Totalnewbies electrical question

[totalnoobie15]

i need help. i am trying to run a 300 watt grow light of a car battery. i have bought a power converter and a battery. then i realized that my battery will drain in about 50 mins since there is no way to recharge it. should i go with a low watt flurescent (not spelled right) light? and what is the diff between these huge wattage lights and the flurescent lights? what should i do?

 

[totalnoobie15]

just have a general question. if it is too stupid feel free not to answer. i was wanting to run lights off a battery instead of my home electricity so that it isnt as obvious. I have bought a power converter and battery but the battery drains too fast because there is no way to recharge it. should i buy a trickle charger and just keep it permanently plugged in? thank you

 

[Hick]

moved this over to lighting for you total'. Hopefully one of the "sparky's" will help you out.

I'm sorta' electrically challenged..

 

[Stoney Bud]

just have a general question. if it is too stupid feel free not to answer. i was wanting to run lights off a battery instead of my home electricity so that it isnt as obvious. I have bought a power converter and battery but the battery drains too fast because there is no way to recharge it. should i buy a trickle charger and just keep it permanently plugged in? thank you

If you charge a battery by pluging it in, your electricity usage would be more than if you just run the light.

It's not feasible to do what you're thinking of. Batteries would only be feasible if you had something that generated electricity that you could store. If you're using the power company to charge your batteries, you would save money by just plugging the lights in.

 

[WrEkkED]

you will need to buy a solar charger, or wind generator to attach to your battery (deep cell). Get one that will put out as much as you are consuming. Note: It will be expensive LoL

 

[Muad'dib]

You could setup up more than one battery in 'parrelel' so that each battery drains less.

Look at this (bad) pic. The little boxes are batteries and the lines are wires.

This setup would cause each battery to provice 1/4 of the power that you are draining. This would increase the life of the batteries a lot.
If you have more than 4 batteries. You can set up two sets. One will be providing you the power whilst you can charge the others.

You can get a car solar charger from Frys' or any major electrical retailer that will trickle charge your batteries for you.

Check out http://www.solarexpert.com/Batteries/batchart.html for better info