GenVibe - Community for Pontiac Vibe Enthusiasts

I just hauled my vacuum out to the car, plugged it in to the AC outlet, only to have the vacuum NOT work...when turning on the on button, vacuum only made this little breathing kind of noise but no suction (and I read the car owner's manual!) BOOooooooo...Planning to go to the car wash tomorrow, but don't feel like feeding their machine $2.00 and dragging their dirty vacuum hose in the car...(and I don't have a long extension cord.) Tell me there's some trick to this thing...

Maybe there's not enough power from the outlet.. At school I got out of class early.. decided to whip out my laptop.. I was on it for a good while and needed to plug it in.. When I plugged it in it charged all right.. but the rectangular black box on the charger was hissing at me and making all kinds of funky noises.. so I looked on it and it said 125V.. and the plug on the Vibe is only 115V.

OH.................let me see..................

120 Volts... So what CAN you power up in this thing?

Ya know.... a small lamp.. cell phone wall charger.. iPod charger.. charge my electric razor.. and a laptop.. but you might want to check on it so it doesn't burst into flames or anything..

Unfortunately, things with motors like vacuums draw far too much power to use with the inverter. I can't remember how many watts the built-in inverter can handle, but it says on the plug. It isn't much.About your best bet is a 12v vacuum or one that can be recharged. Rarely will do as good of a job as a real vacuum but it's better than nothing. Or just get a long extension cord.

The inverter only puts out 100 Watts. Definitely not enough to power the average houisehold vacuum cleaner. If you want to use a household vacuum cleaner, get an extention cord long enough to reach the car form the house/apartment.110V/115V/120V/125V, all are referring to the same, standard US household AC voltage. That won't be the issuie. If you try to draw too much current out of the inverter, it will shut down, has built in overload protection. The good thing is that after you disconnect the excessive load, it works fine again. As I found out during one winter power outage, the variable speed blower on my woodstove hits the limit at about half speed.

Quote, originally posted by HawaiiPontiacLover »120 Volts... So what CAN you power up in this thing? Christmas lights!

Quote, originally posted by HawaiiPontiacLover »120 Volts... So what CAN you power up in this thing? My MacBook has worked just fine on long trips plugged into the '09 model outlet. I think it advises against things like vacuums and whatnot that have a very strong initial power draw.

Quote, originally posted by joatmon »The inverter only puts out 100 Watts. Definitely not enough to power the average houisehold vacuum cleaner. If you want to use a household vacuum cleaner, get an extention cord long enough to reach the car form the house/apartment.110V/115V/120V/125V, all are referring to the same, standard US household AC voltage. That won't be the issuie. If you try to draw too much current out of the inverter, it will shut down, has built in overload protection. The good thing is that after you disconnect the excessive load, it works fine again. As I found out during one winter power outage, the variable speed blower on my woodstove hits the limit at about half speed. that. too much current. the vacuum wanted way to much current. if its a "house" vacuum then it completely makes sense. My aunt gave me a cheap cig lighter powered shop vac, works great actually, which surprised me. I just cleaned both my cars with it! run an extension cord :/

I have used this to power my laptop several times. It isn't completely useless (just mostly).

Seems to me that one of the Vibe marketing geniuses had an ad showing a lady using a hair dryer plugged into that 100W socket.

Quote, originally posted by jake75 »Seems to me that one of the Vibe marketing geniuses had an ad showing a lady using a hair dryer plugged into that 100W socket. Oh great. Just what we need on the road...

Heh, when I was trying to put on some overlays I tried a hair dryer plugged into the inverter - hell no! It might power an electric razor though, would be a good car for that one lady that was in the news lately for, um, landscaping behind the wheel...

Well those electric razors do vibrate!

I use it to charge my blackberry and I have a USB adapter for it so I can charge anything with a USB cable. (Ipods, cell phones, GPS, mp3 player... ect)

I've only used it to charge my cell phone. It was nice when I last bought a new phone that I didn't have to buy a car charger !

...just remember, 100W at 120 VAC is less than 0.83 amps...not 1.0 amps as most people mistakely assume it to be.

BB charger and a charge for the gps!