Panosonic Intelligent Inverter Washers, Fridges and A/C's

dhsola
dhsola Solar Expert Posts: 38
http://panasonic.asia/ecoideas/ecoproducts/

Is there really much savings in running a motor slower but.. for longer periods of time?

And a short scribble from Wikipedia here

Comments

  • BB.
    BB. Super Moderators, Administrators Posts: 33,431 admin
    Re: Panosonic Intelligent Inverter Washers, Fridges and A/C's

    In general, if you can direct drive a Permanent Magnet motor with an "inverter" (or VFD--Variable Frequency Drive), yes you can save a lot of wasted energy.

    Plain induction motors are fairly inefficient, speed reduction (gears/belts/etc.) can cost upwards of 50% of power losses, PM motors don't "waste" energy on developing a magnetic field in the rotor (no brushes or slip rings either).

    Also, with VFD hardware, they can do soft start, reversing, as well as operating the motor at the required speed for the load.

    The Sanyo (now Panasonic) Mini-Split AC system with inverter (VFD) control has been a real boon for Off-Grid power users... Besides being fairly efficient, the unit is set so that if you select low (for example), it never exceeds ~300 watts--Vs the fairly large surges required by typical A/C systems that cycle on and off.

    Sanyo mini split
    AC (inverter/variable speed)
    (among many threads here)

    Is that in all the Panasonic hardware listed--Don't know.

    -Bill
    Near San Francisco California: 3.5kWatt Grid Tied Solar power system+small backup genset
  • waynefromnscanada
    waynefromnscanada Solar Expert Posts: 3,009 ✭✭✭✭
    Re: Panosonic Intelligent Inverter Washers, Fridges and A/C's

    Well the inverter fridge sounds good in one way, it's not in another - - for off grid use.
    On the + side it should eliminate the relatively huge draw to get the thing started, thus may run om the Morningstar 300 watt inverter. On the down side, with all it's computer controls, it would need continuous power supply, meaning the inverter would need to always be on. Still, if you have a Morningstar that's always on anyway - - -
    The expected extra cost of the inverter fridge may well be offset by not having to purchase a relatively huge inverter just to get the fridge started.
    Lots to think about and learn.
    http://panasonic.asia/ecoideas/ecoproducts/econavi_refrigerator.html
    But a lot more things to cause problems too.
  • niel
    niel Solar Expert Posts: 10,300 ✭✭✭✭
    Re: Panosonic Intelligent Inverter Washers, Fridges and A/C's

    supposedly the refrig came out last year, but i see nobody that carries it offhand.