I could use a little help finding a portable power supply as follows:
Powers a small device for a few hours … Don’t need more than that
Consists of a rechargeable battery
Has a normal 3 prong power outlet interface … Really only need one outlet
Smaller is better
Lighter weight is better
All the ones I am finding are big, heavy, and have enough juice to jump start a car. I don’t need nearly that much power, nor do I want to bear that much weight, nor can I afford to spare the space for those kind of dimensions.
Your solution probably starts with a small inverter of 150-200W, which can be as small as a paperback book. You’ll need a 12V battery, like one for a golf cart or motorcycle, or a smaller gel cell, to power it and recharge. Otherwise, you’re looking for all of that already built into a very small UPS (300-500VA), which you could recharge by plugging in and would run a small device (20-50W) for perhaps half an hour.
I am currently using a 12V 18Ah lead acid battery that weighs 14 lbs., and. a 300W inverter thats about 12 inches long. It would power my device for hours longer than I need.
Looking to downsize. I’m surprised at how hard it is to find a little battery with an outlet all bundled together.
A computer uninterruptable power supply (UPS) will do basically what you need. I’m not sure how small they get. The ones I’ve seen are usually about as big as a loaf of bread.
There’s a certain size below which I can’t imagine any good use for a 120V AC power supply, so small UPSes are going to be your most convenient off the shelf option.
What is it you’re powering, for how long, and how many times in between charges?
Our daughter’s DeVilbiss mobile suction unit, suctioning her secretions, routinely every 5 minutes at times and in emergencies at other times, to clear her airways.
It has an internal battery, but that battery is prone to crapping out and losing its ability to hold a charge. Every time this happens, we need our medical provider to swap it out for a new one, which can take a day or two.
We take it with us on our daughter’s medical stroller. Failure of the device at the wrong time could be fatal.
We have been using the more powerful rig to power a Cough Assist airway clearance device that requires much more power and lacked an internal battery. We recently got an upgraded Cough Assist device that has a nice internal battery. So we no longer need to lug around that much potential power.
However, we do need something to keep the suction machine operating reliably, but her stroller weighs 200 pounds fully loaded with her and all her medical devices and power supply. Anything to shave that weight helps push her around all day in the sun safely.
I just took a look at the manual and it suggests that you can run it off of 12v directly, which means you don’t need the inverter at all. You can pick up a smaller battery like this - 12v 4 a/h replacement sealed lead acid battery and use a standard charger to keep it topped up when you are at home. Compare the amp-hour rating to the internal battery to get an idea of the relative capacity of the battery. You can always opt for a larger battery if required.
I’m sorry, I missed that post. As FinsToTheLeft mentions it runs off of 12 VDC. Here’s a 12V power station for CPAP machinesthat weighs 1.3 pounds. I think you’ll find more choices looking for a 12VDC supply.
It’s unfortunate that the device uses a non-standard battery with iffy reliability.
But, with a 12v input jack, you can use anything from a car battery on down to a cordless drill battery. A typical 12v battery as used in a UPS is something like a 1280, which is 12 volts and 8 amp-hours, which is about three times more capacity than your pump’s internal battery. You can get a generic 1280 for around $15.00.
One caution with UPS units is that not all of them can “cold start” without incoming electric power. They’re meant to take over when power fails, rather than to serve as a portable electric outet.
The manual says it draws a maximum of 33W @ 12V, so ideally you’d want something that can deliver 3 amps continuously. Realistically it probably only draws that at startup, and you don’t use the machine continuously so you could get by with less.
Lithium-ion batteries are the way to go if want to minimize size and weight, but they’re more expensive and a little more difficult to charge. The pack TriPolar linked to is unregulated and starts at 16.8V output; that’s too high so you’d need a regulator to go with it.
This pack would last over an hour but it’s a little troubling it’s only rated 2A continuous. If you only used it for a few minutes for, say, a few times per hour it would probably be fine.
The PMD-CP12266W would be ideal and last over 7 hours, but the price is steep. I’m pretty confident the PMD-CP12150 would be adequate. This isn’t the only place that sells this stuff, so you might find something better tailored elsewhere.
Any choice has to be carefully checked, hopefully with advice from DeVilbiss.
That was just an example. But machine is designed to use a car jack which might produce over 14V and should have an internal regulator. One thing to note is that it doesn’t automatically switch modes. If you’re running on the battery pack you have to know if it’s running low and manually switch to the internal battery. You also have to check the effect of recharge/discharge cycle if the external power source is automatically charging the internal battery.