> The cheap inverters you can buy typicaly take 12volts at 25mA powering a
> couple of feet of EL wire (300mW good guess Russel!)

That wasn't guessing. That was BOTE engineering ;-)

> I have seen AA powered inverters that suggest the wire can be illuminated
> for 18 hours from two AA cells, but I suspect they are running the wire at
> very low currents.

AA Alkaline 2500 mAh typical
2500/18 ~~= 130 mA so capacity will be perhaps slightly lower than that ?
Say mean voltage delivered to inverter = 1.25V
1.25 x 2500/18 ~= 175 mW

 which as you say may be somewhat dim.
Our super rough data points seem to be dropping into a consistent range.

        RM

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