This really makes me think twice about wanting to change from

carburated to EFI on

an all electrical airplane. Runtime on a 20 amp-hours battery with the

alternator

gone?

Finn

Once upon a time, while driving my fuel injected VW van (with eletric
fuel pump) across country my alternator went out on me.  Really needing to
get to Lincoln, and not get stranded in Grand Junction, I decided to
continue the trip on battery power alone.

This was a 4 yr old, run down battery.  I found (the hard way) that I

could go about 2 hrs before I needed to pull into a gas station to get it
charged up. Listening to the tape player didn't change things much, but if I
went more than 2 hours, turning on the stereo or windshield wipers would
kill the engine (also discoverd the hard way).

With the dual batteries I plan in my RV, and running avionics, I figure a

very conservative 2 hr. flight time for alternator loss.  Plenty of time to
get to a safe landing, but I dont think I would continue my trip in my RV
the same way I did in my VW.  :-)

BTW, you have never really driven across america until you have done it

spending 2 hours charging a battery for every 2 hours of driving time.

And they lived happily ever after.

The End

Dave Leonard :-)

Pretty far off track, so reply directly to  bfreeman@qni.com if you want ---
Sounds like something I might have done, but didn't.  Any particular reason
why you didn't get an alternator or voltage regulator and install it?

Bill

 
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