No, Larry, during an outage I have only the 30A or so max from the genny to start the motor and that isn't enough to start it under load. When the power is on this house can pull 200A from the grid all day, the neighborhood was originally wired for electric heat.
The washing machine also won't start on 30A unless I push the spring-tensioned motor inward to let the belt slip.
-jsw
The way you said it was...curious. "long outage"
Mine was wired that way, too, and I absolutely hated the baseboard crap. The first thing I did was spend $9,000 to toss the 240v radiant heat, put in a 96% efficient gas heater with A/C, pull out the single glazed aluminum windows and put in dual-glazed PVC windows, and get all-new, -efficient- kitchen and washroom appliances. That gave me 2 new dual circuits for 3 new 240v outlets in the shop (seldom used concurrently), one dual circuit for the new A/C condenser, a circuit for the furnace, and 3 spare slots.
Cheater! Get a new washer. I hear they're only 1/4hp now, and won't blow a 15a breaker.
COOL! I'll let you know when I'm there. I'll need an adapter for the motor shaft to a timing belt pulley and a 5/8" x 4"shaft.
This is what that curious-to-you phrase means:
I ran the fridge on the UPS overnight, then since we hadn't lost power I checked the run time on the 6 year old batteries, which was still adequate. The solar panels I have now aren't enough to keep up with daily demand so I took advantage of Home Depot's sale on "100W" panels for $99 with free home delivery.
They are Grape Solar polycrystallines which get good enough reviews that lack technical details. I have the equipment to measure and record their output and will give them a good checkout, and perhaps buy an MPPT controller if it makes economic sense. Right now MPPTs cost about as much as another 100W panel without adding as much output from a small system. My DPS5015 switching regulator can be used to find and charge at the maximum power point but it won't track changes automatically.
I left the electric heat intact as an automatic backup for the wood heat, with new thermostats that can be set below 50F. Heat in the bathroom is very nice when I've let the house cool below 55F.
My old Dependable Care Maytags are easily modified to wash with water heated on the wood stove and poured in. I bypassed the water level control which allows these top loaders to wash with as little water as a front loader. Water isn't short here but heating it is expensive. The one I'm using now simply has an added Wash/Spin switch that reverses the start winding. All I had to do to change the wiring was rearrange the Fastons.
-jsw
It's that Globular Swarming, uh, I meant Crimate Change, uh, I mean Tipping Point again. Leftist scientists say it'll be happening every
5 years from now on.
Not a bad price.
A PWM controller was included with the $1119 kit I got. 1080w of poly solar (6x 180w panels @ $170 ea.) I found a backup "MPPT" controller for $26, ($99 now
Interesting, but sort of a moot point without automation. Or is it? Finding the MPP of the system might be good for a boost, even without the tracking, but I haven't seen any studies on that. I'll look for some more articles on MPP to see.
Grok that. I disabled my shiny chrome heater, but put a $20 milkhouse heater in there to warm things up before showers. Heavenly.
Yeah, the older Kenmore and Maytags were bulletproof. My Magic Chef (? yeah, me, too) is a cheaped-out Maytag with plastic bucket. They had to replace the washer motor within 6 weeks. And the dryer thumped for the first 5 minutes due to soft rollers. I had them replace 'em although the tech said it wouldn't matter. Once he showed me the soft rubber rollers he removed, I understood. The type of rubber makes for thumps for the first few minutes, but a quieter dryer for the next 45.
I switched to a warm wash/cold rinse, which showed on my electric bill years ago to be the best way. With solar hot water and LED lighting, I may have $20/mo electric bills. The furnace has a variable speed DC fan motor for more savings. Carrier Infinity = no wood smoke = Love it.
One of my water heater elements will be solar soon, so that should effectively drop my electric bill by half. We'll see what 900w will do in a 20gal tank. I'll run solar all day. The other element is
3800w and I installed a timer (limited to 3hr/day) to bump it to 120F in the evening when necessary. Now to find sensors to collect data on it...
