How to convert a UPS backup into an inverter
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 5 ต.ค. 2024
- In this video I'm showing how you can use a dead UPS backup as an inverter for powering devices where no 120v power is available. This could be useful info if things got real. I have a old backup unit were the battery has died so I removed the old battery and attached some jumper cables to the corresponding negative and positive wire inside the unit and have attached a car battery to the unit, then you can reuse the old backup unit as an inverter. Some backup units have a beeper they can be soldered from the board. Thanks for Watching Please Subscribe @kurtscottage Take Care
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Difference between inverters and UPS systems is that inverters have heatsinks and fans to remove heat build up. UPS usually rely on thermal mass as they expect to only be on for a few minutes tops. Watch out for overheating. Stick a thermostat cooling module and a cpu fan in there at least and rear terminals for battery connection.
That is exactly what I thought of doing. I have a 2000va unit and 2 x 100ah batteries. (24v im series). Not looking to run much, just want to get rid of the annoying part of when the power goes off,i must go to the garage and switch the inverter on. Plug in extension cables in house to my devices and the whole rigmaroll again when the power comes back on. I am running 1 x 11w light, wifi router, a fan and a cellphone charger on it. Just want them to run the whole time on the ups.
Is there ANYWAY to get rid of the stupid
beep though?
UPS inverters are heatsinked for limited time operation which is why those items are small and made of a heavy-gauge aluminum. They rely on thermal mass more than rather than convective cooling. Not suitable for continuous use at higher loads unless you provide forced-air cooling.
I used the 24 volt Model 600 watt to run my house for two years and it doesn't overheat if you keep it under 400 watts
@Jeroen Can i use a small fan to cool the unit in case i want to use it for long hours???
@@SiriusSolar I don't understand please elaborate
@@sannialiyu6526 He says that he draws 400 W from his UPS and so, it does not heat up much.
that's a great idea and a very cheap way of doing it.
I ran my house off of a 24 volt 600 watt unit 1 model newer than the one in this video. Looks the same but mine had a strip of LEDs that indicated the load going through the unit. would do a high temperature shutdown if I pulled more than 400 watts for a an hour but never caught fire. It would actually pass all 2000 watts of generator power directly through to my house so I had enough power to start up my refrigerator. My battery charger I had plugged into my generator put out 28.5 volts at 40 amps into a 200 amp hour flooded lead-acid battery Bank. I worked like this for years until I upgraded to a quality off grid system.
Thanks for the video, Thumbs Up. I have a newer UPS in which the charger apparently will not work, or at least not correctly. It was supposed to be charging two 12v batteries, connected to make 24v. But the charging circuit is only putting out 19.9v, which drained the batteries to low for it to work at all.
However, with a fully charged battery, the UPS still works and puts out proper ac voltage. So this is an idea for a possible alternative usage.
In any case, its always good to keep things like this in mind, especially when a need arises, and no other alternatives are available, or if other power sources are being rationed to last as long as possible.
People today especially need to learn to think out-side the "college educated" norms...
Interesting - which make model of UPS is this that takes 24volts?
I plan to do the same thing. Thanks for sharing.
Hey regadsless, this is a great video. Sure, you just replaced one battery with another. But I would have never thought that something so simple could be done to a UPS to make it useful again for emergencies.
This is what TH-cam is made for.
Thanks for posting
Saeid
This was useful, I'm using one that was dumped saving me 2 bitcoin.
don't use car battery, you need deep cycle batteries.
The battery plates in such type batteries won’t get damaged even in deep discharge condition. But the automobile battery is quite different from deep cycle batteries, if an automobile battery is discharged deeply, then definitely it will damage the lead plates and reduce the battery life
The difference of a deep cycle is the distance between the bottom of the plates and the bottom of the battery that holds the electrolyte is greater so when conductive material comes off the plates and falls to the bottom of the battery, there’s more room for it to build up before shorting the plates. I am thinking about using lithium titrate that can discharge completely without damage, charge at a high rate and can get really cold too. They are not as energy dense as more common batteries and the are not as efficient, that’s the down side
I learned about this helping my dad installing high amperage equipment in police cars. I’d leave the car radio on while I worked and also tested light bars, siren, 100 watt transmitters WITHOUT having the car running... killed many batteries before kindly being told not to... ( I had simply thought I needed to recharge them ) the funny thing is as police have changed to LED light packs and portable radios without high wattage repeater packs in the trunk... And draw a LOT less wattage but still burn the gas. Guess the need the ac.
