thebes Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 I've really been thinking about this for quite a while, and that's to purchase a power inverter with charger, connect a battery(s) to it and run my main stereo system off it. Even though I have a generic Monster Power center, to me it's just a glorified circuit protector. Even when using this I can tell when the grid gets quite and the music suddenly seems to bloom. I'm thinking that by using batteries I'll be off the grid altogether and get a nice quite rounded presentation from my system. My main systems in my system so running the cable from the batteries will be easy. First question, has anybody done this and with what results. Second, I'll be running a 35 watt tube amp, a tube line and phono preamp, a TT and a tubed cd player. Would say a 700 watt inverter do? Third, How do I figure out how much playing time I will get with one battery to determine if I need additional batteries to power the system for about 10 hours on a charge. Forth, I've been looking at the Tripp Lite's and they recommend deep cycle or golf cart batteries. Should I go 6, 12 or 24 volt and what about amperage etc. and will such batteries cost a ton of dough? Finally, will the battery power being sent through this inverter be quiet or will I have to mod the Tripp Lite with fancy caps or something to get what I want. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LarryC Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 I guess you're ready to convert to DC? Or don't I understand? A very low-voltage part of my preamp runs off of permanently charged rechargable batters buried deep in the chassis. How about a trial of a PS Audio AC regenerator, limited to maybe 250 watts output? I find it does wonders for the sound from anything run by an AC motor (TT, tape deck, CD player). Very expensive new.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CECAA850 Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 Second, I'll be running a 35 watt tube amp, a tube line and phono preamp, a TT and a tubed cd player. Would say a 700 watt inverter do? How do you plan on running 120v AC components off of a 12V DC battery? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheEvan Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 The kind of inverter Thebes is speaking of converts 12v car battery to 120v power. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JL Sargent Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 Looking at inverter outputs with an O-scope reveals less than perfect sinewave. Your hifi experience may worsen with rectified AC output of inverter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hifi jim Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 How about a trial of a PS Audio AC regenerator That'd be my pick too. PS Audio is among the best at providing clean AC power. The 300 watt models are selling for about $500 used. The Power Plant Premier will provide 1,500 watts of clean power, but these go for about $1,100 used. Batteries are an interesting idea, but providing enough juice for a tube amp would be tricky and expensive. Save the batteries for Class D amps. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
muel Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 I use an APC SmartUPS 1500. It corrects for high and low voltage and is supposed to put out a pure sine wave. Anyone ever put a scope on one of these? I don't know that it has improved or hurt the sound but it certainly sounds better when the power goes out! [] I like the protection too as I have seen the effects of lightning as well as brown outs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JJkizak Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 To me using an inverter seems like wasting a lot of money to accomplish nothing. Inherently poor sine wave output if you can call it a sine wave. It's more like a square wave (yes I have scoped them) and a square wave contains a huge amount of useless high frequency components. That's why they used square waves to test amplifiers. If the amp passes it without distorting the waveform you have a good amp. If you want to spend money invest into inline filters (filtrons) which cost a lot and filter out everything. That's what the big guys do. JJK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebes Posted February 3, 2010 Author Share Posted February 3, 2010 Oh man, looks like a can of worms for sure. I'm trying to get off the grid and get battery power to deliver the magic. If you'll search back in the Forums a lot of people used to like tweaking their system with the simple expedient of using a battery operated Walkman, propped up on an inflatable pillow for isolation. I was once at an estate sale where an obvious audiophile was running his stuff off a Tripp-Lite with a bank of 3 big-*** batteries. Then there's the PSA and other audio isolation stuff. First to me, I don't think it's the same thing I'm talking about, I'm not that extreme, but rather then throw big bucks at audiophile stuff, I'm thinking an industrial, lower cost solution maybe in order. JL, can you tell me more about the o-scope conversions, Have you done that testing, or simply acquired the knowledge along the way? I mean I'm not sure about this at all. Ramping 12 volts up to 120 and having it not degrade the signal sounds like an engineering challenge to me. However, on the other hand, construction sites and stuff that run off of inverters often have tv's playing while the same circuit is feeding a nail gun, I presume without turning the picture into snow, so why couldn't it work for me. Financially, I'm in the same leaky boat as most of you and I'd hate to sink a few hundred into a forlorn hope, when a little time here might get me to where I need to go, or no go. