Looking for a power inverter for the car

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’m going to be on a long hiking/backpacking trip to the Wind Rivers and the car may be my only source of power. I want to recharge some camera batteries when going from trailhead to trailhead. Any suggestions for a power inverter? I think that’ll make more sense than a charger with at cigarette lighter attachment since there will be two different battery chargers, plus I’m sure I’ll get new cameras over time with different chargers.

What features if any are needed? Total wattage? Brands?

2

What type of camera is it? Or what type of batteries does it use? I have Sony rechargable batteries for my digi cam and you can buy a car charger made just for them (the safest route). My camcorder also has a car charger you can buy made just for it…

Check with your original equipment manufacturer, that would be the safest way to go (although not always the cheapest…)

3

I can buy a charger for my Canon SD300 (NB-4L battery) but I have other cameras and will get another some time down the road that will use a different proprietary battery. I have a car adapter for my AA charger, but others won’t be standard and in the long run I don’t want to buy one for each new camera I get.

I have found a car charger for this battery and I can buy it, but power inverter seems like a better solution.

4

FWIW I once saw a power inverter take a car’s charging system down. All the way down.
I wasn’t the tech involved, so I don’t know just what it did, but it took a new alternator, and regulator to fix.
This was a bunch of years ago, so YMMV.

5

I have something likethis (not exact modle, but same brand). I use it to charge my cell phone and mp3 player while on the road. Mine is the 400 watt version, but that’s overkill for what I use it for, and besides it needs to be connected directly to the battery in order to meet that rating, although it does use a cigarette lighter plug for that’s good for about 150 watts. 150 watts in more than enough to charge small batteries.

So a small one will work for you. However, if you want to plug two chargers into it at the same time, you may need some sort of adaptor simply because the side by side outlet design doesn’t work well with more than one ‘wall wart’ type transformer. I use something like this in order to get the room I need. I normally wouldn’t like to do that, but the loads are so small I think it’s ok.