Adding and consuming such big battery is easy, But How long it will take to fully charge 150AH Battery by a ups circuit board which is actually designed just to charge 7AH Battery ? May be 10 to 15 days !!
If you draw more wattage or run near wattage limits you will fry the entire unit. One BIG cloud of stinky smoke. Remember to divide 120 into the wattage to get the MAX amount of amps the unit produces.
Don't run it at max very long either as the unit WILL overheat and smoke as well.
+countryside Probably wouldn't hurt to add a fuse to it so it doesn't give off the magical white smoke when you overload it.
Isn't there a difference between charging a Sealed Lead Acid battery and a car battery or are they the same?
I'm here in Northern California where I expect power to go out for few days+ this year and was looking for a solution to keep my deep freezer going for a few days without power. That's all I care about when power goes out!
you should put some cooling fan on it I have one cut a hole and put cooling fan in my so I can run it long hours and it will not over heated the fan come on cool down the unit
Great for sheds and caravans.
Thanks for posting :)
How do you turn off the alarm sound. Since when you don't have 110V feed it will drive you crazy with the loud bip.. thank you
Bravo........hey pure sin wave........cheers
Hi, can u add an additional 12v battery to create more battery power.
what about charging the car battery?it takes more time than the original ups battery!!!because the ups battery capacity is around 10 AH while car battery is 60-90 AH !!so how to solve this point ??
I ran the 24-volt unit to power my house for 2 years. When I need more than 400 watts I ran the generator. I had a battery charger hooked to the generator to keep the battery full because the built-in battery charger was too slow
Yeah, those things are usually set up to run two 12v batteries in series, and they usually have a charge control circuit inside that can "learn" the capacity of whatever batteries are hooked up up to it. You just plug it in the wall and it not only acts as a charge controller but also a surge protector. You can't use it to charge a single 12v battery though, must have two.
I've tested quite a few of these UPS's and found them to be very inefficient, they consume between 500ma - 1.5amps when idle. It could help you in a pinch but not for very long, you'd probably be better off buying an off the shelf inverter for much cheaper then a UPS. I bought a really cheap 1 at canadian tire (300W) and it only consumes 100ma at idle.
Cheers Hitman
You're right about that I had the 24 volt 600 watt model and it pulled 30 Watts continually and wasted it into heat no matter whether I was running the generator or running directly off of the batteries
The inverter doesn't turn on unless there was originally a 120Vac source. If I just plug the unit to the battery, I can't get the inverter to turn on.
Here u go buddy. Straight from howstuffworks:
There are two common systems in use today: standby UPS and continuous UPS.Standby UPS systems are far more common for home or small-business use because they tend to cost about half as much as a continuous system. Continuous systems provide extremely clean, stable power, so they tend to be used in server rooms and mission critical applications. SO.... does that answer your question 'DUDE'?
Nope, that and most cheap units have a bypass circuit, most of the time it uses house power. This is because most cheap units deliver mod sine wave power that is not as clean as grid power...
Hi I tried this but even with a high capacity battery the ups still things that the battery is small and automatically shuts down after 6~10 minutes. How do solve this problem?
Looks like Frankenstein 🤖🕵😎👍🏻
When ups connected to car battery will it run for 24hrs?
When I do it I get a beeping and a relay trips and it switches off after just a few minutes. An that is with me adding a few 12v in parallel that rund a normal inverter for hours. It seems to be switching a relay that clicks back and forward for a while then just switches off. Any help to bypass the relay.
Does the output from UPS a pure-signwave AC output? If so then I'm off to the dumpster/goodwill to get these.
Pure Signwave inverters are EXPENSIVE!!
0:30 It is VA not Watts, and with a special serial cable you can change settings of the UPS, such as the low battery alarm and many other settings.
how do you turn off the alarm when you don't have it connected to 110V?
How do you jump-start a UPS if it is not hooked up to a 120 volt power source like in a off-grid-cabin.
Are you talking about how to charge the battery in order for it to continue to power your loads? If so, solar would be the way to go. For a 100AH battery, you would need a single 140 watts solar panel, and a 15 amp, 12vdc solar charge controller. When the UPS is not needed, just switch it off.
Easiest is to start this project with a UPS that can start up without the grid.
some models can some models can't.
Else you'll either have to modify the UPS firmware (potentially very hard to do)
or modify the hardware to fool it that the grid is momentarily live,
(potentially easier, but you still need to figure out which circuit to modify)
I you need to check online to see if the OEM replacement battery pack is 12v or 24v, most of those are set up for 24v, and the fact that you are getting them to work on just 12v makes me think maybe it is a learning charge controller. Some of the solar charge controllers will learn battery voltage like that and automatically switch, but I did not expect to see it in UPSs. I picked up a 1200 watt UPS at a recycle place but have yet to test it.
