Charge Jackery While Driving

[tamooreindy]

I have a Jackery 1000. I just changed vehicles and now I'm having problems keeping the charge up while driving. Previously I had a Chevy van with a regular inverter plug (110/120?). I have a Bouge 23 quart refrigerator plugged into the Jackery and seems to pull about 45w. When plugged into the Chevy inverter it stayed at 100% when driving. Now I have a 2019 Chrysler Pacifica gas model but it doesn't have a built-in inverter. If I plug the Jackery into the 12v outlet of the van, it doesn't keep up and I lose about 25% of my charge per day. So I bought a 300w inverter, plugged it into the van cigarette lighter 122v plug, and then plugged in the Jackery to the inverter. It worked for a short time but then it kept going on and off. Am I going to need to give up on having the refrigerator for trips longer than a few days?

 

[user 423]

What does the Jackery manual or CS say about charging directly from the ciggy plug? Maybe you're not getting a good connection.

The fridge may not like being powered by an inverter that isn't pure sine wave.

When the fridge goes on and off do you get error codes?

 

[afblangley]

How many amps is the cigarette lighter rated to handle? Amps = watts / volts, so if the fridge is drawing 45 watts on 12 volts and the battery is draining, that means it's probably getting ~3 amps. That's pretty meager, but does that sound about right for a Pacifica?

If the fridge is the only item that needs power, you could bypass the Jackery and plug it into the vehicle directly while you're driving. Then the battery only has to support the fridge when you're stationary.

Furthermore, if there are multiple cigarette lighters in your vehicle, you could plug the Jackery into one and the fridge into another. Thus keeping them both charged while driving. This should work if the cigarette lighters are on different fuses.

 

[jonyjoe303]

Looking at the jackery manual it says it will take 14 hours to fully charge while driving, 7 hours from ac adapter. I also notice the internal battery is 21 volts. The AC adapter outputs 24 volts 7.5 amps 180 watts. That means if you connected the 300 watt inverter directly to the car battery you might be able to output that. The inverter connected to the cigarette plug won't output more than 10 amps before the plug starts to melt.

I also wonder how DC-DC, a 12 volt cigarette plug is going to charge a 21 volt battery. On the manual it says it support 12 - 13 volts which is unknown what it means since a cigarette plug can output up to 14.4 volts when the alternator is running.

For DC- DC a boost buck converter would work better in getting stable power to the jackery. You can also adjust the output to any output voltage you want. But this at most will give you 6 amps at about 13 volts (78 watts). Which is less than half what the ac adapter can get you.

This is the all-in-one 10a (6 amp constant) boost buck converter. I use these to charge all my batteries lead acid, lifepo4 and li-ion.

 

[user 423]

Alright....is it boost buck or buck boost? And how did they come up with whichever name it is?

 

[hugemoth]

Some people have gotten around then problem by plugging the Jackery into a small sine wave inverter. My friend uses a Bestek 300 Watt that sells for about $50. Charges the Jackery much faster.

 

[user 423]

I bought a 300w inverter, plugged it into the van cigarette lighter 122v plug, and then plugged in the Jackery to the inverter. It worked for a short time but then it kept going on and off.

Which unit do you mean keeps going on-off?

 

[peteg59]

If you do a lot of driving, charging from a vehicle cig lighter socket might work.
Otherwise you'll likely need an outside source for charging the Jackery.

I have the same unit and I can charge it while driving, but I don't typically drive more than a couple hours at most, once or twice a week.
Many times I won't drive and I use a 2000w. generic pure sine wave inverter/generator to top off the Jackery. While the little genny sips fuel, it still uses a gallon in 8 hours of running time.

I'm likely going to invest in solar panels to charge the jackery.
They are pricey up front, but the payoff comes in using free sunlight to recharge the Jackery.

Good luck on your charging dilemma, going forward...

 

[jonyjoe303]

Alright....is it boost buck or buck boost? And how did they come up with whichever name it is?

officially its a boost buck converter, but they usually call them buck boost. They take low voltage from a 12 volt battery boost it up (step up) to about 18 volts, then buck (step down) the voltage to about 14 volts while keeping a 6 amp output.. If you try to charge a 12 volt battery from the car cigarette output at most you might get 2 amps out of it. The battery voltage of both are too similar to charge at higher amps.
When I tried to charge a very low lifepo4 battery from my cigarette plug with the engine running I thought I was going to see 15 amps of charge power, but all I was getting was a measely 2 amps which is insignificant for a 220ah battery.

I recommend a dc wattmeter to measure how many amps are flowing into the power station when charging from the car. The dc wattmeter will show volts/amps and give a more accurate picture of whats going on. The jackery only shows input watts but it doesnt show the volts/amps.

This is a picture of another boost buck converter charger I built, this actually has the two converters. As long as you know the requirements of the battery your charging this is a good way of getting 6 amps of stable charge power to your device. I prefer the all-in-one converters for obvious reasons. Something like this will easily charge a jackery as long as you have the right plug. I been using these for years to charge my 12.6 volt 26ah li-ion packs and also a smaller 14.6 volt 10ah lifepo4 pack. But at 6 amps it will take many hours to charge a giant 100ah
power station. Thats why getting the 300 watt inverter to work would be a better solution.

 

[Happy Camper]

The inverter is too large of a draw for the plug it's in. That's why it's going on and off. It's a protection mode that saves a fuse from popping. I have experienced this first hand.

Get a smaller inverter under 150w and you'll be fine. Most built in inverters in vehicles are 150w or under. You'll be good to go