A DIY 1,500 Watt Power Station for My Sharpening Business

[BeSharp]

I built a 1,500 Watt power station for sharpening at farmers' market and other places with no power.

All my equipment fits into Tanos / Festool Systainers. Therefore, I wanted my power station to be inside a Systainer too!

Festool just introduced their SYS-PowerStation, but 1) it's not in North America yet, 2) It's 2,610 Euros / $3,750 CAD / $3,030 USD, 3) I don't need that much power, since a Tormek only uses 200 Watts, a Twice-As-Sharp scissors sharpener uses 375 Watts, and my Rikon buffer, 300 Watts (and I hardly use more than one machine on at a time).

[BeSharp]

The 6' back table is for a Viel S-5 at one end, and a Twice As Sharp scissors sharpener at the other end. In the middle is this Tanos / Festool Systainer stack:

Top: Toolbox M137: holds Tormek jigs, tape, knife sleeves
Middle: 3-drawers: holds tools, abrasives, lubricants, sharpness tester, etc.
Bottom: the DIY power station

[BeSharp]

Closeup and inside pics:

Total cost was $900 CAD / $ 727 USD / $627 Euros (using a half-price used battery) Battery capacity is 840 Watt-Hours; 120 VAC power output is 1,500 Watts. It weighs 8.3 kg / 16 lbs 6 oz.

More pics and deeper description at my post on FOG (Festool Owners' Group) forum: https://www.festoolownersgroup.com/festool-and-tanos-systainers/a-diy-1-500-watt-systainer-power-station/

[BeSharp]

How Long Will It Run?

A Tormek uses 200 Watts of power; the Rikon buffer uses 300 Watts.  It takes me about 7 minutes to sharpen a knife, of which actual machine "on" time is probably 5 minutes. 5/60 x 250W (average) = 20.8 Watts/knife.

Trials confirm this - a knife takes roughly 20 Watts.

At a farmer's market a lot of time is spent interfacing with customers, so in reality only 6 knives/hour, or 120 Watt-hours.

A 4-hour market then uses 4 x 120 = 480 W-h.

My battery is 840 W-h. However, I only charge it to 80% capacity and try not to discharge it below 20% (it triples the battery life). Therefore, 840 W-h x .6 = 504 W-h of usable energy.

In conclusion, the 840 W-h battery has enough capacity for a 4-hour market.

[Ken S]

Clever idea! Well done!

Ken