measuring duty cycles of 12v fridges

Submitted: Friday, Feb 16, 2007 at 22:14
ThreadID: 42396 Views:6945 Replies:6 FollowUps:11
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For anyone pondering how to measure the amps consumed running a fridge over a given period, I have worked out a simple solution. I simply installed a 12v analogue clock in parallel with the compressor of the fridge. If the clock is set at 12, it then acts as an hour counter showing the amount of time the compressor has been running. The duty cycle does not matter as the clock is only powered up when the compressor is on and stops when the compressor is of. This means that at any time the runtime of the compressor can be seen by looking at the clock. It is then just a matter of multiplying the runtime by the power consumption of the fridge typically approx 4 - 5 amps to calculate the power drawn from your battery. I have also placed a switch on the clock so that I can turn it off when running the fridge on 240v or car alternator thus preserving the battery only runtime. Cost was minimal, in my case an old vdo 12v clock, switch and wiring. The clock draws negligible current, in my case less than a computer fan.
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