the battery till 18v before cutting off. therefor killing the battery. so on with the rest

It's not always true. Some users cause it. Even where the inverter has an inbuilt mech of auto trip-off when battery reaches a level, some users will still force it to supply them with the assumption 'shebi it will still work na'. At the end, the battery drains off untimely, lasting less than five years before requiring replacement. The inverter will continue to supply all the same.

i got more than i bargain for when posting the topic, fuel is killing my pocket hence the need for the post.


i am making my move, enof of frequent visits to the filling station.


I ran a cyber cafe of 10 systems in an area where PHCN is non existent.

i spend N700 daily on fuel, i need to find a solution very fast,

The knowledge we are getting from this thread is priceless kudos to all contributors.
Pls i wud like to know the requirements to power a one horse power window unit a/c and a single energy bulb plus a lap top for 6-8 hours at least. I don't need to power everything at home at same time just necessities will do for now. Thank you.

nice replies , pls wld like to know the most approprate inverter to buy for a provision shop that has about 7energy saving bulbs, a long fridge and 3 ceiling fans. Also the best battery to use. And lastly the cost of all of these.

@seal777 just few advise. to use inverter to run cafe
rule
1. learn to shutdown the system when no one is using it
2. the 10 systems must not be on at the same time on inverter
3. your system must be lcd monitor with 230watts cpu max or pc station
4. minimum of 2500watts not kva and 400ah battery
if not your money go loss
goodluck