I broke down and bought a lithium battery generator kit with a small 100 watt solar panel to use until I get my electrical work done. This is a Rockpals 300w system and when it arrived I was so excited! The battery is tiny and has all kinds of outlets. The solar panel is still in the box and I will test it this weekend when I go camping in the rain 🙂 In my excitement, I dragged out a couple of small kitchen appliances to put to the test. I figured that I could use the larger wattage appliances to discharge the battery that was recommended in the instructions. The instructions are in Chinese and English and comes in a tiny pamphlet and not very useful. They are pretty explicit in stating that you can’t use more than 300w. First you have to discharge the battery before the first charge. So, I started plugging things in to see what happens.
First, I plugged in a 12v portable stove that truckers supposedly use on the road. This is the first time trying it and the anticipation was killing me. The whole thing came apart when I opened the box, and I had to push the pieces back into the casing. Then I found the 12v plug and put it into the battery. At some point, the red indicator light turned on then off again, and I couldn’t tell if it was working. 15 minutes later, the unit was not even warm to the touch. Was it defective or does it take forever to work on a battery?
Since my patience is less than most people I know, I pulled out the Vita Mix to see if it would draw the power down. This baby is a 12 amp power horse and I want to be buried with it. Plugged it in to the AC outlet and boom! It worked perfectly. Vita Mixs only take minutes of power to accomplish complete annihilation of whatever is in the container, and I was happy with the results. However, it didn’t draw down the battery as quickly as I expected.
Finally, I decided to try my new induction cook top, another appliance that I haven’t used yet. Plugged in and tried to turn it on twice, then I heard a “pop” and the AC outlet died. The rest of the battery outlets are still working. What went wrong? I frantically pulled out the instruction sheet for the cook top and discovered that there is a sequence in turning it on, and when it was plugged into a house outlet, it worked fine. It pays to find the wattage on these appliances, as this one is 1300 watts. Hmm, did I screw up here? I don’t think you can use a 1300w appliance on a 300w battery even if there is a 600w surge.
So now I have a brand new battery that cannot be used with electric appliances. I called the 800 number and got a voice mail message. To my surprise, a gentleman called me back and we talked about what happened. He said that he would contact support and took my email address. I am not sure that I’ll be able to return this and just spent a LOT OF MONEY on another item I can’t use.
NEXT UP: the Bestek 1000w inverter test. This should be interesting.