car inverter

[Ash]

I had an autoelectrician come out and install a cigarette lighter point where I planned to put an inverter in the van.

I set up the inverter today and thought, lets put an RCD adaptor and put a power strip through it, started up, pressed the reset button on the RCD adaptor and bang, big spark where the leads connect and the fuse for the cigarette lighter had blown.

I moved the inverter to the old cigarette lighter without the RCD adaptor and it all worked ok.

I'm guessing the RCDs and cars don't like each other?

 

[mikep]

May be to do that they give out a Square wave instead of a Sine wave and some won't charge your battery chargers due to they are switch mode chargersfor drills etc.

See if anyone else agree's.

Hope this helps, Mike

 

[Sidewinder]

Can't see the point in an RCD on an inverter supplied from a van myself, but hey ho.

As far as the rcd goes, not sure, as I don't know what the rcd was nor which type of internal mechanism, so can't comment.

 

[steptoe]

would this not come under electrical separation?

so would agree with SW that NO RCD required, well, its actually pointless having it,

 

[Andy™]

RCD is a bit pointless. my inverter & genny dont have RCD protection, only mains hookup does.

whilst the test button on an RCD may work, in reality, the RCD wont. inverters are usually IT unless you modify the output

also, cigarette lighter point is a little undersized for most inverters. at most, you can get 15A through one. which is about 150w at mains voltage. my inverter is wired in 25mm

 

[Ash]

the rcd was more just a little experiment

 

[batty]

the rcd was more just a little experiment

Self destruct experiment?

 

[Ash]

seems so