Use Prius in Power Outage?

Short Answer: Yes, that will work fine.

You should get a UPS with a battery that is appropriately sized for at least a couple full nights at the pressure you need for your mask. Another important feature in your case is one that you can silence the beep. It is common for them to beep when the power goes out. That's great to let you know it's on battery, bad if it's at 2am and wakes you up. You can then charge this UPS with an extension cord to the Prius if the power doesn't come on periodically which it sounds like "once it's out, it will be out for days".

You can also just use your Prius as a generator as people often do when camping or after hurricanes/storms that are in your same situation of no power. You can get a 12v 1000W inverter cheap, hook it up under the hood and now you can just run an extension cord inside and power whatever as long as you want. About a gallon for 8 hours worth. Now if you're in a no power situation, that also means no gas stations so you need to have extra gas on hand too.

 

yeah the prius is way more efficient than a 4kw gennie - if it were a slow down on low use gennie (newer models), it would start getting closer to the on /off gas useage of prius, but still not as much because prius is atkinson cycle - .. but yeah u can only draw 1kw or less so that's the limitation ...

 

Is this the cause, or is it people building homes in the woods and then needing power to these home? At some point PG&E has an unsustainable line run.

Since your CPAP is a critical device, I would go out and pick up an efficient 120V generator (Honda makes a nice one, and there are some clones as well - very quiet, fuel efficient, etc.) These will generally run an entire night on less than a gallon of fuel. This is better than using your $30K car as a generator.

Plus, you don't run the risk of disabling your car with a dead battery or lack of fuel if you need to use the car to escape from a fire (which is what PE&G is trying to prevent). Leave the car full of gas and packed with essentials, in case you need to leave in a hurry.

 

For a 1000 Watts, using Prius as a generator is silly. Just get a 2000 Watt inverter generator and it will be way better. Honda, Harbor Freight and others sell them. It'll run you about $400 for a new one and less for used one off craigslist.

Explanation. Most Prius have 100 amp maximum going to the 12V battery. That is a little over 1000 Watts. That's all you can get out of Prius working as a generator. You will also need an inverter, which will cost you as much as a 2000 Watt generator. I looked into it before. It's much more sensible to buy a small 2000 Watt inverter generator. The inverter part is important. These types are quiet and very fuel efficient.

 

its not silly if the car is already sitting in the driveway not going anywhere anyway, then u dont have the pita mtc of a gennie that sits and has to be started and fuel freshioned periodically -- a CPAP , to my know, is a low draw machine - talking less than 100w if i'm not mistaken ..
i dont think u want a harbor freight 'football tailgaiting specia'l because it is a 2cycle, pain to mix 2cycle oil with gas and they dont generally last as long as 4 cycle engine,.


34 watts is all u need, u dont need to buy a seperate generator, unless u feel running an invertor off the prius 12v battery is going to fail ... http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t80150/Measured-CPAP-power-consumption.html

 

I specifically said INVERTER generator, not a tailgate special (though a small inverter generator will do fine for that as well). HF sells really nice ones that are quiet and fuel efficient.

Here is one.

You will spend close to that to make Prius do the same thing. You will need an inverter, fuse, wires, etc.

 

Deleted

 

... but check out this recent thread:
Consumer Rpt blesses Harbor Freight generator? | PriusChat

 

HF inverter generators have been praised by many people. They are not exactly cheap, either. HF is starting to carry good not-so-cheap stuff right along the usual cheap crap made of chineesium.

 

The car can do it with an inverter. Should work fine.

I just got home from the vacation cottage- it’s off-grid. Solar-equipped, but we keep a Honda eu2000i for cloudy day charging. Those are just marvelous little generators. Super quiet if you hit the eco-throttle cutback switch.

I think Harbor Freight still sells the TailGator™. Nasty little thing.

 

Yes, you'd need to leave it "ON" - not Accessory.

You can still lock your PRIUS with:


Remember to turn lights and Climate Control etc - OFF.

 

Harbor Freight sells a direct competitor to Honda eu2000i and it's evidently a very good product. Similar to the Honda in all but price. I have not tested them side by side. I bought a small 2000 Watt inverter generator used from Craigslist for $300 and it's excellent. Portable, quiet and very efficient. Has quiet mode where it will adjust the throttle based on the load. Very good design and is cheaper than jut getting a decent inverter for the Prius.

 

Are you telling me a 1000 watt invertor costs more than $300 ?
not that i endorse amazon but ..
Amazon.com: 1000 watt inverter

 

For most loads you want to consider PURE sine wave inverters. Also, the rating needs to be about 20% more than 1000 watts if you ever want to actually get 1000 watts out of it (headroom) and lastly, a good quality inverter is not going to come from Amazon. It just isn't going to work properly or for a long time if it does. Even on Amazon, pure sine wave machines cost more like $200-$300. Then you need wiring, fuses and some other odds and ends.

 

are you powering the house or just running a single device in the house ?
if house, the breaker box is your fuse, if single device, the invertor already has it's own fuse on it (most over a few hundred watts do)..
wire is an extension cord, < $1/ft. that's it , no odds and ins, its very simple and straight forward, no rocket science !!!

 

Getting back to the original problem- It looks like @rshev wants to occasionally charge a battery that will later drive a CPAP machine.

That can easily be done with a storebought inverter plugged into the lighter socket. No need to overthink this.

 

If powering a single low wattage device (under 120 Watts), the built-in power outlet/cigarette lighter is enough and no need for inverter. If wanting to use as anything more than that, then 1200 watts is max from the 12V battery on the Prius (there is a 100A fuse between Prius inverter/converter and 12V). In this case you need a good quality reliable 1500 watt inverter to go on the 12V in the Prius. Connecting the 12V to the inverter requires a decent quality cable that can take up to 100A. That really should also be fused, but okay, let's skip the fuse. From my research it seems 4 AWG wire is required between the 12V battery and the inverter. That's another $30 or so at least.

 

Yes, very good point. If all you need is sub-100 watt load, then the lighter socket is more than enough. Funny, my other car, a 2006 Toyota Matrix has a 100 watt inverter built into the car and has a cute little AC plug on the dash board. I love that, even though I don't think I'll ever use it. I am not sure if it's a pure or modified sine wave, but the idea is great. Probably can buy one of those from a wreck on a junk yard and rig up in the Prius.