Jackery power supply issue (1 Viewer)

[BigMF]

I purchased a Jackery Explorer 500 in February and have had a little opportunity to use it but not really put it through its paces. My goal was to have it plugged into the 110V outlet in the back of my LX to keep it charged while traveling and then plug my fridge into it. This way the fridge has a constant supply of power, even when the truck is off and the Jackery can be recharged while driving.

On Friday, I completed a 7 hour drive and ran into some issues. At about the halfway point, the charge on the Jackery was still at 99% and I thought "Great, it's working as planned". However, when I stopped an hour later I noted that the charge on the Jackery had dropped and there were 0 watts flowing into it. The LCD on the Jackery shows watts going out AND coming in. The power supply of the Jackery is similar to a laptop charger in that it has a two-prong plug that leads to a "brick" transformer that then plugs into the Jackery with a round plug. The brick has a blue LED on it which was lit indicating that power was flowing into it. While plugged in and charging, the Jackery also has a blue LED that is solidly lit. However, while getting 0 watts, the blue LED on the Jackery was flashing.

Once I got to my parent's house, I plugged the Jackery into a wall outlet and it charged just fine with 84 watts flowing in. Plugged it back into my truck and 0 watts. Checked the voltage of the plug going into the Jackery with a multimeter and found the same voltage (23.8V) when plugged into the wall or the truck.

The only thing I can think of at this point is that the 84 watts is too close to the 100 watt stated max output for the rear power outlet. However, it's not exceeding it so I'm confused why it would fail completely to charge some times but not others. Also, would think that if I exceeded the 100 watts it would blow a fuse and not just fail to send power.

Any thoughts or advice before I reach out to Jackery?

 

[indycole]

I believe that there’s some basic intelligence in that circuit that will cut the power without blowing a fuse but I could be wrong. If so, I’d say the power draw of 84 watts is close enough to the limit to cause issues once you factor in the instability of the vehicle’s AC waveform, the variance between peak voltage and rms, and the unknown quality of the transformer that comes with the Jackery. Just guessing...

In terms of other troubleshooting, it’s probably worth checking the fuse and perhaps the voltage at the battery, fuse, and outlet both when the vehicle is off and at idle.

 

[TeCKis300]

That pesky rear AC outlet. I really do wish it had just that much more oomph as 100W has relatively little utility. Something like the Tacoma's 400W would be infinitely more useful.

I had the same problem. My GZ has a 60W charger using a similar laptop type adapter. Get this, I measured that it draws 180W AC for 60W DC output. So yeah, it's just exceeding the output of the outlet and the car inverter has failsafe's to shut the party down. No harm no foul, other than it won't work for this application. I did test the limits of the onboard inverter and while I don't remember its specific output limit, it doesn't have much margin over its 100W rating before it shuts down.

Many of us have resorted to installing a 12V outlet in the rear. I use that to charge my GZ with a car adapter, which works at 60W and 120W rates. So I guess a win other than having to do the mod. At least I've found the mod useful for other things too and it's nice to have 12V and USB outlets in the rear.

 

[Thornton Melon]

Qualifier—i know nothing.
But I use this same method. Jackery 500 into a Dometic cfx3 45 and it works just as you would hope. The only thing I could think that may tip the balance is if youre using the 12v or 120v outlet on the Jackery. Since it loses its efficiency using the 120v—>12v outlet is the best option. If youre already using the 12v outlet...i have nothing else to offer.

 

[BigMF]

That pesky rear AC outlet. I really do wish it had just that much more oomph as 100W has relatively little utility. Something like the Tacoma's 400W would be infinitely more useful.

I had the same problem. My GZ has a 60W charger using a similar laptop type adapter. Get this, I measured that it draws 180W AC for 60W DC output. So yeah, it's just exceeding the output of the outlet and the car inverter has failsafe's to shut the party down. No harm no foul, other than it won't work for this application. I did test the limits of the onboard inverter and while I don't remember its specific output limit, it doesn't have much margin over its 100W rating before it shuts down.

I guess the things that confuses me most is that it doesn't shut the built-in inverter down completely as I can still measure 23.8V coming out of the Jackery transformer. Unless....the built-in inverter is "smart" enough to essentially say "I'm not going to shut down but I cannot supply 84 watts so I'm not going to try".

Qualifier—i know nothing.
But I use this same method. Jackery 500 into a Dometic cfx3 45 and it works just as you would hope. The only thing I could think that may tip the balance is if youre using the 12v or 120v outlet on the Jackery. Since it loses its efficiency using the 120v—>12v outlet is the best option. If youre already using the 12v outlet...i have nothing else to offer.

I'm plugging the 12V (cigarette lighter) cord from the fridge into the Jackery.

Many of us have resorted to installing a 12V outlet in the rear. I use that to charge my GZ with a car adapter, which works at 60W and 120W rates. So I guess a win other than having to do the mod. At least I've found the mod useful for other things too and it's nice to have 12V and USB outlets in the rear.

Do you have a post related to this mod? I know there are plenty on here related but most tend to be overkill for what I'm trying to accomplish and I've found yours to be pretty simple and unsophisticated (in a good way). I'd be happy to just install a 12V outlet with some USB's in the back that would support charging the Jackery. One requirement that you may, or may not, have built into your system is that I want it to be a "switched" power source meaning when I turn the truck off, I want the rear 12V plug and USB's to shut down as well.

 

[TeCKis300]

It's likely the 120V inverter is cycling, meaning turns on > detects overdraw > shuts down, and repeats. Power transformers can store a bit of excess surface electrons/capacitance which is likely what you're measuring.

I like what @InkMing did with his setup here. Straightforward and functional.

Additional 12V Outlet in the Back of the Car?

Here is where I choose to run the wiring into the vehicle. Will route it up and along the firewall and through the plastic wire housing that is along the top of the firewall, then down along the left side to the battery. I made a little incision in the bottom of one of the rubber tubes. Then...

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You can probably tie this circuit to your new switch panel? Hopefully that can be setup with ignition on. I have mine setup that way to my Switchpros that also has a low voltage disconnect function so I will never accidently draw things down too far. My GZ charge adapter also has that function as another layer of protection.

Another easy way to do this is via a fuse add a circuit from the driver lower dash fuse box. That should have has ignition switched power there. Should be a straigthforward and clean run and don't have to bother running a wire from the engine bay.

 

[BigMF]

FYI, I tested charging the Jackery from the cigarette lighter up front and it started pulling 84 watts immediately. I'm going to drive around a few days with it plugged in like that to make sure I didn't get lucky this first time before I call it conclusive. That being said, if it works, I'll run a power supply back to that back and install a 12V jack in the back.

 

[1world1love]

I’m definitely in the camp of using 12v to charge when possible. These battery packs are very sensitive and the 120v inverter is very sensitive, and the combination makes for a very difficult troubleshooting job. You could also just run your fridge and top off the battery every couple of days using an existing 12v outlet. Mine will run our 55L dometic for a couple of days without getting below 40%, even in hot weather. I just run the solar panel during the days and will occasionally plug it in to the 12v in the second row for a couple of hours while we are driving. Your fridge will maintain a good temp on its own for a couple of hours as long as you are not opening it which provides a chance to maximize the charging time.

 

[BigMF]

Ran some 12V power to the rear. Here's my short writeup about it:

Builds - LEXpedition Overland Build Thread

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