Cobra CPI-A4000BC AC Power Inverter AWG Cables

1. 
   HMMWV permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by HMMWV for Cobra CPI-A4000BC AC Power Inverter AWG Cables
   Rating:
   If Monster cable could only see the copper inside this jacket. Normally when you cut a piece of heavy cable in the center and strip back the insulation you see nice shiny copper. Granted the ends may be oxidized a bit but they are open to the air – I cut this at the halfway point to make 2 shorter cable sets or 4 equal cable pieces. This cable, while being nice and flexible, looked like an old penny inside – heavily oxidized and ugly as sin. I suspect its reclaimed copper 2 times over without proper slag removal. That’s the only reason I took away one star.

   Also the crimp lugs supplied leave a tad to be desired, but they include some properly sized red and black heatshrink. You are supposed to put the stripped cable into the lugs then fold each half over the other with “electricians pliers” – My professional crimper was able to fold them but not close them tight on the wire, so out came the persuader – a 16 oz claw hammer and some cement. Yep – that closed the crimp nice and snug on the wire. Now it has a good snug grip. I did buy some professional #4 lugs at the hardware store made of copper like a shiny penny and my professional crimper did those justice, so their lugs are a tad sub par but you can put them on with just about anything. Alternately I could have hit it with a propane torch and fed some solder to it, which I may still do if there is excessive loss in the cable. I prefer soldered connections wherever possible.

   I also bought some nice bolt on attachments at the hardware store for $2/pr that have a bar which snugs down with 2 ea 7/16 bolts and nuts on the back side. Now that was a solid connection – I drove the bolts home with my dewalt 3/8″ impact driver and a 7/16 socket which grabbed the wire and would not let go, then gave me a big ring to tie to that did not look like someone pounded a crimp lug with a hammer on cement to make it grab!

   I realize copper is expensive these days but this stuff was recycled 2 or 3 times over. New copper wire shouldn’t look like a 1960′s penny under the couch. It sure makes monster cable’s oxygen free copper look bright and shiny by comparison. On the other hand, I did especially like the fact that the insulation is color coded properly, red and black. I have seen high current wiring kits where the wire’s insulation is entirely black, entirely white, or some other way of not coding the positive and negative by insulation color. Even the space shuttle wiring is ENTIRELY white no matter what purpose it serves. The only identification each white wire gets is a black wrapper with a 4 or 5 digit number that is referenced in the schematics. Nasa’s wire is also silver plated copper and thus carries the same current of cruddy copper wire 1 size larger with the same loss and less weight at 10x the price.

   Other than the cruddy copper – it’s a good value – you’re getting 20 feet of #4 cable with precrimped lugs on one end and trimmable to length on the other end with a set of lugs you can pound onto the wire. It certainly has the heft of 20 feet of #4 too – this shipped at over 5 lbs, most of which was the 2 pieces of #4 cable. It ran my inverter just fine so no harm.

   You also get a green ground wire to tie your inverter chassis to whatever ground you have, be it in a car or a ground rod in the earth. Like me you probably don’t think you need a ground for a battery powered device – when wwas the last time you grounded your remote control? In theory ground wires should cary no current nor any voltage, but the spinning fan on the inverter can cause static electricity. You do need to equalize any static charge buildup or leakage in capacitors, or alternately stray magnetic fields causing voltage in metalic parts. Sure these are small voltages, between 0.5 and 2.0 V but they can flip a logic state if not returned to ground and also making troubleshooting a nuisance. While not absolutely necessary, if you don’t ground it be sure that somewhere from the output path of the inverter to your load you have a GFCI plug. That way if the current finds another path back to the battery or to the inverter chassis it will cut off power in a fraction of a second preventing electrocution – yours, not to mention damage to the equipment.

   Keep in mind that #4 wire can carry 100′s of amps (approaching 1000 amps) and will do a nice job arc welding. Once you get this installed treat it with a great deal of respect. Don’t be shocked (no pun intended) when you make the final connection if there is a SMALL arc – emphasis on SMALL – the reason is that there are capacitors in the inverters that help to smooth out the current flow and they charge instantly when power is applied. When finished, disconnect from the battery. Use some extra caution when using tools like crecent wrenches around deep cycle batteries = don’t bridge to the other terminal. I had an electrician drop a crescent wrench inside a pac bell phone central office onto the -48VDC buss bars that powered the building’s phone switch. It didn’t even blow the fuse – just vaporized the wrench into sputter. We crawled down to the buss bars and there was nothing even resembling a wrench where it made contact with the -48VDC bars. This product box even has a warning that if you are not familiar with high current wiring have someone who is do it.