It was truly great of you to share this info! Thank you so much.
took me the whole video to understand why you're saying 110 all the time, forgot that was the mains in US (i'm from Lithuania)
And some people call it 120 (volts)
Dear Kurtcottage..
Thanks for your video uploading...
I have same like a UPS 12 V and I want to know maximum how many ampere i can giving battery? and I have 12V 200 A Battery so I can used it.?
yes, you can.
Just get a small ups and want to use it for a inverter but it keep turning off after about 4 minutes on my battery
Vary clever idea, so simple. I wonder if that could be used to open my 1/3 hp electric garage door when the power goes out?
Considering you can buy said batteries for like $20 Australian, (and out prices are usually much higher than the US) I don't see how the batteries are worth more than the unit. but meh,
Be aware, that most of these smaller units are not designed to run for long periods on batteries, so you may get over heating.
>I don't see how the batteries are worth more than the unit.
You can get a UPS with a dead battery at a thrift store for less than $5 in the U.S. The new battery would be $15-20 or worth 2-3x the cost of the used unit.
because you can buy cheap electronic parts from china and tiwan, batteries are still made here.
and the economy of scales is vastly different.
go look up the "how it's made - lead acid batteries" and see what goes into them.
Nice video, but please I have the APC 650 and let say I'm able to connect the UPS with the Car Battery and also charge as well and it supplies light without Pluging to the Mains ..... How long can it be in the Mains or I can leave it to keep on charging .... Please reply
do not use car battery, use deep cycle battery
i think it has charge controller. leave it connected to mains
Sir what is cable yellow(shocet red) to reconnek.
thinking about running this in my 1972 vw beetle. the battery rides underneath the rear seat. i might be able to hook it up to the battery and leave it under the seat and run a wire to a momentary switch on the dash, then i can run standard 120 stuff such as chargers and things like speakers because theres no radio, but all i ever use is my phone, so if i can just use speakers, id be home free...
+NateWilson99 All of those things have a AC->DC converter in them. You'll just be wasting power as heat by inverting 12VDC to 120VAC and back to some low DC voltage. Just use DC->DC converters (called "boost converter" for voltage increaser, and "buck converter" for voltage reducer) and bypass the AC part of the devices you're wanting to connect.
Otherwise, inverters are cheap and a lot safer than modifying an already malfucntioning UPS system (which already has an inverter so you're not really "converting" it)
Thank you for sharing! Highly appreciated.
Would it be possible to provide a wiring diagram ?
I really want to avoid battery’s.. there too expensive. Yet I have 500 watts of panels wasting energy all day. Why can’t somebody engineer a device that consumes the dynamic 12-19 volt dc from panels .. boost the power to 115 ac BUT reverts ( and or mixes ) to Mains power if the solar input is non sufficient. Of course the ac power sources would always have to be in phase.( a difficult prospect that a ups achieves )The filtering action and nice sine wave from a ups achieves some of the goals. A grid tie inverter will not produce ac if the mains go out so using that is not a good option as it doesn’t facilitate emergency power.... and my power company will have a cow if they detect me using one ( thanks smart meter ). Anyhow thanks for your video ! Ideas are collective and you got me thinking. Sorry if I’m all over the place.... just drank a monster LOL
well im trying to hook up ps4 in my car using this method instead using a normal power inverter. i think it will be good right? and if i keep car idle the battery wont discharge
as long as you use a true sine inverter NOT a modified sine inverter.
VERY WISEMAN
Is the transformer used by the inverter, I would like to remove it because of it's weight
Yes, and it doubles as a battery charger
awesome ! ×D
how many amp inverter would this be
I guess it would be a sine wave inverter
I believe most UPS units are Modified Square Wave (some people call them Modified Sine Wave) inverters. The watt rating of the unit would not change. The thing that would change is, the run time of the unit, due to having a larger battery to power it.
How to stop the cutt off timer?
My desktop ups has auto off feature if there isn't enough load.... How do I prevent it???
It won't lasts long if I connect small loads such as mobile charger stereo etc
can you conenct to it using usb or network? you can usually use a program to set that. including any warning signals on or off
@@chriskwakernaat2328 no I can't.... Only power outlets are there no other ports available
UPS is not design to run for a long time how do I make it run for 24 hours
Install a fan. Make sure it is a powerful one.
on those ups the transformer is the power supply to charge the battries and power the inverters computer there are relays that flip the inverter on when power goes out sending power back through the transformer and it osolates taking the 12 volts to 120 volts so the transformer plays double duity as a stepdown transformer and then when power goes out the realy disconcts from mains and then the transformer is a step up transformer. and when power is sinced on the mains it switch back to mains.
