How Do You Cook Onboard?

[hellosailor]

Janny, to use a pressure cooker you have to be a "recipe cook". Someone who follows recipes and times and amounts and can be happy bolting it up and seeing nothing until you unbolt it. Unless you get one of the new pressure cookers with a GLASS TOP which allows you to see what it doing inside without opening it up. I confess, I'm tempted.

[Therapy]

Originally Posted by Seeratlas

Koolatron Total Chef Oven TC01G

Here's the best price I've seen on the Koolatron. I have one of these and it rox.

seer

How many amp hours for a chicken dinner?

Chicken dinner with rice?

[Seeratlas]

Hmm, I don't rice, heheh had my fill a long time ago, so I'd have to sit down and calc that out but basically you can count on cooking time being about 30 to 40 percent of what it would take in your average oven. I'm not at the boat so can't remember exactly how many watts it is on high, but I'm guessing 1200 to 1500, so if you know how long it takes your chicken, and what temp you set at, take 35 percent of time, calc watts based on percentage of say 1300 and you should get close.

All I can say is it cooks fast, cooks well (even browns, and its a lot faster cause you can toss meat straight from the freezer into the oven.
and when its done, well "it eats good"

heheh

c'mon, its 92.00 delivered, the others are cheaper, down around 50 something. Try one, if you don't like it post here and give it to your brother in law LOL.

seer

[Therapy]

So, I come up with something like 30 amps for a chicken dinner.

Would that be correct?

I am math challenged and did it in my head real quick.

[hellosailor]

You don't want amps, you want watts and watt-hours. Look at the cooker, there will be a power rating in watts on it. Possibly 500 watts, possibly 1000 watts (which is typical for a domestic microwave oven).

Multiply the maximum wattagge times the number of hours it takes to cook a chicken, and you get watt-hours. If it is 500 watts and it take 20 minutes (1/3 hour) to cook a chicken, you have 500 x 1/3 equals 166 watt hours.

Which could be 13 amps out of a battery bank. The number of amps will vary with the charge state and system voltage, the number of watts won't.

166 watts at 14.4 volts=11.5 amps, from a running alternator, etc.
166 watt hours at 12.7 volts = 13 amps, from a fully charged battery.
166 watt hours at 12 volts= 13.8 amps, from a 60% discharged battery.

[fastcat435]

I have done the Math and to cook a 3 course warm meal for 4 people will cost 1500 watts total consumption first upon start of cooking the wattage, is high but it drops very fast the installed solar panels on our boats are plenty to cook and supply us with all the other energy needs on board
Including radar gps autopilot etc etc.

[Seeratlas]

Heheheh, give me a couple of weeks to get back on the boat and tell me how big a chicken, and whether its frozen or not to start and I'll get you some empirical data. Oh, and how do you like your chicken? hehehehe

seer

[hellosailor]

"chicken, and whether its frozen or not to start "
What, you guys don't keep LIVESTOCK on board?<G>

[Seeratlas]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

"chicken, and whether its frozen or not to start "
What, you guys don't keep LIVESTOCK on board?<G>

well, not intentionally

lol
seer

[Therapy]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

You don't want amps, you want watts and watt-hours. .

Well, I am a retard because all the battery monitors I have read about show you amps out of the battery and amps into the battery. Most of what I have read to figure out stuff is to multiply the amps a doodad uses times how long you are going to use it and then add some for "losses".

So now there is this added math (with much larger numbers I might add (forgive the pun )) that is going to do nothing but confuse me.

When I get the boat is there a thingy that I can just put in line with the doodad that measures what it just used? I think it is called a battery monitor but hell, I am a retard.

[Pblais]

A battery monitor will tell total amps in and out as well as current amps in use. Measuring just one item isn't really as easy to work with or useful. So when things are turned on the battery monitor will say how many amps are in use. Normally I can tell what is on so it gives you just what you are asking for. They are a great item to have aboard as it will teach you the real world implications of how much power you arr using and have used.

Just because you think you are a retard does not mean you have to stay one. Some basic math is all you need it seems to me you already can do that. You just also have to understand what the numbers mean.

[Therapy]

Originally Posted by Pblais

. Normally I can tell what is on so it gives you just what you are asking for.

.

I figure that if I am cruising around with one of those things then I would have plenty of time to turn everything off except the chicken cooker, reset the "how many amps is doing what thingy" and watch it while the chicken is cooking and I am drinking a beer or two.

It might even pay to have a pencil and paper to write it down so if someone asked...........

Seems a couple steps away from rocket science. Maybe I could handle it.

[hellosailor]

Therapy-
I don't know or care if you are mentally challenged. (Retard is SO PI.<G>) Most cars have gas gauges on them. Are they accurate? Not really. But if you want a fancy digital cluster that tells you "miles to go" and such, you can buy a car with the ore accurate cluster--it justs costs a whole lot more. You CAN buy a real wattmeter for boats, tha will take about 100-amp service, but the price is significantly higher than that of an ammeter. That's why you get just an amp display--it's cheap and a lot better than nothing.

West Mountain Radio RIGrunner - Power Analyzer and Whatt Meter for an example of what you CAN get and use, if you really want to. Note that they rate it for only a 30 amp discharge, but a 100 amp charge, for whatever reason. I expect that's because something in it will blow out if there's more amperage in the "reverse" direction.

But if you just look at the maximum wattage the cooker draws, and multiply that by the time it takes to cook a live, dead, or frozen chicken...that should be close enough.

[Therapy]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

But if you just look at the maximum wattage the cooker draws, and multiply that by the time it takes to cook a live, dead, or frozen chicken...that should be close enough.

Sorry for all the ruckuss.
I just wanted a ball park figure on what it takes to cook a chicken (it ended up being the "base line") with the mentioned cooker.

PS I bought my first-ever new car (still a mistake) last year and it has, as standard, a "computer" that tells one miles till empty, MPG, and assorted other jazz. It is suprisingly accurate.

[rebel heart]

If you use propane, you could probably cook around 200 chickens on a 20 lb tank. Maybe more. There's an inherent inefficiency to using heat (engine/genset) to make electricity, to turn it back into heat again (stove / oven). Cut out the middle man! :-)