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Old 02-21-2014, 11:05 PM   #1
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Inverter or not

I'm changing out my TV for a smart TV and was wondering if this was the time to install an inverter so the Tv will run when not hooked to a land power or generator. My question is will it drain the batteries too quickly? When plugged into land power the Tv will still work off the batteries and the land power will recharge the batteries. Does this cause premature battery failure?
I'm new at this so any help would be appreciated.
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Old 02-22-2014, 12:04 AM   #2
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I have this setup for my "entertainment" system. A few questions to ask is how many watts the TV will need to run and what else you will run with it.

For example: we chose a 24" led TV over a 32" because the 24 used approx 30 watts and the 32 used more like 80. Actually the 24 was cheap as hell on Black Friday and I am "roughing it" after all! Also the blue ray player uses 5 watts. So plug it all in to a 400 watt inverter that I already had and even if I'm using 100 watts with inefficentcy it only comes out to about 8amp/hrs.

Most group 24 batteries are 84amp/hrs so it's not a huge drain when boondocking. Need to remember to turn off inverter when not in use. Wired it all to provide power to TV all the time and when plugged into shore power, trailer charger will keep up nicely.
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Old 02-22-2014, 12:15 AM   #3
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If you're doing hard wired, it shouldn't be much more work to install a switch. That way you can run off shore power when you have it and only use the inverter when boondocking.
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Old 02-22-2014, 12:17 AM   #4
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Just hooked ours to 12v and inverter has power switch on it.
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Old 02-22-2014, 12:25 AM   #5
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The new LED backlit LCD televisions draw a fraction of the power that the not-so-old cold cathode backlit LCD televisions use. Last year I replaced a broken Jensen LCD with a new 24" LG brand LED LCD. It draws 30 watts, and the yellow energy guide tag said it cost $6 per year to operate. I specifically picked this TV for its low power consumption for boondocking. It runs great on a cheap modified sine wave inverter.
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Old 02-24-2014, 01:41 PM   #6
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I bought a Samsung 5500 that only uses 30 watts with a 89 watt peak start up. I also have a 400 watt inverter that I'm going to use. Did you hard wire the inverter into the 12V DC circuit that runs the lights and furnace or did you run a new line to the batteries?
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Old 02-24-2014, 01:46 PM   #7
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I installed mine in the entertainment center so I can reach the power switch on the inverter. There just happened to be 12v wires running behind it for a 12v outlet( which I will probably never use that one!) so I t-taped into both wires. I want to say it was 14ga which will be fine for the max 10 amps I will be running.
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