COOL! I'll let you know when I'm there. I'll need an adapter for the motor shaft to a timing belt pulley and a 5/8" x 4"shaft.
*** Doesn't sound to hard. I'm sure I can destroy those parts easily. Use the contact form at cncmolds.com to start a private mail conversation when you are ready.
Nope. Conditions vary so much that a single snapshot of an MPP in time wouldn't be of much use. It appears that the MPPT controller changes the resistance of the circuit so it continues to output max power at all times, from 1 to 1000 times per second. (one of 84 million 400 thousand snapshots a day. ;)
We were wrong to doubt Chicken Little.
There's this, if you want to look cool and easy to operate:
If the sky is clear the panel output doesn't change much in an hour. We are downwind of Vermont's mountains and if it is at all cloudy the solar output may vary so much that I'd be better off recharging from a generator.
My well-insulated 40 gallon electric water heater draws ~1 KWH per day, 28 KWH on the bill for September.
-jsw
I made that measurement on my HF 45W panels with a large rheostat and a DC Volt/Amp/Watt meter and found a range of several volts where the efficiency was at least 95% of the peak.
Batteries charge with Amps, not Watts. Any charging voltage above the
12.6V that the battery gives back is only a lost entry fee. The graph shows that the current continues to increase as the load (battery) pulls the panel voltage further below the Maximum Power Point.The DPS5015 displays output Volts, Amps and Watts and with another wattmeter like the blue Aode in the input, the output can be adjusted for the maximum charging current reading, then you can compare Watts in and out to see efficiency.
-jsw
Finding the MPP with the DPS5015 shows me how much more current an MPPT controller would give, compared to a direct connection from the panel to the battery as with a PWM controller. I've read that an MPPT controller isn't cost-effective for arrays of 200W or less, or for trickle charging batteries whose voltage is already close to the MPP.
-jsw
Ohmigodwe'reallgonnadie.
I would all but guarantee that it's not an actual MPPT controller. (Oh, it says "Not True MPPT". How about that!) MANY of the cheap Chiwanese units aren't. I'll find out whether or not my cheapie is real once it's installed. It's likely also "MPPT compatible".
It all depends on what you're doing with the power. I'll be spending it as quickly as it's produced until summer comes. Then it goes to feed the batteries, of which I'll have too few. If you have the controller for it, you can have excess volts converted to amps for storage in the batteries at various levels. I'll run a 24vdc bank (of two), with up to 43v in...if the controller decides to work well.
Why aren't you using it? (Oh, woodstove heating water, right. Isn't that hot in the summer?)
I ran 558kwh in the hideous August heat, and only 202 last month. The overly-long/hot July bumped my Comfort Level payments from $38 to $43/mo. Half is for admin and half is the charge for electrons.
I -am- using the electric water heater. My sink spray shower is very efficient.
-jsw
Schools can buy solar simulators now, with which they can do this type of experimenting. Guessing that FLC won before reading the article, which looks like one I'll enjoy. Thanks.
Yup, but they can give you a whole lot more usable power on larger systems. I intend to expand this 1kW system to 6kW at some time in the future, so I should probably buy that Outback before more panels. So, with the new 100w panel, are you now only up to 145w (theoretical)?
Dayum, must be. That or your monthly shower is short.
The cutoff showerheads sure save water/power. I like lots of water to do quick rinses, so shutting it off after wetting down, shampooing, then soap/scrubbing, then turning on for a quick rinse with many hard, fine streams is great. Instead of lo-flo, I go with hi-flo/short showers. A wimpy hand sprayer wouldn't suit me at all. I'm in and out in four minutes, loofah in hand. (Dad was Air Force and related the GI shower theme to me.)
I have around 200W now and ordered another 200W. The limitation on solar here is large shade trees that cut my air conditioning bill to $5 a month. One solar array catches an opening between the trees before noon, the other after it. I used an extra freestanding HF panel to find a convenient area for the new panels where I can get power from 8AM to 2PM though it's not a good spot for a permanent mount.
