It looks like most of the 20-30 dollar ones that plug into the cigarette lighter port are loud and cheaply made. I only want to plug in my laptop (might be charging a mifi and a smart phone off of it as well). I've heard I should make sure the car is in "Ready" mode. Does this apply even if I'm just sitting there parked? I watched my almost full battery go down to two bars when I was just listening to music and had the fan going so I started driving around... I basically need to be able to park and turn my Prius into an office for an hour or two at a time, as well as charge while driving. I'd like it to be well hidden and preferably involve as few a modification as possible, but the most important thing is that it's safe for the car and done right no matter how it looks or what mods it entails.
The 12 volt outlets are powered by the inverter assembly which is powered by the high voltage traction battery which is recharged by running the internal combustion engine (ICE). As long as you have gas in the tank and are in ready mode you won't run out of 12 volts which I assume you are going to use to run an inverter to provide 110 volt AC power outlets. In ready mode the car will automatically run the engine to keep the high voltage traction battery from running out of power. You could hide your 110 volt inverter most anywhere that provides proper ventilation and where you can supply 12 volts to power it. Note the 12 volt aux/cigarette lighter sockets are only powered when the car is on and you must be in Ready mode or you will quickly discharge the high voltage traction battery as well as the 12 volt battery.
Ready is the safe answer for your mobile office. You can't kick start a Prius. You can't bump start a Prius It is (financially) very risky to jump start a Prius. (done wrong, $4000) I would stay in Ready anytime I needed electricity from my Prius (lights, sound system, A/c, whatever) I have a small (12 inch screen, no CD/DVD) laptop and have no issues so long as I am in ready. http://www.amazon.com/dp/product/B000YQT6RS?tag=priuschatcom-20
I was in Ready mode, but I was parked (parking brake and P gear selected) and I saw the traction battery decline. It also didn't sound like the engine was on. Do the cigarette lighters run off something differently than the stereo and temperature control? I'll look into the inverter. Thanks.
The engine will periodically turn on fora short time each time the Traction (HV) battery drains to near 40% (two bars) capacity. You can safely pull about 80 amps out of the 12v charging circuit so limit the AC inverter capacity to about 1 kwatt (1000 watts). Higher capacity AC is possible if you know how to safely work with high voltages. You can directly drive an AC inverter off of the traction battery (200+ volts). See: http://www.priups.com/ JeffD
If you want to run a laptop and phone, why not get a 12 volt adapter for the laptop? The transformer that comes with your laptop converts 110V AC to 5V-20V DC (depending on the laptop), so you will be going from 12 V DC to 110 V AC to 5 V DC. Why not just go from 12 V DC to 5 V DC? Check with your manufacturer, or you can try this: Auto Car Power Adapters - For Portable Laptop Notebook Computers or a similar company and get a 12 Volt adapter. It is much more efficient and totally quit. The same for your phone - get a car 12 volt adapter for it as well.
This is actually what I ended up doing. While I like the convenience factor of being able to plug in anything (within the acceptable wattage range), I really just need it for my laptop. I can power the other items off of the USB ports on the laptop, and this keeps it all DC. Thanks for all the help guys.
