I need help on a basic fact of inverters in the 2000w to 3000w range

[JoeHam]

Looks like plenty of good advice and I think you’ll be fine with either choice.

I believe Will used a Giandel when he lived in an RV full time

 

[fblevins1]

Once again, a google search takes me here. Good times. We ran into the same issue here at the postgraduate school where I am tasked with providing enough load to run near the maximum wattage of the inverter but not exceed the normal ratings of a single outlet and what we came up with is an electronic load 1000 watts each and they can then in turn be used in a Master/Slave configuration for between 1000 to 4000 watts of total load power but each outlet will be limited to 12 amp (1440 watts) The big issue we had, was we had DC electronic loads and those don't work on AC outlets, So I just suggested that we plug up our 36 volt 40 Amp power supplies into the inverter and then use the electronic loads to control the load so that the student can get whatever power they need on the microgrid. Apparently they liked the idea they are going to buy two more power supplies and two more loads to get me that total power needed. Oh and the reason we are doing it this way, is AC/DC electronic loads in the power range we needed are ridiculously more expensive than DC only loads, and since we already had 5 supplies and two electronic loads....... Thanks again guys for bringing up these questions....sure saves me a lot of time. Best Solar site ever. P.S, don't hurt your calculators....lots of per outlet limits being imposed, our assumptions are based on the total wattage of the inverters but are imposing a 1500 watt limit for each outlet or in this case 1440 watts. Ummmm I am rambling now and forgetting to look how old the post is.

 

[fblevins1]

That question came up today when discussing some of the different inverters we have around here. I assume one NEMA 5 -15 can handle 15 amps at 120 volts, but in the case of my 5000 watt inverter, it means I can get away with running two 15 amp or 1800 watt devices on 2 of the 4 available outlets but not all four, on a perfect day I can run 1200 watts on each outlet, but as mentioned above it is probably more realistic to expect 1000 watts each, but for sure you can go balls to the wall on at least two. The one inverter I am testing at work is a 3000 watt inverter, so I can expect full rated power out of one outlet but not both. I wish the darned companies would match the inverter power to the number of outlets, but then that would take lower power applications that use the same outlets off the gameboard and we can't be having that.