david lloyd Posted April 20, 2021 Share Posted April 20, 2021 Have wired in a pure sine wave Victron Phoenix inverter simply to charge/run small items like the laptop, hair trimmer, hand held vacuum etc. No problem with the live and neutral which are wired directly to spare supply posts on my lithium system. There is an earth point on the back of the casing which I wired to a bolt through the floor under the seat where the earth leads for my other lithium equipment is connected. The inverter is wired through a Victron remote switch to turn it on/off. When I plug my 3 pin socket tester in it shows ‘no earth’ so I am assuming the earth connection at the rear is just to earth the inverter chassis. Should there be an earth supply to the 3 pin AC outlet on the inverter or is an earth not required? David Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alanb Posted April 20, 2021 Share Posted April 20, 2021 The requirements for earthing an inverter were outlined by mikefitz, in his post dated 27 January 2021 in this thread. I hope that by live and neutral you really mean positive and negative of the 12V supply. The terms live and neutral should only be used to denote the live conductor of an AC supply, and its associated return conductor when that is connected to earth at the point of supply. Alan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Posted April 20, 2021 Share Posted April 20, 2021 In other words, it's a floating earth and don't worry about it ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
david lloyd Posted April 21, 2021 Author Share Posted April 21, 2021 My apologies for the lack of correct terminology - I am certainly no electrician but yes I do mean positive and negative connections to the 12v DC. Thank you Charles for the clarification. David Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Posted April 22, 2021 Share Posted April 22, 2021 My generator is the same, all the small ones come like that. Never changed it but we had a power cut at home last winter and I plugged the combi boiler into it, everything worked fine for 20 seconds then the boiler shut down flashing a red LED. Took a bit of head scratching before I realised it needed an earth. All I did was make a 1ft extension up with an old socket and put a link wire in between the N and E. Worked perfectly after that. So some things do need an earth but I've never bothered with it on the van inverter, they're just as safe, just different. Where as it's dangerous to touch a live wire at home (because you're effectively stood on neutral) on the inverter you'd have to touch both outputs at the same time to get a shock. Very unlikely. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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