Hi...i have a ups 24volt battery supply how to convert to 12volts?tnks.
The first thing you'll need to do is re-wind the transformer, and replace all the mosfets, then you'll need to modify the voltage sensor... this is almost certainly not worth the effort. either arrange a source of 24V power or see if you can swap it for a 12V one on craigslist etc.
Wire two 12v batteries in series, then you get 24v, "conversion" complete...
Great video. Thanks!!!
how many amps are there?
I did it. its really work!
FYI it already is an inverter...
Can I connect it to my running car and leave there fixed?
through a fuse that allows a quarter to a third of the maximum alternator power you can. I'd go just for the battery and make a failsafe logic that warns me when the voltage drops below 10.7 volts and turns the inverter of at 10.4 volts ( i know it's harsh for the battery, but that's just an idea i made in 5-10min without any true concept).
+eivis13 good idea, thanks
How do I know what voltage car battery can I use on such a UPS?
look at the original battery that was in the UPS, it should have a voltage listed on it.
Or if it doesn't state, and the battery is to dead to test.... then, if you have a little know how, you can power the UPS on, disconnect the battery, connect a voltage meter to the charging wires on the UPS (the red and black wires that connects to the battery) and see how much voltage the UPS is charging the battery with. A 12v battery will usually be charged with 13.5v - 14.5v. A 24v setup will charge with 25.5v to 26.5 v, on average.
please how can i make my ups run for 24 hours without being damaged
I bet you love that little alarm that goes off when you don't have it plugged in huh but she wish you knew how to turn it off
Is all UPS pure sine inverter?
nope
The APC brand - the ""Smart UPS" line is sine wave.
useless.. i have done this before but car battery ruin the inverter..
hi, how could I disable the internal automatic shutdown timer?
If you disable the internal shutdown (not a timer) you will drain the batteries too low and damage them...Auto or deep cycle and lithium can all be damaged if you draw them down too low.
@@problemwithauthority he is asking how
And in another failed attempt I figured I could hook solar panels to my ratty sine wave inverter, then to my ups ... in would clean the sine wave, charge the internal batteries ( or bigger external batteries if I hit the lottery ) and smoothly switch to battery when the sun went down ( with absolutely no interruption to my low power desktop( 90 watts !) . It would also avoid the varying dc voltage from the panels.. as the inverter simply turn off at low voltage.. and effectively consume all the sun nature gave me. . Sure I’d loose an amp or two on the deal but what the hell. Well turns out the ups is finicky about the ac input. Doesn’t like crappy semi square wave... only premium crap from coal fire plant. It makes sense in the end as a ups vets the quality of ac input before changing over. Solution... MAINS. :-(
A lot ov the modern (& cheap) UPS units will only run for a set amount ov minutes. The reason for this is that the power transistors don't have proper heat sinks, so they have a thermistor near one ov the transistors that turns off the unit when it reaches a certain temperature. It seems like a timeout but it's actually temperature. The solution is to bend the thermistor away from that particular power transistor and fit decent heatsinks to all ov them or they'll burn out. Possibly add a fan 2.
With Avasva plans doing something like that was easy.
this sounds too good to be true!!
24 watt UPS how to connect single battery 12 watt please answer me fast
You would have to hook up a boost converter. In essence ( believe it or not ) it takes 12 volts dc in .... converts it to AC... then converts it to 24v dc. All this being said... the price of such device increases as the amperage increases. You would have to do the math to figure out how much the ups would draw when it demands battery power. There are a whole lot of things to worry about.
do they charge when they are on 110 , like even the 24 volt /?
how would you charge 24 volts in like say an rv?
Unfortunately, this was the most obvious part of making a UPS function as an inverter -- Hey! Hook up a 12v battery to the 12v battery terminals! I wanted to see how to disable the beeping (locate and clip the piezo-electric beeper, I assume) and reduce the massive box of the UPS. Make a 2nd video showing how to downsize the UPS, scrap the huge transformer if it's not needed, disable the beeper and add a fan for cooling. Shouldn't be too hard (I hope), and if you've had your hands in the guts of these things for 10 years, I bet you know how to do it easily!
The transformer is needed
Yo do your video showing it.