After the leaves fall there's sun all day, filtered somewhat by bare branches. I already have enough solar power to keep my vehicle and backup batteries topped off but this last storm and run time test showed how dependent I am on a generator if I can't keep food cold outdoors.
-jsw
Oops, I meant MidNite Solar Classic 150-SL @ about the same price.
Oh, good. You're inching toward real power, good for something more than a 5" tv, am/fm radio, or LED lighting.
But if you have solar, you can generate your own free electrons. Are the trees on your lot/cuttable? IMHO, shade is extremely overrated, except when you want to sit outside in the spring/fall, in which case you need precisely one tall shrub or small tree. I took down 4 large trees and I sure don't miss the trouble they caused. I no longer have trouble mowing and with only 3 trees left (1 constantly shedding Redwood and 2 deciduous at the property lines, sharing the bounty with neighbors' fields) I have a metric shitload less raking.
Just hope you don't have a branch come down and poke through them. Impermanent placement sucks. Moving things twice daily is a PITA. What are your future plans re: mounting and expansion?
You'll get enough power on a bright day (in the shade) to top off your batteries, but even a small amount of real shade kills a full panel's voltage and current. I haven't yet experienced this, but I've seen it demonstrated often enough in vids on Djutube. Oddly, I wasn't inclined to fool around with the little HF system. I just installed it and tested it. But I put in 4 little concrete reinforcements for the base and another under the batteries, so I guess I was done for those days. All that research first must have filled the need to play, measure, and chart.
That is true of some panels One of the technologies is worse than the other - ac't remember the terminology - and good panels have schotky bypass diodes that will allow the panel to produce reduced voltage instead of going totally off-line when a portion is shaded.
It's still a backup for outages, until I set up outdoor battery storage and can let them charge more quickly to the equalization and gassing voltage. Limiting the battery voltage to non-gassing 13.6V as the APC1400 SmartUPS does extends the recharge time past one day. I think I can get away with a partial recharge for a week or so by using a generator and my 24V 20A welding transformer charger to make up solar shortages.
Speaking of falling branches, last Sunday's storm brought down two full grown oaks and the top of a third among my sheds out back without doing more than dent the edges of the corrugated roofs as the trees landed right beside and between them.
-jsw
Yes, charging outdoors does allow your hydrogen producers to avoid the lebenty seben different sparky things inside the home. I'll surround my batteries with batts of fiberglass, vent the box with a screened 2" hole top and bottom, and allow charging and discharging to keep them from freezing. It's easier here than there, as we have a nicer (non-Global Warming, kumbaya) climate. I'll be running in (mostly) DC mode until I put up a second+ kW, expand my battery bank, and get a real inverter. The 2kW HF inverter is 120v only and is semi-sine. :-/ I'll call Carrier today and ask if the Infinity will run on it.
Congrats, you got lucky and dodged yet another bullet, and now have enough additional firewood for 3-6 more years. After you put in the week to process it and a year to age.
The problem I see with solar power is the lifespan cost of the batteries. If I pay $100 for a battery that stores 1 KWH, i.e. 83A-h at 12V, and it lasts 500 cycles at full discharge or 1000 at 50% DOD the operating cost is $0.20 per KWH of "free" electricity, more than grid power even here where it's up at $0.19.
OTOH if I buy that battery for emergency backup I want it to last as long as possible and so won't cycle it very often or very far, except to confirm that it's still able to run the fridge overnight.
The compromise I want to try is to have enough solar power to fix lunch, watch the TV news and browse the net at noon without drawing much from the batteries. I've been experimenting with a 300W rice cooker as a general-purpose heating appliance. The outside doesn't warm up and waste heat. It does get hot enough to boil over so I may loan it a thermocouple and temperature controller.
-jsw
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