Other Uses for an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS)?

buy a new one so am interested in other uses.

Doorstop.

Chock behind the wheel of a car when jacking it up.

The power cord makes an adequate disiplinary device.

Give it to Goodwill.

If the shape is compatible, use it to raise a flowerpot off the ground.

Heave it at the next missionary to come to your door.

Wrap it up in Christma wrapping and leave it a visible place for someone to steal.

Buy a battey ( less than $20) and use it as a UPS.

PlainBill

Wrap some furry stuff around it, and you can then pretend you have a cat that loves you, rather than loves that you feed it.

Gareth.

to buy a new one so am interested in other uses.

Recently I was pursuing an isolation transformer, until I read a comment of using a UPS in place of one. All one would need to do is remove the A/C plug and operate the test device from the UPS. I often face this kind of problem with a scope when troubleshooting a device.

to buy a new one so am interested in other uses.

Don't expect to use it as an emergency inverter with a car battery. The heat sinks are rarely able to dissipate the heat of a continuous load over long periods.

I wouldn't risk my life, or my scope on it. Make darn sure the one you have is completely isolated. Modified sine wave is sometimes a hindrance to debugging a power supply.

I forgot to mention another downside of trying to use a UPS as a general purpose inverter or isolation transformer. Some UPS's can't be manually started. You have to supply AC then remove it to get it to run.

Most cheap UPS's do not produce a nice sine wave, but rather some crude stepped waveform that supposedly approximates one.

If you are trying to troubleshoot something, you need to be sure of certain things first, and work from there. Generally you start with a good power supply.

Gareth.

kind of problem with a scope when troubleshooting a device.

Funny, I once took my UPS on a camping holiday, thinking I could charge my phone on it. Turned out the UPS wouldn't continually run with such a small load as a mobile phone charger.

Gareth.

at anything like rated output. I actually use a 150W unit as a car-powered inverter for running my 40Watt Weller soldering iron on solar-powered sites. The duty cycle never bothers the unit, but the inaccessible PITA beeper is another matter entirely ....

"Am interested in all suggestions!"

Guess I let myself open but will only respond to constructive suggestions.

So far the only other use I have thought of is as a trickle charger for 12V gel or std lead acid batteries.

While I can easily make up a set of connector cables was also interested in making a cigarette plug connector to use if vehicle's lighter socket is energized with key off.

Has anyone tried anything like this?

OK, as to the OP, use it as a PS for an audio amp, but rectify the output directly, no more tranformers. Should be able to get plus and minus 150 or so. Feed that into some nice hefty pitput transistors and make the streets quake.

That is some serious power.

Make sure you charge some money for this of it works.

Just sayin'.

to buy a new one so am interested in other uses.

yeah, I learned that the hard way.

huge bang and large cloud of smoke, then total silence.

directly, no more tranformers. Should be able to get plus and minus 150 or so. Feed that into some nice hefty pitput transistors and make the streets quake.

And some serious amps from the battery.

Excluded efficiency yet.