| Hi folks. A couple weeks ago, a cougar (or equivalent) put its pointy little claws through two of my plastic gas cans, which I've been leaving outside next to the van. Currently I only have physical space for the 4 pseudo-deep-cycle batteries that are now under the floorboards of my van. It is clear that the next thing I need to do is build a powerhouse.
Concrete is relatively cheap (about $3 for a 50-pound bag) and gravel is plentiful (the whole place is sitting on decomposed granite) so I'm going to try casting my own bricks in 1-gallon plastic water bottles. If that doesn't work I'll probably go to cinder-blocks.
In any case, my next project is to construct a powerhouse. There are some conflicts inherent in this little project.
- Hydrogen emission during charging. The area where my batteries are currently stored is well ventillated, but we're talking a new storage area here, and I certainly don't want to build myself a bomb.
- Freezing. It gets down to around -15F in the winter. No good freezing your battery bank. When I set up the van I never really considered freezing, but apparently I've been lucky. That, and the battery bank has usually had a pretty decent charge on it since I've been using power primarily from my generator.
- Ventillation. I need to build this powerhouse in a way that lets me run the generator inside. Current measures are different from what was in use in the past, and are stopgap. If I have to work on the generator (which needs to be done once in a while) I don't want to be doing it in the snow.
- Gasoline storage. Gotta get the plastic cans out of kitty's reach.
- The freakin' bees. In the summertime, any hole into a building on the east or southeast side is an openv invitation to the local bees to build a nest there. Two years ago the little buzzers made a nest behind the refrigerator in our trailer and it was a real mess to deal with.
So there are some interesting conflicts here. I need to keep the battery bank area well ventillated but as warm as possible. I need to keep the bees out (1/8" hardware cloth should take care of that one). I need enough ventillation to run the generator inside without poisoning myself on CO when I have to go inside to do whatever (as in add fuel, I customarily add fuel while it's running if it runs low). I need to keep the gasoline separated from the rest.
Last summer I think it was, we dug out a place for the powerhouse, in the side of a hill. That side of it can be about 8 feet. That side is also closest to the road, so if we ever hook up to the grid I'll want to bring the gridline in to the powerhouse as a distribution point.
I'm thinking the best place for the battery bank is up against the hill on that side so the earth can provide some insulation. Probably on the south side of that area.
Not sure quite how much space to leave for the battery bank. I run a workshop so I'll want to leave plenty of space to expand the battery bank later as batteries become available at the right price. I'm thinking store the batteries on several stacked pull-out drawerlike thingys for easy access when servicing them.
I should probably have a solid wall between the batteries and the generator, and another solid wall to keep the gasoline stash separated. The whole thing seems like a lot of work.
What have I overlooked here? Has anybody done something similar? What did you do wrong or right? |
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