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2. 
   tavegas permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by tavegas for Cobra CPI-A4000BC AC Power Inverter AWG Cables
   Rating:
   Great cables and a very good price. more than I need in lenght but thats ok . well made and are copper. much cheaper that bulk + ends. great deal!

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3. 
   M. Skyles permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by M. Skyles for Cobra CPI-A4000BC AC Power Inverter AWG Cables
   Rating:
   Good quality cables, I purchased them for the cobra 1500 watt DC power inverter. the cables where a bit long for what I needed them for but I could always use the rest for other projects. They don’t come with the 30 amp fuse though as suggested in the instructions. You don’t really need the high amp fuse unless your using the DC power inverter and cables for an appliance that draws massive amps like an air conditioner or large home appliance in that case you should use a high amp fuse or your cables and power inverter may over heat and catching fire. I use my Cobra DC power inverter for my 1000 watt coffee pot and power tools like a drill and saw when I’m repairing or building a board fence in the pasture. The Cobra 1500 watt power inverter and cables work well for my needs, plenty of amps without heating up. I have a diesel 2500 Ram pick up and realized that the the engine compartment was limited on space to install the power inverter. If you have this problem you could do what I did, I cut a 2×6 board in the length of the passenger side battery and cut a groove in the middle of the board to run the batteries mounting screw though, it held the board tightly in place. I than bolted the power inverter to the board. Note: you have to mount the inverter to the board before you install it. So the inverter sits bolted to the side of the battery on a board facing up. The shorter you make the power cable the better your power inverter will perform. I used less than a foot of cable and I don’t see it interfering with the battery in anyway. It works for me.

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4. 
   Graham J. Odonnell permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by Graham J. Odonnell for Cobra CPI-A4000BC AC Power Inverter AWG Cables
   Rating:
   Great cables but I would have liked to see them a bit longer. For installing in a semi, they are a bit on the short side.

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5. 
   Eric permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by Eric for Cobra CPI-A4000BC AC Power Inverter AWG Cables
   Rating:
   This wire is very difficult to work with. I had to trim to a shorter length and I found that the insulation jacket is distributed into the wire core. So I had to pick out a mess of jacket from the inner wire. The wire was also not bright and was oxidized so I had to spend 10 minutes scraping each individual wire stand in order to solder on ring terminals. But in the end, it is serviceable (but of low quality).

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6. 
   A. Rose permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by A. Rose for Power Bright VC200W Voltage Transformer 200 Watt Step Up/Down 110 Volt – 220 Volt
   Rating:
   I bought this transformer about a year ago for my German sewing machine (230 V, 85 W, 50 Hz) to run it in the US (110 V, 60 Hz). So far it works like a charm. I’ve used it for quite a few sewing projects over the past year and was worried whether the 60 Hz/50 Hz difference would be an issue, but everything seems to be running just fine. Investing twenty bucks in a transformer allowed me to keep using my familiar sewing machine instead of buying and learning how to use a new one, so it was well worth it.

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7. 
   Fawzy Mikhail permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by Fawzy Mikhail for Power Bright VC200W Voltage Transformer 200 Watt Step Up/Down 110 Volt – 220 Volt
   Rating:
   Excellent Transformer for people wanting to use European 220V Electric products.
   
   Surprisingly compact and relatively light for its Power Capacity…
   
   Good value for money.
   
   I would buy it again and would recommend it to others with no reservations.

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8. 
   Rui Si permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by Rui Si for Power Bright VC200W Voltage Transformer 200 Watt Step Up/Down 110 Volt – 220 Volt
   Rating:
   I bought this tuner to convert voltage for my mother’s healthy treatment. It works fine with a power up to 70w. No observable heat was generated after 1-2 hours using. Good equipment and good price!

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9. 
   Vinay Nair permalink

   October 13, 2010

   Review by Vinay Nair for Power Bright VC200W Voltage Transformer 200 Watt Step Up/Down 110 Volt – 220 Volt
   Rating:
   I am disappointed with this product and not using it since. It gives out a strong smell after using for few minutes which is very noticable. Also it gets very hot very fast. So one does not when will this catch fire. Used for probably few hours and thinking about safety decided not to use. Will not recommend.

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10. 
    G. Groves permalink

    October 13, 2010

    Review by G. Groves for Power Bright VC200W Voltage Transformer 200 Watt Step Up/Down 110 Volt – 220 Volt
    Rating:
    We bought this transformer to power a 220v Christmas light set (window display) we purchased in Germany. It worked great. It had no hum, nor did we have any interference issues with computers, tvs, etc.

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