(originally written for a solar power forum, but applies here too)OK, I wussed out, and bought a commercial product! We have a small sleeping hut built on the ranch now, but no power in it yet. It's going to take a while to mount a panel, batteries, charge controller, wire up lights and such, and we arrive at nighttime, and no where to plug the CPAP in ! So I spent a couple days pricing out different ways to accomplish this, and settled on a portable jump start pack. Found a model with good reviews (Peak PKC0AZ 450), and no air compressor (that often fails after 50 total minutes of use). Located one in stock at local autoparts store, and bought it, taking a chance it's been parked in a warehouse for a year, and then in the back room for 2 more years, resulting in a flat, sulfated battery. (fully half of the complaints at Amazon)
Other choice was to get a AGM battery, rig up a case, cigar jack outlet, charger and hope it still fits into the car.
Upon opening it up, and throwing a voltmeter on it, I was pleased to find it reading 12.85V on a warm afternoon. It's built-in indicator showed it was 4/5 charged also good. I plugged it's wall wart (transformer, not switcher, 12V, .5A) in, and let it top it off for a couple hours, it came to quiescence at 13.37v, and I unplugged it. After an hour, it read 13.13V. Awesome! And the Respironics power cord (for the CPAP) appears to fit snugly into the Lighter jack.
Using my kill-a-watt before I was shopping, I'd discovered that the CPAP consumed about 75 watt hours in a 6 hour run, and that for 2 nights, I'd consume about 12.5 ah of battery. The "450A packs" claim to have an 18AH AGM battery in them, but I figured, I may as well have a portable unit, than a hulk that will last me a month. And if I only ran it one night (6.25 AH consumed) and then recharged, it'd live a long lifetime. Well, the power brick for the CPAP is a pig. After running all night (6 hours) , the voltage in the AM, read 12.66v Whoo hooo! Internal battery indicator LEDs still showed 4/5 charge, way less drain than the power brick used (all my testing is done with humidifier OFF) so even though the brick read about 3 watts idle, it was using more with a light load.
So, this will recharge at my shop, and I think I'll get a plug in lamp timer, and set that for a 1 hour charge daily, to keep it topped off between visits. And since the shop is on solar power, now my CPAP is too!
Added benefit, the power pack has a LED lamp built in, and a USB power port, so I don't even need a cigar plug Y cord to charge my phone and PDA.
So, I've owned this less than 2 days, but I think it will do the job I need it to, and it's not DOA out of the box. It can also charge via a running car too, but I've not tried that yet, I think I can also feed it from a 3 stage charge controller set for AGM. And it can jump start the tractor too, if I need it.
And it was a lot less than the $$ soft side 14ah CPAP battery pack. I hope the AMA does not come after me!
The only issues I've had with this unit (why I dropped 1 star) is for charging it, I've had to send power thru the lighter outlet or main jumper cables. The red LED indicating "charging" comes on with it plugged in to their "charge port", but after leaving it plugged in for an hour there was no increase in voltage. I connect up a charger to the other places and instantly see "12.75V, 12.76, 12.77, etc". If I push the "battery indicator" button while something's in that "charge jack" the red LED shows with under 12.75V, the yellow LED shows for under 13.1V, a green LED shows for under 13.5V and 2 green LEDs show for over 13.5 (which makes sense to me). Yet if I push the indicator button without something in the "charging jack" the 2 green LEDs show even with the battery below 12.5V (seems weird to me that it's not consistent with above, but I may do more tests on what it does while draining). Also the switch for the outlets doesn't turn them off, but they work fine. Update Dec 2012: I got the guts to open up the case and on the back of the circuit board, I saw a line of solder going across the switch terminals for the "power outlet" switch. I'm 99% sure that shouldn't have been there, so popped it off and now the switch turns off the outlets. Still not sure about the charge issue though and didn't want to risk breaking the circuit board trying to get it out.
As far as it living up to it's title of "jump starting" a car, I have doubts. I've tested other units like this finding that just like this battery is ~1/3 the size of a car battery, you won't get but about that much power from it. I dislike the labels like "900 peak amp" to make it sound bigger than a cars battery with "500CCA" (yet I'd bet the only way anyone could get that power for even 1/2 a second from it is by putting a thick metal bar between the clamps). Update Oct-2012: I disconnected my car battery and tried starting my Ford Festiva (4 cyl) with this alone on a morning with it ~40 degrees out (disconnecting the car battery to simulate a dead one). It did start it, but the starter struggled just barely being able to crank it. I tested my car battery the next morning and it's labeled as 500cca, but passed as only a 200cca (showing I need to replace it soon). After doing that test (which drained some power) I started the car off of it and didn't notice anything abnormal or the starter barely going. So even with a car battery that's not very good, it has a lot more power than this (perhaps just from it's size and how it's built, perhaps from factors like much better connections thru the bolted on terminals versus spring jumper clamps).
The cars battery condition will also play a big role in whether or not this can "boost" you enough. If a cars battery is pretty weak (like from leaving your lights on while you went to a movie for 2 hours) but can still provide some power, this can give you some extra power and has a fair chance of getting you going. But if a cars battery is fully drained (like from leaving lights on all night long) and you hook this up to the dead battery, the dead battery will instantly start "stealing" power (to recharge itself) & probably drain this unit before you can even get from the hood to the driver seat & try to start the car. In that situation I doubt you'll get started without a charging source (an a/c charger or car & jumper cables).
Buy Peak PKC0AZ 450 Amp Jump Starter Now
I purchased this thinking this was an outright 900amp unit, when I went to pick it up (Advanced Auto)the unit stated 450 starting amps and 900 peak amps, obviously no one was able to tell me what that meant. But I kept it in the spirit of giving it a try. At home, I was able to take a closer look, to see the features. A switch for some workable LEDs, not to bad when you don't have a flashlight around. the DC plug, though I didn't use it yet, looked good. Nice rubber bottom on the unit to help it stay in place. After putting it through an 18hr or so charge, I plugged into a work van (Ford V8) that had a completely dead battery. Hooked up the unit to the battery, and ... nothing. Though I did hear the buzzing noise that my key was in the ignition, just not enough to do anything else. Now I left it for about 20 min. Didn't know if that was either enough or I had it on longer than needed or not enough for that matter, but came back and tried it again. I got into the van and this time the starter was trying to engage, and I kept cranking, either it was going to turn over or die on me again. Well it finally did turn over, which means I will be holding on to the unit, since the other two cars I own are 4 cyl. I have not plugged back into the charger I will see how it runs its course. But simply impressed enough for the price. I did get it at AA over than Amazon was purely price, a preblack Friday special of 50.00 which I thought was excellent at the time for 900 amps... which is really 450 starting amps.Read Best Reviews of Peak PKC0AZ 450 Amp Jump Starter Here
Used once in two years.... worked fine. Now, two years later, seems it won't hold a charge. Charged regularly each month to have max performance available, but it is time for a new pack.My choice: Clore Automotive JNC660 Jump-N-Carry 1,700 Peak Amp 12-Volt Jump Starter
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I bought this to use as an emergency jump starter for our cars. Works great, have only charged once and so far no problems. I like the extra amps as opposed to the smaller ones.Save 50% Off
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