Does anyone make a charger for D-70 / D-200 that would work from the cig lighter plug in a car? Shure would be a nice trick for those road trip shoots. And while I`m thinking of it can I use the same charger on both batteries? Thanks to all for looking.
Go to Radioshack or similar and get an inverter or "voltage converter" as some call it. They're less than $100. Plug that into the cig lighter, then the battery charger into it. We use inverters all the time on road trips for charging not only for camera batteries, but also laptops, strobe batteries, and our P-2000.
Posted by Bill Langton on October 23, 2006 at 12:30 AM
I have an inverter that plugs into the lighter. It gives me a 110v outlet with 175 watts capability. I can plug in a small power strip and run two battery chargers at the same time.
Works like a charm...
Bill
Posted by Jim Salge on October 23, 2006 at 9:05 AM
I use an inverter too. Get a larger one than you think you'll need. I often have the battery charger, phone charger, and laptop running at the same time. Then i added a drink-cooler in the summer.
If you run a lot of stuff, you might check to be sure your car battery has an automatic shut off if the battery gets too low to start the car. When the car is running, the battery is charging, of couse. A friend found this the hard way when he left things pulling power as he was out shooting for several hours...in a very remote place...
Sandy r
If you car does not, you can get one cheapy at a car parts store.
To them I'll add that there are inverters, and then there are inverters. There is a wide range of features along with size differences. We have a 300 Watt unit from Radioshack we really like because it comes with terminals for connecting directly to a battery as well as to the ciggy lighter. The downside is that it has a cooling fan which sucks power at least as fast as the appliance you are running. It draws down a battery quickly! For long sits without the engine running we have a couple of smaller 150 Watt units without cooling fans, and even working together these draw much less juice than our 300.
BTW- If your car doesn't have a safety interrupt such as Sandy describes, in all likelihood the inverter has a low voltage alarm and/or cuttoff. That's handy, but in our experience the units don't cut off soon enough and can result in too much power loss from your car battery for starting.
If that happens, disconnect everything and turn off your car. Let it sit idle for half an hour, then try starting it again. Unless the battery is really down, often there's enough "bounce" left in it to get your car started after the wait.
Posted by David Senesac on October 25, 2006 at 9:35 PM
One problem with battery charging in a car out in the field is that most will do so at night since we are often too busy during the day. Thus the potential exists for someone plugging in a heavy current device then falling asleep which if one then doesn't wake up might draw down the car battery too much. And out in the field in many remote places that could be a huge disaster. I charge my little Coolpix lithium batteries at night in my car all the time however the current draw is no threat to my car battery even if left on all night. For those that are plugging in a device with heavy current, I would recommend using one of those mechanical timer devices sold in hardware stores for say controlling lamps when not at home. Thus if a battery takes 2 hours to charge, one might set the timer to shut down after 2 hours and not have to worry. ...David
Thanks again to all for great fast info. Got one today at Radio Shack for about $40.00 and its 150 watts. Now I can quit the worry about dead batteries and on rainey days when I may use truck as a blind I can play with the Epsion P-2000.----and just what did I do with that cute little coffee maker?
Discussion
8 repliesWorks like a charm...
Bill
If you run a lot of stuff, you might check to be sure your car battery has an automatic shut off if the battery gets too low to start the car. When the car is running, the battery is charging, of couse. A friend found this the hard way when he left things pulling power as he was out shooting for several hours...in a very remote place...
Sandy r
If you car does not, you can get one cheapy at a car parts store.
To them I'll add that there are inverters, and then there are inverters. There is a wide range of features along with size differences. We have a 300 Watt unit from Radioshack we really like because it comes with terminals for connecting directly to a battery as well as to the ciggy lighter. The downside is that it has a cooling fan which sucks power at least as fast as the appliance you are running. It draws down a battery quickly! For long sits without the engine running we have a couple of smaller 150 Watt units without cooling fans, and even working together these draw much less juice than our 300.
BTW- If your car doesn't have a safety interrupt such as Sandy describes, in all likelihood the inverter has a low voltage alarm and/or cuttoff. That's handy, but in our experience the units don't cut off soon enough and can result in too much power loss from your car battery for starting.
If that happens, disconnect everything and turn off your car. Let it sit idle for half an hour, then try starting it again. Unless the battery is really down, often there's enough "bounce" left in it to get your car started after the wait.