Battery power for big SSTC

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: Matthew Smith <matt-at-kbc-dot-net.au> 

Hi All

Inspired by Dan's 10kW SSTC, I was wondering if anyone considered car* 
batteries** as a power source for larger SSTCs?

I am able to get batteries which are not quite good enough to start an 
engine but can nevertheless hold a charge, for free.  I use a bank of four 
to run an ex-telecomms inverter - can give 300W for several hours.  This 
got me thinking...

A 60Ah battery can deliver 60A for an hour when new.  When old, we can 
probably still get 60A, just not for so long.  If we hook up twenty of 
these 12V batteries, we have 60A -at- 240V = 14.8kW to play with. (Yikes!)

Could this be a way of overcoming the limitations of smaller domestic supplies?

Cheers

M



* Automobile for those in the USA
* I should really call them accumulators.

-- 
Matthew Smith
Kadina Business Consultancy
South Australia
http://www.kbc-dot-net.au