Michael Heron writes: > > you know those little square ceramic heater things (approx 8" * 8") that > people put in their basements.... well, how difficult would it be to change > them from 110 volts to 12 volts so they could be used in a car. I have one > in the basement and it PUMPS out the heat. You could probably melt your > floormats with such a device. > > Is ther some sort of voltage inverter/modifier that you could put in your > lighter socket to let such devices work. I know that they have such devices > to allow you to use your portable radio in the car (i.e runs a 110 volt > appliance on 12 volt). What does everybody else think? Surely there must be > some way to get heat in the bus without having to rely on that old rusted > tube that runs the heat up from your engine to the cab. [27 quoted lines deleted] Michael, It is possible, yes, but not practical. The reason is that heaters draw too much power to be run on electricity in the car. Example: The typical electric heater like the one you describe above (for the home) draws about 1200 Watts. At 110 Volts (in your house) that is about a 10 amp draw, which is reasonable, but at 12 Volts, the amperage jumps to 100, and would probably be closer to 120 after 12-120 volt conversion losses. 120 amps would drain a typical car battery in 15 minutes or less. It is also more than double the output of the typical VW alternator. This should also provide us with a gentle reminder of how inefficient our engines are, when we see how much heat they put out. -David ============================================================================= David Schwarze '73 VW Safare Custom Camper (Da Boat) SAIC Comsystems '73 Capri GT 2800 (Da Beast) San Diego, California '87 Mustang Lx 5.0 (Da Bruiser? Soon...) schwarze@nosc.mil http://papaya.nosc.mil/~schwarze =============================================================================
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