Member - Peter H (WA) replied:

I would always go pure sine. However why dont you get the 12v - 6v dropper from Dick Smith and run it from 12v?

Peter

Member - Doug T (Qld) replied:

Rusty_lux
There is a section to ExplorOz that deals with Inverters and will give you all the Info you need
Inverters on EO



Doug

David from EAC Supplies replied:

If is anything electronic we would recomend that you use a Pure Sine wave for safety, better than destroying something, cheaper in the long run and better if this were to happen 500 clicks from town!

Member - Mainey (wa) replied:

yes, PURE sinewave............ only real choice

anything else is just second best & yes less expensive

As the notion of some being only 85% efficient
Yes, some 'elcheapo' inverters are - but the better quality ones are over 90% efficient

Then there's the question of 90% of what ??

No one complains when they loose 10% of their 12v power getting to their Aux battery system & often they really don't even know it.



For shear efficiency use an inverter "matched" to power the product/s you use.

Eg.. don't use a 800w inverter only to charge a 'low drain' item, yes you WILL loose well over 10%
The larger the capacity of the inverter, the larger the loss, when charging a "low drain" appliance.
(unless you NEED the inverter to power something else and the 'low drain' item is just added to the load or it's 'urgent' that it's charged)
yes bigger may often be better - but is it efficient ?

However, if the Storage battery system is reasonably large and easily recharged (solar) then there is no real problem at all with having a large inverter capacity.