www.iFourWinns.com

I plan on installing an inverter over the winter to a 3rd battery and would like to wire the 120v side to the existing system. I was wondering what would happen to the inverter when you plug in for shore power? Seems like I need some type of 120v isolator. I could just use a inline switch but a know I'll forget switch it off sooner or later.
Any thoughts?

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278 Vista

Most of our friends have that have inverters. Put a shore power cord on them. Then all you have to do is plug it in on your shore power. And turn what ever you like on. That way you do not forget to turn a switch off.

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348 Vista ( Last Call )
Raystown PA

Ahh, that is a good way to do it.

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278 Vista

Another option would be to wire the inverter to the (unused) generator side of the power panel.

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318 Vista
"What Next?" (for sale)

But what if you already have a genset wired into the panel? I've been thinking about adding an inverter to our 348. There are only a few times we use the genset; frozen drinks in the blender, making coffee in the morning and running the microwave to steam veggies for dinner.

If we're out when it's hot enough to need the AC we usually prefer to get a slip instead of risking the genset running overnight. That and not wanting to bother everyone else at an anchorage with the drone of a genset all night long.

So an inverter would be pretty convenient.

I'm not sure I'd want to try rigging up some sort of cable to re-run it into the shore power connections. That'd be a bit cumbersome and would require yet another cable to deal with storing.

Then there's the issue of dealing with the battery charger. It would be a bit stupid to end up having the inverter feeding back on itself trying to recharge the batteries as it's depleting them. Yes, I could manually turn off the Battery Charger breaker. I'd prefer to make this as foolproof as possible though.

The ultimate question is where to put the controls for it. Surprisingly there aren't a lot of free places to put another set of circuit breaker panels. I don't think there's enough room in the shore power locker. There's certainly not enough room in the main electrical panel (it's already full). I'm tempted to remove the unused 5-disc CD-changer and get a custom panel made to take it's place. This would also give me a place to put some additional breaker controls to separate chart plotter, NMEA2k bus (fuel flow, GPS), wifi and other DC circuits. There's really no other flat spot on a wall that works well for this. At least not one that's near the existing circuit breaker panel. The wall next to the steps is out because people using the steps would be banging up against it.

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-Bill Kearney, 2005 348 Vista

I think I'll go the shore power cord route. The cable itself shouldn't be anymore than say 15' or so.

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278 Vista

That is our plan as well, we will be adding our inverter and will use a power cable to plug into our shore power connector. This keeps everything simple and you can never have to deal with having two AC power sources. We want our inverter to use the microwave when we are on the water. We looked at the 12 volt microwave but this seemed to be cheaper and more versatile.

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Jnizi

2007 Vista 338 "Better Yet"
Previously:
2007 Vista 258 " Just Right"
2005 Horizon 230

This shore power cord solution seems a bit hokey. I have a 248V and having a shore power cord hanging over the side of my boat while underway seems, well... bayliner'ish. C'mon guys, revolt against the shore power cord solution, for the good of FourWinns! Don't give us a bad name.

I might add that I have no better suggestion at this time.