Cannibalize jump pack for power station.

[Walkers]

I have a CAT jump pack from Costco that was given me for my birthday. It has never functioned worth a darn though. It certainly won’t start a truck or tractor with a dead battery. I never use the compressor, as I have way better solutions for air. The lights are worthless. I have plugged in my phone once or twice. I assume this has a SLA battery in it. I was curious if anyone has used the charging and inverter portions of these to build a DIY power station? I have a marine deep cycle battery in a box (FLA, not SLA though). It would be nice to have the plug in charger, as well as the small inverter and the outlets. The rest can go in the trash AFAIC.

Thanks,

 

[BCMoto]

I have that same jump pack your talking about but never thought of modding it. I do use it to jump start vehicles all the time without problems tho.

 

[KonzaLander]

I say, go for it! What do you have to loose? If the components of the power pack that you would use, work; I see no downside. You can easily shove everything you want into a pelican style box.

I recently built my own waterproof powerbox for multi-night kayaking trips. This will help keep my navigation and communication units charged as needed.

 

[Walkers]

Well, I pulled the battery pack apart. It netted a 12v 19ah SLA battery, a 200 watt inverter with outlet, a decent power switch, and the charger, which is a 12v, 750 milliamp transformer. Not sure if I will use much of it for this go around, but maybe another time. There were so many circuit boards, with lights and litteral bells and whistles that I think the thing must be handicapping itself.

Also, I am curious. The machine has a sticker on the front that say “1000 Watts”. No matter what I do, I can think of no way of using a thousand watts out of this battery unless it was to give it a dead short. Even on the rating plate it indicates 500watts instantaneous, 300watts sustained.

 

[lhoffm4]

I like your idea. I have had a few of those jump packs over the years that seem to work right up to the point you NEED them. I have since built my own SoGen, based off a set of LiFePO4 cells that should outlast me. Pulling components out of dead jump packs seems like a great way to source some usable parts. Hadn't thought about adding an air compressor from one to a SoGen, so thanks for planting a seed...

 

[Billiebob]

Fabulous idea, I love what KonzaLander did but you need to be pretty battery charger literate to do this safely. Tons of liability, risks if you get it wrong.

 

[Walkers]

after Pulling apart my “1000 Amp” jump pack I found a 12v 19ah SLA battery, a tiny mess of miniature wires and several circuit boards with bells and buzzers, a 200 watt inverter, a small air compressor, an on/off switch, a 750ma transformer. I decided to not use most of it for this project, but diduse the switch and some wiring.

I had a fairly inexpensive 400 watt inverter. I ordered a 12v & usb outlet bank with led volt meter. I bought a group 31 battery box, and a small pelicanish case from HF. I put the group 31 FLA battery in the box, then mounted the HF case to the lid. I made a cut out for the inverter and mounted that, then drilled some holes for the 12v outlet and usb outlet. I drilled a hole in the battery box lid and mounted the switch from the battery pack. I need to address charging, and will likely add an Anderson connector to ameliorate that issue, as well as being able to use it as a jump starter, or for my trailer mounted winch.

 

[Walkers]

I used my little power station over the weekend. I went up to my camp in the mountains and plugged in my new Massimo 40qt fridge that I bought from Costco, and it powered it just fine. Ran most of Thursday, Friday, Saturday, until Saturday late afternoon. I had the fridge set at 38* . Friday afternoon I jumpered it to the truck for 45 minutes, not sure how necessary this was, but it was convenient. I have no complaints. I will likely add a solar panel to the system for longer stays, but most of my trips are weekenders. The other thing that I will likely add is an Anderson connector for charging.