back up power supplies

joblow

Know expert wrote:

Hey Joblow, I just realised it was you who posted the same backup system photos and diagram on a thread I created back in Aug/Sept last year. I built the system and it worked perfectly and it's still working perfectly now. Every now and then I unplug the water pump just to check the backup kicks in and so far it hasn't missed once. Thank you!

That's great stuff, mine has save the fish a couple of times, we had a car knock down a power pole on the corner and the power was out for over 10 hours while they replaced the pole. This one has been in place for a few years now and still hasn't missed a beat and like yourself I often turn the power off for a spot check.

Because we had a very long cold winter and the battery had been previously discharged a couple of times that battery didn't last the full period of time the power was out, but it still gave plenty me of time to get a small generator in and then I replaced the battery with a larger amp hour unit later.

If I ever had another long power outage I would replace the battery again, they don't surrvive a big discharge all that well and it's better to be safe than sorry.

JamesSullivan

There are lots of good stuff about the generator, they might be helpful for readers. Thanks :wave:

WhiteShepherd

When I started reading this thread I was thinking a deep cycle battery + relay + charger and power cube for relay. Then I saw others built it!

For those who do not have large power needs, solar may not be a bad idea (comparing cost to deep cycle battery replacement) for emergency or even main pump/air power depending on load. I got my amorphous panels at $129 per 100 watts (with stands, brackets, pwm controller, etc ready to go). I suspect they are cheaper now and in bulk WAY cheaper.

If your battery is maintained by solar panels then your not going to drain it down unless it's night time.

blacksail

I was thinking about solar panels before reading this topic, where from did you get yours? I was exploring couple guides on how to build from solar panels with estimations on power and cost, it seemed pretty cheap on paper.

LowCarbTNPer

Sorry I haven't read all 20 pages so this may have been brought up already, but if there are any good DC air pumps (both in reliability and not using a lot more power than A/C ones) I was thinking about going full DC so you don't have to have 2 pumps. Basically a solar-type setup with a charge controller + battery + DC air pump just feeding the charge controller with an AC/DC adapter instead of a solar panel.

Gunagulla

The Hailea DC air pumps and Sunsun copies I have tried are reasonably efficient, but are brushed motors and do not last very long before the brushes are stuffed (a few months), so I only use them for fish transport now. I wouldn't recommend them for full time operation.

LowCarbTNPer

Yeah I did a quick search and mainly saw those as well, I see Pentair has one that is USA-made with replaceable brushes but is a whopping $500. For that price could just throw a cheap inverter inline and use a high quality AC one and have $300+ left over lol

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I guess another option too if you are going dual pump is to put some check valves on and have them feed the same airline with the check valves preventing backflow into the other pump.

jp_cruz

The 12V systems look great, married to a trickle charger and a battery minder, it's a perfect solution.

Currently the systems I'm using use 120V (US) and for an indoor system runs at less than 130W for the water pumps and the air. I was looking for a way to calculate how off the shelf UPS systems would work for smaller systems.

APC has a calculator https://www.apc.com/shop/us/en/tools/ups_selector/home/load.

The information should help those growers that were looking for the same information.

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