Updated:07/09/2010 ENTIRE
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Learn about
alternative energy, hybrid systems and watch pointless videos!
If you have any
questions, contact us.
I'm always happy to provide a convoluted answer to a simple question.
At this site, you can learn from my real world experiences
in solar energy production and how I produce power at our cabin in Northern
Michigan. The cabin is located right on the 45th parallel near Gaylord,
Michigan. Check out our photography
site which has some photos around the cabin in the nature and winter
sections.
While this format of the site will stay
here as it is, more of our updates and new articles will be in the new
format. Visit the
new format site here.
Peukerts formula helps you design an
alternative energy system by showing the real world capacity of your
bank!
First of all, welcome to our site! We've been
around for several years and conduct all kinds of half baked DIY projects on our
show, This Old Shack. Be sure to check out all
of our half witted articles and pages. If you have questions, just Email
us and we will do our best to confuse you beyond all belief.
Disaster
planning should be part of every single household across America, strike that,
the world. When disaster strikes, people die or lives are c80%hanged. In times of
plenty, forego the Playstations and buy extra food. You can explain a lack of
toys better than a lack of food to your children.
In
1980 our military switched its entire food ration program over to the full
moisture MRE pouch system. These are the meals we tested on "This Old
Shack". Check
them out here.
First we should have a little bit of background on designing a low voltage
circuit, especially a direct current (DC) system. Think of your circuits
as a tube with marbles in it (just like our friend Ted Stevens description
of the internet).
The marbles flow only in one direction in direct current. The rate of flow
of the marbles (amperage) is dictated by the size of the tube and the supply of
current. All the current in the world won't do any good if the tube is too
small.
Therefore, the larger the tube, the faster the marbles will flow. Too
small of a tube will cause friction and a loss of the marbles' energy to
friction. So, the larger the tube, the less loss of energy there is. Put in
electrical terms, the larger the wire in a low voltage solar system, the less
loss of current you will have which is why you see massive wiring in solar panel
installations that produce high currents.
Current is important because that is what you use for charging a battery
bank and/or powering equipment. Having a million volts at 0 amps is useless.
Having 14 volts at 50 amps is something you can use. A diode is a little thing
that is a one way valve in our tube of marbles. It allows the marbles to move in
one direction (negative to positive) but not the other way.
A solar electric system has at least one diode somewhere in the system,
whether it be in the solar panel, the wiring or the charge controller.
Some of the inexpensive solar panels (like the Harbor Freight kits) have no
diodes at the solar panel.
Here's a description of my wiring and my charge
control system with costs (2008 prices):
PV wiring
Panels wired to low voltage junction box (Lowe's,
$2.99), bonded together with stainless bolts. This is a decidedly low tech
solution to bonding the feeds from the solar panels. Other solutions are
available however are more expensive. Since we move the panels around a lot, add
to the system and reconfigure it for testing, a simpler way was called for.
Panel negative and ground bonded together. Ground is a 6 foot ground rod driven
into ground. Second ground is located 35 feet away bonded to negative side of
system at that end.
Grounding
1 ground rod ($20) at east end of cabin, 100 amp
service ground cable.
east rod bonded to 12 volt negative.
1 ground rod ($20) at west end of cabin, 100 amp
service ground cable.
west rod bonded to 110 volt neutral / ground.
PV to charge controller
10 gauge solid wire (low voltage orange) purchased
at Lowe's home improvement, 30 foot run.
Charge controller
Xantrex C-12 charge controller/12 volt
distribution panel ($82).
Bulk setting at 14.3, float at 13.3, auto
equalization off.
Generator
2500 watt 110 volt, 12 amp 12 volt outputs ($495).
Battery Charger
Schumacher battery charger ($80) with
bulk/float. Used at 30 amp setting.
Uses 110 of generator output for power.
Battery bank
Bank #1: 3 group 31, 110 amp hours each, 330 total amp hours. Approx 75
cycles on bank
Bank #2: 2 East-Penn group 31, 119 amp hours, 238 amp hours total, 10
cycles on bank as of 7-6-10
House wiring
Square D QO (12 volt, 110 volt rated) distribution
panel ($79).
3 circuits used. Circuit one is bedroom, circuit 2
is outdoor lights, circuit 3 is living area.
There are several people on various newsgroups and discussion areas that waylay in uninformed or those just starting out in the off grid world of self power generation. This involves an almost religious belief in a phantom 6v golf cart true deep cycle battery that is superior in every way to any other battery in existence.
A simple examination of the specification sheet for a line of 6v and 12v off grid batteries will tell you quite clearly that there is no one single best solution for all circumstances. It is not accurate to say one is best.
Our system has been using the much maligned Harbor Freight 45 watt solar panel kits for 4 years. Over these years, we've moved them back and forth from the main home in Saline, Michigan to the shack in Gaylord. They've been dropped, exposed to heavy rain, snow, sleet, hail. One even has even had the glass on it shattered from a tree limb dropping on it.
Look, using testing equipment is all well and
good but those spec sheets don't mean squat if you can't run YOUR stuff
for as long as you want to. So what I do (so you don't have to) is get the
equipment (batteries, inverters, solar panels) and put what I run on it.
Usually about 30-50 watts at 12 volts - few amps of draw. You know, turning
lights on and off, running a computer (a laptop) and whatnot.
Throughout the test, a digital meter is run on
the bank and a hydrometer is used once an hour to determine whether the meter is
reading the correct voltage. During the sunlight hours on the panels, there is
another digital meter installed at the primary junction box (where the panels
feed into the 10 gauge cables that feed to the charge controller) that measures
panel voltage and amps.
One of the things that I like the best about
alternative energy is that you can make it as complicated or simple as you like.
Some people, even though they use alternative energy simply don't have a good
grasp on the entire substance that goes into the makeup of an engineered system
that has been built from scratch.
Don't ask me why, but I've recently become interested in
studying earthquake/volcano activity around the world; ash plumes and such. I've
added a page with RSS feeds and links to satellite imagery.
