12V Car battery as emergency power

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kb0nly

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Ok. Finally got my marine deep cycle battery from Autozone. I called one of the Autozone's near where I live. They said they had three in stock but were not selling them. They said they wanted to keep them for themselves. Finally found one on the other side of the county. Anyway, should the power go out I most likely will just power one scanner. The hurricane is still hours away from NJ. Hopefully it won't be as
bad as they are saying.

Keeping them for themselves for the storm or? I suppose supplies are getting tight. I saw on the news they talked to a guy at store that said he couldnt get batteries for his flashlight as everyone was sold out!
 

Rob_K

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I ended up purchasing an Optima battery for the storm and to build a permanent backup power solution. I like the Optima because it was completed sealed as it will be in the house.

I want to keep a couple of scanners online and have my FT-7800 available. I also wanted to keep my online feeds going (scanners and thin client are all DC powered). I didn't get a chance to hook the battery up before the storm. I lost power around 8AM and still don't have it back. Fired up the generator and ran the feeds off that (along with the other essentials in the house).

Funny, I was worried about keeping my cable modem and router up but after about 8 hours without power, my ISP crapped out. No cable or Internet. Guess I don't have to worry about keeping my feed up!

(Unless I figure out a way to stream it through the Verizon WiFi Hotspot I'm using right now...)
 
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kb0nly

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I ended up purchasing an Optima battery for the storm and to build a permanent backup power solution. I like the Optima because it was completed sealed as it will be in the house.

I want to keep a couple of scanners online and have my FT-7800 available. I also wanted to keep my online feeds going (scanners and thin client are all DC powered). I didn't get a chance to hook the battery up before the storm. I lost power around 8AM and still don't have it back. Fired up the generator and ran the feeds off that (along with the other essentials in the house).

Funny, I was worried about keeping my cable modem and router up but after about 8 hours without power, my ISP crapped out. No cable or Internet. Guess I don't have to worry about keeping my feed up!

(Unless I figure out a way to stream it through the Verizon WiFi Hotspot I'm using right now...)

Good choice on the battery, they cost a little more but will give you years and years of service. Mine is on its sixth year of continuous service. People think they won't last that long but they do, they just don't see the conditions in your house that they would see in a vehicle or boat, extremes of heat and cold, heavy usage daily, etc.

Get a good charger/maintainer, or if the shack needs a power supply upgrade get an Iota with IQ4 option and direct connect to the battery like i did, then you don't have to worry about nothing.

No surprise on your ISP going down. Most telco co's have enough battery for 8-12 hours around here, beyond that they will bring in a generator. Cable internet is far more fickle, for example in my town the cable system has line powered amplifiers every couple blocks to keep the cable signal at a specified strength. The problem is the internet goes through those as well and they provide an amplified return, power goes down all the amps go down and no cable or internet.

I put up tv antennas after the storm to pull in some local channels so i still have news when the cable goes out. When the power goes out my feeds go out, nothing i can do about it, even if i had DSL it would go out after a matter of hours, and when we had the tornado July 1st all the overhead phone lines went down and it took out the service in most of the town anyway, those that were underground still had some phone service but the internet was out. Even the local cell tower can't be relied on for this either, it died under the load it was taking, you could send a text message but making calls was next to impossible.
 

Moose

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New Jersey
Follow-up

Boy am I glad I got that battery. Settled on an Everlast deep cycle marine battery that I got from Autozone. Brought it home and decided to only use two scanners if the power went out. Well, the power went out about 4am Sunday morning. I used a Radio Shack Pro-2067 as the primary. In that one I
programmed only my town, and the towns surrounding mine as well as the county freqs. The other scanner I hooked up was a Uniden BC996T which has "everything" programmed in. I ran the 2067 about 30 minutes each hour to hear what was happening in the area. Then I would turn that off and power up the 2067 to hear what was going on outside my area, including State and Federal stuff. That one I kept on only about 15 minutes each hour because I believe it draws more power. We had electricity restored about 9:30 Sunday night, which was lucky for us because the people across the street from me and the rest of the town westward are still without power as of this morning. Having working scanners made me feel more "in control" of my situation, at least I knew what was going on in my town and the surrounding ones. Thanks to everyone who responded to my initial post.
 

FallenAnjel

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Long Island
Hi Moose, I saw your thread and I actually thought of this just after Irene. I'm on the north shore of Long Island and my power went out at 10 am on Sunday and was restored just 15 hours later at 1:15 AM.

I was actually thinking of using a car battery for my charging my cell phones and possibly trying my modem for internet. (and charging the laptop too). I didn't know how much time I'd get out of it tho. (I don't drive and I do not have a car.)

Since my Pro-164 isnt' picking up suffolk county PD right now (been working in it for a couple days now w/ no luck), I only was listening to my town's FD and LIPA frequencies. I ran the scanner for almost 24 hours straight before the battery icon popped up. My power was only out for 15. I turned off the "low battery" beep so i let the scanner run until it dies. Gets the most out of the batteries. I use mostly CVS batteries. I don't throw away batteries I take out of my camera and stuff, because I can use them for other "low drain" items like flashlights and the radio, and possibly the scanner.
 

Moose

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New Jersey
Hi FallenAnjel, glad you made out ok during the storm. I'm the same way with my batteries.
If the batteries in my camera give out, I hang on to them and use them in my tv and dvd
remotes. I also have several rechargeable AA batteries that I use for various gadgets. I've certainly gotten my money's worth out of them.
 

slicerwizard

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Toronto, Ontario
I was actually thinking of using a car battery for my charging my cell phones and possibly trying my modem for internet. (and charging the laptop too). I didn't know how much time I'd get out of it tho.
Car batteries are not designed for that type of service. You will quickly end up with a pricey foot stool.
 

grumps96

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May 31, 2010
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Massachusetts
Hi all, whatever you decide on, Generator, or Battery, make sure you have proper ventilation, generators
create Carbonmonoxide, very hazardous. and charging batteries can generate Hydrogen Gas, very explosive. be safe! ~JC
 

OptimaBill

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Sep 22, 2011
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Pigeon Forge, Tn.
Hi Guys,
I usually respond to automotive related forums, but when I came across this one I just had to post. I read a lot of great information here and want to comment on a couple things. First, I certainly recommend a deep-cycle battery for this application. Our YellowTop series would be just fine as an Optima choice. We also have a BlueTop series, generally associated with watercraft or motorhomes, but some larger size options that may be more suitable for an application that would mean longer times without power. Both choices would work though, depending on your application and space to store the battery. Any batteries wired in series or parallel need to be the same age, size and type. If you do put the battery in a tight enclosed space, be sure to choice one with ventilation provisions. Also, as far as keeping the proper charge, just get a modern, microprocessor-controlled charger and you should have no problems at all. Fully-charged, our YellowTops (and BlueTops with light-gray cases) will measure about 13.0-13.2 volts. If you have any specific questions about our products, feel free to ask here. Thanks,
Bill Howell
 

audioman79

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Oct 4, 2011
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Location
MD
another good deep dry-cell battery are kinetik batteries. Ive used them in several applications in car audio installs. they have one that has 134 AH. HC3800 power cell.
 
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