Wiring

Unless your house was built with a backup power system in mind, you will not be able to just unplug the power company and plug in your backup. This can be one problem with setting up your backup. Some of you will need an electrician to do your wiring. This will greatly increase your cost. However, as in all survivalism, safety needs to come first. Having the greatest backup system in the world will not do you any good if you burn down the house the first time it is plugged in. You also need to worry about codes. Some areas will not let you do any wiring unless you are a qualified electrician, and that includes backup systems. I know many people who have done their own wiring, as I have, but it is not something that I can reccomend. Only you know what your capability is. First you need to know that you need different types of wiring and different types of receptacles, different types of fuses or breakers for different types of power. 12v and 12ov and even 240v all require different wiring. With 12v you usually need a stranded wire rather than the standard solid house wiring. You also need a larger diameter for 12v. When you wire in an inverter, you will need to use 12v wiring from the battery to the inverter, then back to regular house wiring. First we need to wire from the charging unit to the battery. For this I simply use heavy automotive wire. I use red for positive and black for negative. Anytime you go to a wire that is available in only one color, be sure that you mark the wires plainly. When using heavy wire, such as that which battery cables are made from, which only comes in black, I wrap a piece of red tape around each end of the cable that will be used for the positive cable. When wiring a system from the charging unit to the battery, make sure there is a diode in the line of the charging unit that will prevent bleed back from the battery to the charging unit. Most manufacturers provide these, but be sure to check out the specifications to make sure. When hooking the batteries to inverters, you will need a fused junction box. This is the same type as the fuse block in your car. You need a six fuse unit with six 20 amp fuses. If more fuses are needed, simply add another fuse block. The reason for the fuse block is that most of the small inverters that I use for my backup system come with a ciggarette lighter style plug. The larger ones come with clamp on leads, the smaller ones do not. This means that your are going to need to wire a lighter receptacle to a fuse for each inverter you are going to use. If you have inverters with the clamps you can use an in-line fuse and if you are going to use one large inverter for your entire backup system, that makes it even easier. To be continued.