ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Using an inverter to run my battery charger

I know this sounds kinda weird but it seemed alright at the time. I keep a 400 watt inverter in my truck, and was out working in the middle of nowhere the other day. Lo' and behold both of my batteries died in my cordless. I decided to charge my batteries with my inverter(change DC to AC then back to DC again, doesn't sound very smart does it?)It charged my first battery alright but my charger died while charging the second.
Do you guys think it has anything to do with an inverter having a more square sine wave than a normal rounded one? Or doesany one have any ideas on what burnt in my charger? BTW its a Milwaukee 14.4.

Some of the lower-end inverters put out a modified sinewave, but many seem to have an output almost approaching a perfect squarewave!

I'd guess it could well be responsible for damaging the charger, especially as on modern tools the charger is likely to be a switched-mode type. That squarewave from the inverter will be very rich in harmonics, and could well cause problems for a SMPS.

Now, if you could just get the inverter to run a charger that's connected to the battery that's running the inverter.....

How old is the charger?
I would think that the charger shouldn't be any mor susceptible to non-sinusoidal input than other electronic devices such as televisions. Did you try to power anything electronic since then to see how it operates?
I actually like the idea of having the inverter to recharge battery packs.
Keep us updated, please.

Its about 2 yrs old Redsy, I can run all my other stuff from my inverter. It may have just been time for my charger to die. I know that new ones aren't cheap and its tough to go a day without a cordless anymore. I had to build a battery charger for my 4th year of trade school but this one seems to have a few more doo-hickeys than that one.

Hey CandandianSparky, try http://search.ebay.com/search/searc...ortProperty=MetaEndSort&BasicSearch= There seems to be a bunch of chargers here at decent prices.

Canadian Sparky I bought a 400 watt inverter from Canadian Tire, and planned on using it for the same reason as you. Never did but last month we had a power outage in town and I ran a 29" tv and satalite dish for @ least 3 hrs off of it no problems. May be the charger was already on the way out.