Other Interest aka I want One

[foozer]

Always liked the idea of electrical production so last year stuck this together. Some Solar panels, a Grid Tie inverter and assorted others resulted in . . .



4 100 watt 12 volt panels wired series/ parallel to 24 volt 200+ watt



4 110 ah batteries wired same series parallel to load the inverter at 24 volts.



Inverter Outback 2524 Grid Tie model, its mate controller and the charge controller for the solar panels.

System only functions when sun is shinning and here, near Seattle thats a happy day indeed. Batteries main function are to act as a load for the panels and buffer the solar output during the day. Inverter sells back to the grid any power in excess of whats required to keep the batteries charged. System at this stage is way under utilized. capacity to feed into Grid some 2500 watts and on a good day I manage about 100. Got a 400 watt windmill sitting on a 47ft tower also for the winter time when the wind actually picks up.

But for the 4 grand or so it satisfied the urge to "make my own juice" I just don't talk much about the 10 cents a day it saves me on the utility bill. But then who said hobbies were sensible

When move time comes, its property with running water, micro hydro electric, thats the ticket.

Robert

[Darren]

Hi Robert,

I'll take some pic's of my solar panels later. I put five panels of 20 evacuated tubes on the roof to pre-heat a 300 litre storage tank, That's 100 tubes.

It's turning out to providing all my hot water, even on cloudy days, for approx 8mths of the year. For the winter the tank usually heats to around 25 deg C so still quite useful.
It is fed from the tank to my combi boiler which is a modern regulating type, that is it senses the incoming temp of the hot water and adjust the flame to only what's need to raise the out going temp to what's required.
I have fitted a valve before the boiler so that if the pre-heated water is 46deg or more it bypasses the boiler altogether and is fed directly to the taps.

All works rather well...

As I sourced and installed myself the cost of it all was £2.5K, not £25K as quoted by the "professionals"
At full cost it would have been a joke, but quite reasonable when done DIY.

It should take about 5-7 years to balance out cost wise, depends on future energy prices which of course will only go one way.

I would like electric panels but the cost puts me off.....but like you my next property must have water.....except the powers that be won't let you make electricity that way unless you participate in the funny handshake have deep pockets.

I have a Lister single cylinder diesel with genny that will run on used veg oil, but not got far with that idea as yet.

You're a man after my own heart....

[Bernd]

I'd like to try wind power since we always have a breeze here. I just wonder what the town codes are to put up a tower.

Bernd

[foozer]

Hi Robert,

I'll take some pic's of my solar panels later. I put five panels of 20 evacuated tubes on the roof to pre-heat a 300 litre storage tank, That's 100 tubes.

I have a Lister single cylinder diesel with genny that will run on used veg oil, but not got far with that idea as yet.

You're a man after my own heart....

Domestic hot water preheat is a project under construction. About 4-5 months here the wood heater is running 24-7 so have a 70 foot (21m) of 1/4 (.6cm) copper coil cased in plaster upon one outside stove panel. To finish is the hookup for small hot water circulation pump triggered by the stoves built in fan. This to pump the water thru the preheat storage tank and the stove coils. Preheat tank to be plumbed in series with the main hot water tank.

I'm on well water which is always around the 45F degree (7C) mark. Hot water cost, no way around that. Test runs last winter showed the simple loop system brought 30 gallons up to 100 degrees (37C) within a few hours. Still more gadgets to get for this plus some thought. As it is heating water some safety valving needs to be incorporated. As the primary heating coils are upon the outside of the stove the runaway overheat (steam) condition should not exist, however an adequate pressure relief valve is in order. Bride would get a tad upset if I blew up the house.

System design much like THIS even have the same type stove which makes the copy much easier. As the bride likes to stuff the wood burner to the point of having to open windows in the dead of winter, figure i might as well use some of that excess heat

Robert

[foozer]

I'd like to try wind power since we always have a breeze here. I just wonder what the town codes are to put up a tower.

Bernd

Where I'm sitting I get a good wind during the winter. Problem with wind power is the getting from the air to the lamp. Wind generator itself is rather cheap, the stuff to make it usable is where the cost are. This package, if I had the pockets looks like a good one. Me I have an AIR403 up on a 47 foot tower. Tower raising is an adventure all to itself. It'll pump 10-15 amps into the batteries but not consistent enough to trigger the inverter into sell mode like the constant output of solar panels do. Yhe power produced by the windmill doesn't go to waste tho. The way the inverter is setup with the cutin, cutout voltage allows for the batteries to feed the inverter, just takes longer between cycles.

But I like watching them blades spinning around