Paul C. Buff, Inc. Technical Forum

While waiting for the Einsteins to ship, I've been thinking about possible lightweight location power solutions. I believe I read that the the original Vagabond had a 150W pure sine wave inverter in it. That being the case, is it reasonable to assume that a portable battery pack built around a 150W pure sine wave inverter would be up to the task of powering a single Einstein (while providing at least 3-5 second recycling times)?

Incidentally, I am aware that multi-voltage units such as the Einstein are often incompatible with most inverters. I'm hoping the Einstein turns out to be inverter friendly.

Dave F.

150W should be fine, in and of itself. However, your inverter needs to be able to stay on during the peak draw times of the recycle period. Many inverters see this peak draw (18A) and shut down, thinking something is amiss.

TS

Thank you for the super-speedy reply. It's much appreciated.

Dave F.

I have five of the 150w Vagabonds and use them to power five WL X3200. Those are 1320ws lights. Last week I didn't want to have to carry two battery packs through the deep snow, and ran two WL X3200 from one Vagabond. It worked OK, but recycle time was slow, like 15 seconds. Keep in mind two things: first I was running the equivalent of four 640ws lights from one Vagabond, and second the temperature was +5 F. Recycle would likely have been much faster if I had been using them indoors.


Kent in SD

That's great first-hand information, Kent. Thanks much!

Dave F.