2400w Inverter Issues

[Overtrail Mike]

Just recently finished a trip from Tucson to Seattle.

My son was trying to run an Apple tablet off the inverter. I would press the AC button to turn on the power and it would run for a while but would trip off about every 20 to 30 minute the entire 3day trip. After 2 to 5 minutes after iI shut down I could turn it back on.

Any ideas why it might be shutting down? I was monitoring voltage and generally was hovering between 12.9 to 13.3 volts most of the trip and occasionally would get up as high as 14,4 volts for very short periods.

Tried turning air conditioning off(and cool box). Still made no difference. Did the same thing with headlights on or off.

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[jefkat2]

Just recently finished a trip from Tucson to Seattle.

My son was trying to run an Apple tablet off the inverter. I would press the AC button to turn on the power and it would run for a while but would trip off about every 20 to 30 minute the entire 3day trip. After 2 to 5 minutes after iI shut down I could turn it back on.

Any ideas why it might be shutting down? I was monitoring voltage and generally was hovering between 12.9 to 13.3 volts most of the trip and occasionally would get up as high as 14,4 volts for very short periods.

Tried turning air conditioning off(and cool box). Still made no difference. Did the same thing with headlights on or off.

Any help would be appreciated.

From what I read in the owner's manual it also depends on the Hybrid battery charge. If while driving the Hybrid battery runs low, it will shut off the power inverter until the Hybrid is sufficiently charged back up. Makes sense if you are running air conditioning and cool box and whatever the Apple tablet is drawing. I've only used mine while parked and needed to heat some water for coffee.

 

[Insanoflexathf]

Was the Apple Tablet the only thing pulling watts, or was there other items plugged into the inverter? I’ve seen a couple of videos of people killing the AC Inverter power in the Land Cruiser whey pulling too much watts, or when it’s too hot to keep the inverter at a reasonable temp. Apparently it’s a safety feature and the inverter will be able to run again after it cools down. They recommended running the air conditioner, if it’s really hot out. Now, I have not experienced this and have run my portable fridge off of the AC inverter as several campsites. It does require the engine to kick on and off randomly to charge the battery, but the LC handles that on it’s own. I don’t run my air conditioner or any dash lights when parked at a campsite.

 

[Overtrail Mike]

The Apple tablet was the only draw for part of the trip (no air conditioner or cool box) and it would shut down about every 20 to 30 minutes.

On other parts of the trip we had outside temperatures of 99 to 205 Fah. and we ran the air conditioner with the same results shutting Nt down about every 20 to 30 minutes.

Like I said we could restart it in about 5 minutes which doesn’t make much since it is trying to cool it down.

Thanks for the reply!

 

[JordanJ]

I’m following this as I’ve yet to truly try and use the inverter for anything but charging my phone while working on the truck. And I’m in Houston so it gets ungodly hot here too, so I’d be curious to see if A/C does effect this… hopefully it’s just a freak glitch for ya

 

[Overtrail Mike]

I have a 10,000 mile appt for maintenance on Thursday so will bring this up with the service department and let everyone know what I find out.

 

[Brando]

We’ve run the AC for our camper off the LC inverter with no issues with it stopping. The center console where the inverter sits became pretty hot so I ran the AC inside the car. No issues on our end.

 

[jaray]

Was the Apple Tablet the only thing pulling watts, or was there other items plugged into the inverter? I’ve seen a couple of videos of people killing the AC Inverter power in the Land Cruiser whey pulling too much watts, or when it’s too hot to keep the inverter at a reasonable temp. Apparently it’s a safety feature and the inverter will be able to run again after it cools down. They recommended running the air conditioner, if it’s really hot out. Now, I have not experienced this and have run my portable fridge off of the AC inverter as several campsites. It does require the engine to kick on and off randomly to charge the battery, but the LC handles that on it’s own. I don’t run my air conditioner or any dash lights when parked at a campsite.

Can you elaborate what you mean when you say that it requires the engine to kick on and off randomly to charge the battery?
What state are you leaving the ignition on for the engine to start and stop on its own?

 

[EOD Guy]

Start the engine and leave it in "Park", open the door. After a few minutes there will be a message come up about automatically shutting the engine off after one hour, just answer "No" and it will cycle on/off until you shut off the engine or it runs out of fuel.

 

[Brando]

Can you elaborate what you mean when you say that it requires the engine to kick on and off randomly to charge the battery?
What state are you leaving the ignition on for the engine to start and stop on its own?

I started the vehicle. Left it on in park. Plugged up our camper and hit the inverter button. The LC engine would cycle on and off as needed based on the load. With the camper AC running the LC engine would cycle quicker. With less of a load the LC engine would turn off for 30-45min.

 

[Insanoflexathf]

We’ve run the AC for our camper off the LC inverter with no issues with it stopping. The center console where the inverter sits became pretty hot so I ran the AC inside the car. No issues on our end.

I read that running the cool box helps keep that center console cool.

 

[Brando]

I read that running the cool box helps keep that center console cool.

No cool box for us. 1958 Trim.

 

[Insanoflexathf]

Can you elaborate what you mean when you say that it requires the engine to kick on and off randomly to charge the battery?
What state are you leaving the ignition on for the engine to start and stop on its own?

Yes, essentially what @EOD Guy said. If you turn on the AC button on the left side of the steering wheel the vehicle will remain on and will automatically shut off the engine to conserve gas and running solely off the hybrid batteries. As the hybrid batteries start to run low, the vehicle will kick over to the gas engine to charge the battery. It works similar to a generator.