1 min into the video that transformer is really a battery charger to charge your batteries when you have power
Actually this is a dumb idea!! UPS units are not designed to run heavy loads continuously, their transformers aren't rated for running for long periods of time and eventually fry . Also most offline UPS units has the control circuit programmed to shut it down after max 15,30 min even if the battery has a lot of juice left.
I ran my house for 2 years off of the 24 volt 600 watt model. It had a bar indicator to show the load that was passing through it. it may have been a slightly different model. It actually passed power from my generator directly through to the load and and charge the batteries at the same time. As long as my generator was running the internal inverter in the UPS was not being used. When the generator was off if I kept it under 400 watts it would not overheat. Of course I finally upgraded to a real off-grid setup but these old UPS's proved robust to me
You say the control circuit shuts down after a set time? I'm not sure but mine would work for a few days before my batteries died and I was forced to run the generator. Of course I disable the annoying beeper
wath are the amps in that ups ?
The rating would be on the outside of the unit. But, by going with an external battery to power it, you are extending the length of time the unit will run a given load. I would suggest using a deep cycle battery, rather than a car battery for this application.
tank you
Remove the warning sound...
wait so when the power goes out it stops using the inverter... and just runs your pc from 12v .. lol what?
yes. It converts the 12v from its battery to 120v
I have this problem, I connected the UPS via the lighter socket and when I turn it on it does work until I plug something into the UPS, so reading your comment suggests that this happens because I use the lighter socket right? And if I try connecting the ups directly to the battery I wouldn't have this problem?
What for sure we cannot convert back to Inverter is when the UPS requires 220 volts DC input. My UPS is 6kw and it requires 20 small 12 volt batteries therefore I couldn't convert it back.
lol. I was just thinking about trying this. I have a CyberPower 625AVR that was given to me and the battery was cracked. I threw the battery away and what I want to do is put a cigarette lighter plug to the battery connector of the UPS then cut the AC plug off. Then use the CyberPower 625AVR as an inverter in my Van to power laptops and my Xbox360. Does this sound like it will work well?
I did it with the help of Avasva solutions.
replace one battery with another and call it a ups to inverter conversion. ha ha.
If you would show how to remove transformer entirely that would be a great help.
i did all the connections , but my ups only supply for 5 min and went off, so how can i make it to be supplying permanent current with out goin off. which relays do i have to disconet and how? best of regads yunus.
Question, will this work? Taking my working APC UPS and tapping the battery leads to plug into a running vehicles cigarette lighter while leaving the UPS battery still hooked up? I would disconnect when ever cranking the engine is required. Its a 550VA 330Watt UPS with a 12volt sealed lead acid battery. I run my all in one computer that draws 69 watts +or- with programs running. I love my UPS but it sucks that it wont stay on threw my inverter.
Please explain that last sentence:
are you saying that the UPS you have does NOT work with the inverter you have?
Which models?
It will work for charging the UPS battery but be careful not to take too much power from the UPS or it will blow the cigarette lighter fuse
my ups has 3 pins that connect to the battery. the battery just went dead so I want to hack it, but I have no idea what the third pin is for.
I guess using a car battery is good in a pinch, but you're better off investing in a deep cycle battery, as they are design to be charged and then discharged multiple times and a car battery is not. Great idea though, I'll have to keep my eyes open on garbage day! ;-)
Yip that is what I have done also
lol I found the 4 tho. but all worked great for months after I found them new batteries
12volt deep cycle battery 100A is best ok not any and any car battery ok or if will killed battery ok I know
@kurtscottage Me too lol Trying to pawn the stuff off for free lol
@kurtscottag pls can u tell me i have ups APC 10000 can i recharge my car bettry from this ups in my room electricty? pls reply
how to modify ups into inverter
how to remove ups battery
and after replace with car battery
any chance for me…?
The APC is already a power inverter is why you get 110v ac from 12v dc with it. Knuckle Head! lmao,!
Its funny because you still think you are right. And I answered YOUR unasked question, because apparently YOU failed to google it before posting. These are home and small office UPS units and I know that they are not continuous because I have messed with some similar models myself.
I'm glad I was able to teach you something.
lmao... always runs on the inverter..... dude, it has a fast relay that switches over to battery once the power dies. It DOES NOT always run on the inverter.
My 24 volt 600 watt unit works just as you described. I was actually able to pass 2,000 Watts through it from the generator
Rakesh Saini Ranoli Peeplu
Nevertheless really cool. Check out American Science Center. They have good prices on sealed lead acid batteries. This will come in useful in the event of an Armageddon solar flare!
للأسف تصوير الفديو رديء .
Show physical step by step procedure