12v lighting for my house powered by my van

[12vshocker]

hello all is this possible????

I drive a van around all day, I want to use the van to charge up a 110ah Agm battery, I then want to use this battery to power up a 12v led lighting circuit in my house. I also want to use the 240v supply as a back up to the same lighting circuit, with some sort of switch over device for when the agm battery voltage gets low.

Essentially I will have 2 batteries in rotation, charging one all day why the other is being used

Any idea if this set up is used any where and how well it works, or where to find the calculation to see how long a fully charged 110ah battery would last

I don't want to use a inverter, just the transformers already build into the Selv lighting, and diodes to stop the 240v system back feeding into the 12v system.

Is this possible, (not too bothered about it being economical)

Let me know your thoughts and criticisms

 

[davesparks]

In theory anything is possible, but this would be very expensive to implement.

You couldn't use diodes to achieve the seperation of mains and battery, you would need to use one or more relays or contactors.
Also the 12V cabling would need to be of a very large size to overcome the voltage drop, and you'd need to design and install protection (fuses) to prevent fires.

 

[Deuce]

Just pay to power your own 12v PSU rather than fleecing the AH from your company van

Anyway, sounds like this could effectively be achieved using a UPS controller feeding the 12v PSU. You could use a time delay relay to switch on the 240v supply to the UPS every time the 12v supply holding the signal circuit relay open fails, and hold it open for say 12 hours to allow the UPS time to recharge the existing battery - just in case you fail to drive enough in the same time to recharge the other one

It's an interesting idea though... Using company/allowable expense fuel to pay for 'what could potentially be' private usage power..

Good luck to Mr Tax Inspector on figuring that one out

 

[telectrix]

i want a smartmeter that isso smart, it powers my house and the supplier pays me £50/week to use their leccy.

 

[Deuce]

Just to add to my comment above, obviously anyone looking to direct power generated from allowable company fuel for private use, should consider that whilst the power itself is not traceable, it's perhaps best not to post on a public forum to ask how to set-up an arrangement that 'could' be used in that way.

Jus sayin...

 

[telectrix]

who says it's a company van???? OP is in Enfield so it's more likely nicked. .

 

[Deuce]

who says it's a company van???? OP is in Enfield so it's more likely nicked. .

I won't stoop so low. There are plenty of honest folk in Enfield that would steal power from a company van without resorting to stealing someone else's company van

 

[Deuce]

All joking aside, electric cars are charged BIK at a flat rate including 'fuel' now, if the fuel is provided by the company you work for - presumably even if it's your own company, registered at your home address.

So what exactly stops a person trading as a ltd claiming that 80% of their household electricity usage is used to charge their company vehicle? And in the future, will we see people that work for companies that allow charging during work hours, find ways to liberate that stored energy for private use? I think Tesla are about to release a system that can take power from a car, as well as push power into the batteries. So charge at work for free and then power your house in the evenings!? I'm sure this will become a somewhat hot topic in the next few years as the government are pushing electric cars but it's more or less impossible to identify where the power comes from, and where it is used..

 

[KEV 1 N]

Just thinking out of the box here....
Could you not use a power unit from a caravan/motor home? Where mains voltage charges the battery, and the battery powers the 12v DC lights.
Use existing cables and switches and change the lights to work on 12v DC LED units.....and if it doesn’t work, just put it back how it was.

 

[Strima]

i want a smartmeter that isso smart, it powers my house and the supplier pays me £50/week to use their leccy.

Or just tap into all that unused neutral current that just gets sent back to the DNO...

 

[Gavin John Hyde]

Personally I would get a few hamsters and link their wheels in the cage to a couple of dynamos. failing that get yourself a couple of cheap pv panels and rechargeable batteries, link them up to some leds. quite easy to achieve.

 

[Deuce]

Or just tap into all that unused neutral current that just gets sent back to the DNO...

Or just rescue a few horses and put em to work?

 

[littlespark]

Voltage drop is going to be the problem... unless your house is the same size as a Ford Focus.

 

[Deuce]

Voltage drop is going to be the problem... unless your house is the same size as a Ford Focus.

I would assume the led circuit in question only requires 12v at source, why would it be a problem if the power comes from a 12v battery or the typical psu?

 

[Dave OCD]

Why even bother.