Battery Backup

[Jakalwarrior]

Didnt see any good forum to ask this in, so i'll put it here with the other power stuff. When a battery backup / surge protector pack senses a power dip and flips on the battery, is there a disturbance in the power recieved by your machine? Do they effectively level out the power nicely or just keep it going with some ripples present?

I bought a cheap 45 dollar one (not enough battery to run my setup for more than a few seconds) in hopes of getting more even current. I dont particuraly care about the actual backup part.

Its been worth it sofar though because it told me one of my wall sockets is faulty and there is a pretty big dip when my AC cuts on (it flips to battery then back to normal every time the compression kicks on) so ive stopped running the AC at the same time as the computers and am going to run another line from the pole.

[twilyth]

afaik, a UPS should always supply power from the backup battery so when there is a dip or a spike, the only thing that is interrupted is the charging cycle. But if you try to draw more power than the UPS is rated for, I think (not sure though) that the battery circuit is bypassed completely. UPS's aren't cheap, but the difference between different rated outputs isn't huge. At Costco, you can get an 1100 VAC (probably about 700-800 watts) for a little over $100. If you're going to use a UPS, you should make sure it can handle the max load your rig can draw.

[Ugly n Grey]

afaik, a UPS should always supply power from the backup battery so when there is a dip or a spike, the only thing that is interrupted is the charging cycle.

That depends, consumer grade UPS systems are rarely "online" that means they don't switch to battery unless there's a need.In other words, they just monitor the AC from the wall and stay offline. The switch cycle is so fast in any case that the capacitors in a power supply will have filtered out any dip in line voltage.

The rating of the inverter isn't what's typically important on consumer grade stuff, it's the speed with which they switch to online mode and the amount of power they can supply over time. Systems with one or two small batteries won't run a PC for long.

You can get refurbished rack mount style online UPS systems on EBay for a relatively cheap amount of money.

Recycle your batteries! some places pay good cash for those now.

Cheers
UnG

PS the A/C capacitors can be changed for a style that draws less voltage over a longer period at startup preventing the huge dips you get in the line voltage.

[Jakalwarrior]

"PS the A/C capacitors can be changed for a style that draws less voltage over a longer period at startup preventing the huge dips you get in the line voltage."

Running a dedicated line from the poll would probably be easier for me though.
Put my computers on the dedicated line since I dont care of my lights dim a bit when the AC kicks on.
Like I said though the battery is only powerful enough to run me for a few seconds but if it makes my PSU live longer its fine with me. At 45 bucks it was less than some of the quality surge protectors / power strips.

I do find myself wondering what kind of battery that is though? My old fourwheeler that I put an old street bike engine in had the strator removed (And most of the flywheel) so it ran off battery for the spark. I started using little cheap deer feeder batteries from the store since they were dirt chip, rechearagble, and 2 could run it for hours without caring if they were run to empty. They also look identical to whats in my battery backup. Is it safe to wire these things into bigger better batteries?

[Ugly n Grey]

I do find myself wondering what kind of battery that is though? My old fourwheeler that I put an old street bike engine in had the strator removed (And most of the flywheel) so it ran off battery for the spark. I started using little cheap deer feeder batteries from the store since they were dirt chip, rechearagble, and 2 could run it for hours without caring if they were run to empty. They also look identical to whats in my battery backup. Is it safe to wire these things into bigger better batteries?

Yes, as long as the incoming combined voltage to the inverter is the same sure... keep in mind, that the inverter on those little units is NOT big and can rarely take the heat for long durations.

I myself took an old style online UPS unit and changed the small acid gel packs out for large deep cycle batteries mounted in an external wooden rack. Mine sits in the basement and is directly wired to my living room/den circuits. My system requires 72V DC to work and I've arranged my batteries accordingly. Yeah it's expensive but the power goes out here a lot and this gives me a couple hours use at about 20amps / 120vac draw.... sometimes when we're watching the tube at nights, we don't even notice the power went out. When the system is out longer I can use the power off my diesel generator without fear of some random generator spike blowing up all my electronics since everything comes through the UPS.

I paid 120 bucks for the UPS with dead batteries at an auction, and 80 bucks each for standard deep cycle marine batteries. the batteries will be good three years or so and start diminishing their capacity over time ... I only relate this as an example of managing bad power conditions... typical small UPS solutions that sell for 100 dollars use two 12V gel acid batteries and invert the 24vdc to 120v AC.... using different or more batteries can increase the run time to whatever you can afford to buy batteries for...