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hifi jim Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 I'm trying to get off the grid and get battery power to deliver the magic. For that I'd recommend a 12v rechargeable car booster and one of those $65 Super-T amps fed by an iPod or similar portable. Off the grid, and off the charts value wise. http://6moons.com/audioreviews/trends/ta10_3.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 Crap, I wrote out a long thought out post and then the browser choked and I lost it.... Longstory short, a power inverter is going to be noisier than the AC comingfrom your wall unless you invest some serious cash in a nice inverter. Ifyou're really worried about signal integrity when the AC line is beingstupid, then I would recommend purchasing an amplifier that uses aswitch mode power supply (SMPS), or retrofitting such a supply insideyour current amplifier. Sadly this probably isn't something hobbyistsare able to accomplish on their own. The basic gist of a SMPS is thatit automatically compensates for variations in the line voltage in sucha way that the noise doesn't transfer through to the output, but is way more efficient than other means of filtering. As a side point, I think a lot of the signature sound to anyamplifier and tubes in particular is very much related to how the powersupply responds to deliving the load to the speaker. In other words,the best solution probably isn't going to give you the same soundyou're accustomed to. I would argue that it would be less distorted,but that's not always the goal... A 50W SMPS would probably cost about $10-$50 in parts alone depending on how awesome you wanted it to be...so like $100-$500 at a consumer price if you were looking to purchase something off the shelf. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebes Posted February 3, 2010 Author Share Posted February 3, 2010 I'm trying to get off the grid and get battery power to deliver the magic. For that I'd recommend a 12v rechargeable car booster and one of those $65 Super-T amps fed by an iPod or similar portable. Off the grid, and off the charts value wise. http://6moons.com/audioreviews/trends/ta10_3.html Given my current system that would be like trading in a Vette for a Pinto. [] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JL Sargent Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 Yes, I have studied wave forms generated from inverters. Most are not true sine waves. Most are very choppy and noisey.They are not all created equal. Some are terrible imitations and some get pretty close. As for hifi applications such as your investigating, I have not tested. Mike mentioned switching power supplies and they are very common and work well, but would one work powering your tube amp? I wonder if a 1:1 isolation transformer would do it. You put your 110v ac in and get 110v ac out using the transformer to isolate your hifi input power. Problem with that is you would still suffer the voltage swings from incoming power. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebes Posted February 3, 2010 Author Share Posted February 3, 2010 I'm kinda wondering why an inverter should be so noisy, so troublesome, so hard. Here's a typical 100 watt inverter circuit. It's like 6 transistors, a batch of resistors, and, as far as I can see, not even a single cap.Arent't you basically runing up a sort of simple step-up transformer? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshnich Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 Im thinking that you may want to try a cable upgrade before you head down the battery powered road. Josh Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted February 3, 2010 Share Posted February 3, 2010 I'm kinda wondering why an inverter should be so noisy, so troublesome, so hard. Here's a typical 100 watt inverter circuit. It's like 6 transistors, a batch of resistors, and, as far as I can see, not even a single cap.Arent't you basically runing up a sort of simple step-up transformer? Why don't you build it and find out? The output of that circuit will be a square wave that rings like crazy. Also gotta love a 9.1V zener in parallel with a 12V car battery...and diode reverse polarity "protection" that only protects the output stage and not the controller IC. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hifi jim Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 Im thinking that you may want to try a cable upgrade before you head down the battery powered road. True. [Y] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 Im thinking that you may want to try a cable upgrade before you head down the battery powered road. True. Are you suggesting that changing a piece of wire is supposed to affect the noise present on the AC line? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hifi jim Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 Are you suggesting that changing a piece of wire is supposed to affect the noise present on the AC line? No. I'm suggesting that money would be better spent on cable upgrades first. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don Richard Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 I'm not that extreme, but rather then throw big bucks at audiophile stuff, I'm thinking an industrial, lower cost solution maybe in order. If you aren't doing this already: http://www.peavey.com/support/technotes/soundsystems/acpowerdist.cfm All it would take is an enclosure, a center-tapped transformer, and some rewiring. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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