I do have a home constructed portable power supply for my Alien Bees.
Consists of a 300 watt Samlex true sine wave inverter, a 12 volt 17AH
gell cell lead acid battery and a Schumacher Electric 1.5A battery
"maintainer" from the local AutoZone as the battery charger. Electrical
connections are quick disconnect, high amperage parts made for RC model
cars. The charger is also so equipped. All installed in a little
backpack similar to the way Alien Bees does their unit. The backpack as
a carry device is good since the whole thing is pretty heavy. Battery
in bottom pocket, charger in middle, inverter in the top pocket. The
whole package is about 17" high by 9" wide. (43x23 cm)
<http://www.chucknorcutt.com/gear/Powerpack%20for%20Bees.jpg>
Not all true sine wave inverters are created equal. Even though rated
at 300 watts the first one I tried would instantly shut off as soon as
even one flash unit tried to draw power. The Samlex easily handles all
4 of the Bees with the only effect that doubling the number of units
doubles the recharge time. If I had it to do over again I would use the
smaller, cheaper 150 watt Samlex which appears to be exactly what Alien
Bees uses but with their label attached. The inverter seems to draw
lots of power on its own even when it's idling and not feeding power to
the flash units. It places a limit on how long you can shoot without
being concerned about shutting the unit off during short breaks in the
action. I assume that the 150 watt unit would be less power hungry
while idling but don't know that for sure. Recharge time from a full
dump on a single Alien Bees B800 (360 watt seconds) would go from 1-1/2
to 3 seconds but that's really not a problem and they're never at full
power.
Wayne Harridge wrote:
>
>>Chuck Norcutt <chucknorcutt@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>>Think outside the box. 240 KILO volts. :-)
>>
>>On a more serious note, lightweight capacitor storage units might be
>>more readily exchanged than 1,000 pound batteries.
>>
>
>
> That would make a great power supply for a studio flash unit !
>
> ...Wayne
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