So I gave in on two different things. I have decided to add a microwave. Which of course meant I had to give in and add an inverter. I had planned to keep everything in the van at 12V. I hate wasting energy to convert from 12V to 120V, but the only place that makes a 12V microwave is out of stock and no idea when or if they will ever get more back in stock.
I will admit I am very spoiled by having a microwave. I thought that I would be fine without one and I know I could handle it if I tried hard enough. But being able to boil water really quick and not have to break out my stove is so nice. And eating cold leftovers suck... I am usually too lazy to break out the stove and propane connections just for a quick reheat (and then of course more dishes to clean)!!
I decided I needed a really small microwave since space is not a luxury I have in such a small van. Looking at all my local stores I realized that a 700W microwave was the smallest one I could find. Problem is, a 700W microwave actually pulls a lot more than 700 Watts. In fact most pull in excess of 1000 Watts which means I needed to get a pretty big inverter. Again space is limited so I decided I wanted to stick to a pretty small inverter. I found a nice 1000W pure sine inverter that had great reviews and fit in the area I wanted to put it. But it was not powerful enough to handle the 700W microwaves. Luckily I was able to find a 600W one on Amazon that again had great reviews. This particular model had a 950W input requirement. Since the inverter I wanted to use was capable of handling 1000W continuous and 2000W peak I figured it would work well. Turns out they work very well together. At least so far. I have tested it several times and will post back on here if I have any issues in the future.
Now this being a much smaller unit and quite a bit under powered compared to most microwaves I knew that cooking/heating times would take a lot longer. I did a quick test and on high power it will bring one cup of water to boiling in about three and a half minutes. Perfectly fine for me especially since this is free energy for me anyway... thank goodness for solar panels!! Another big plus for this microwave is that it does not have a built in clock. This means that it is not drawing any power when it is not being used. And since I plan to unplug it every time I drive away I don't have to worry about a 12:00 flashing clock every time I plug it up!
Below are some links to the inverter and the microwave I purchased.
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