| A Friend of mine recently sold me a 45 watt Harbor Freight solar power system for $150 and I installed it last year 2007 in October. I was going to post about my new system when I got the Solar Panels Mounted properly but it didn't happen so I'm finally posting about it now. But I can tell you more about things since I've been using the system for 4 months now.
The pictures are all 640x480 but I have them tagged to display small in this story. If you would like to see a larger version of a picture you can Right-Click the image and then select the menu item that views the full size image.
Here is the Shed with the batteries and my solar panels. If you look closely right next to the solar panels you will see a little 1.5 watt solar trickle charger and my solar Pool Heater. I want to mount the solar panels on top of the shed and mount the pool heater over the first section of fence next to the shed. The Above Ground pool goes in the spot where everything is sitting right now.
All of my Solar sources will combine through this little diode network. You can see the three main 15 watt panels hooked up here. This is an older picture so you can't see the trickle charger hooked up and I have a 5th panel that I'm weatherizing and will add later this year. This diode combiner will be rebuilt with some low voltage drop schottky diodes later.
Inside of the shed I have the batteries inside of an Ice Cooler. The three wires going to the battery are to the Panels, the Dump Controller, and the output to the House. Eventually the Diode combiner and another Dump Controller will be mounted to the panel on the left. If you look back in the corner on the right-side you will see another 10 watt panel that I will add after I rebuild the weatherizing for it. Plus, I have a 200watt wind generator that I hope to add this year.
There are 2 batteries in the Ice Cooler but I'm only using one of them. The Little one is a 30 amphour car battery. The Big one is a 135 amphour Deep Cycle. I will be rewiring this with a 12amp circuit breaker on each battery using 8 gauge wire. Then I can use the Breakers to switch eather battery online individually so I will have some kind of backup like weeks of no Sun. I have removed the Drain plug on the cooler and drilled five 1/8 inch holes in the top for ventilation.
Currently mounted on the Right-Side is the Dump load that I built with the Controller that Ghurd sells. I used 3 strings of Resistors for the Dump itself, each string is seven 1ohm 5 watt resistors in series. This makes a 2.33ohm 105watt 6amps Dump Resistor. Notice that I'm Not using the Harbor Freight charge controller. Mounted on the left side are the fuses for the Output to the House. This box was built for a smaller system and is OK here but I really need to make something bigger and better for when I add a Wind generator and stuff.
The wire run is about 110 feet (33m) long to the Point of Use. It'a actually longer than drawn in the picture. The first 25 feet is 8 gauge wire and partially buried. The other 85 feet is 10 gauge wire with plans to make the entire run into 8 gauge. I also ran an 8 conductor telephone wire to give me some indications from the controllers. The plastic covered thing is a Greenhouse I built.
I use the power at my computer desk in the living room. Here is my power distribution system under my keyboard and over my dusty computer. The 4 switches control the power to the little terminal strip in the back where my loads are connected. There is a yellow LED that indicates if any of the switches is turned on. The 2 green LEDs connect to the Dump controllers in the shed through Telephone wire and indicate when the controllers are dumping. The Red Pushbutton Test switch is for checking the battery voltage on a meter by the computer monitor. I also have a 20,000 mfd capacitor in there to help out with some power surges I was getting when I operated the switches. Have plans to add more switches since I discovered that I have more power than expected.
I use the 12vdc straight from the battery without inverters. The picture shows the Voltage meter on the top. It only reads out when the red pushbutton is pressed, There are 2 marks on the meter, the low mark is 12.2 volts, the high mark is 14.4 volts. The meter comes out of a cassette deck and lights up when I press the test button. My 12v DSL modem has been running on solar power for 4 months now. I don't use this Router but it runs on 12v too. I use the 12v TV which is also a Radio. The Harbor Freight Kit came with two 12v CFLs for light. I have a 12v muffin fan to help cool me down in the summer.
- Results -
I have been extreamly happy with this system. With the few devices that I'm running there is practicly unlimited power. The DSL modem is on about 18 hours a day and pulls .6 amp, The two 12v .4 amp CFLs are on about 4 hours a day and have been left on overnight a few times. I use the TV for about an hour a day and it pulls about 1.1 amp. When it's hot I run the .8 amp muffin fan about 4 hours a day. If it's sunny outside the batteries will be charged by 1:pm in the afternoon. I went for 7 days without Sun once and just used the Modem, lights and fan some for those 7 days. The battery never got below 12.1 volts and it took 2½ days of full Sun to get the battery charged back up. I have seen the system Dumping power on heavy overcast days. Ghurds Dump controller works like a dream and I love having the Dump LED indicator inside where I'm using the power.
When i first powered up this system i found the the DSL modem would Reset when I turned on the Lights or TV. I was thinking this was because of the power surges on such a long cable run. I put a 20,000 mfd capacitor across the power in my Switch Box and that problem disappeared.
I live in a large neighborhood that streaches out more than a mile (2km) in every direction. Here is a picture of a power pole that is on the corner of my property. If I wanted to get into anykind of major Grid Tie then I have a good place to tap into. I have also considered trying to run some wires under those High Tension lines to see if I can tap any static charges or something and get even more power. Just past that power pole is a 5 lane city street.
Questions or Comments Welcome
W o o f -={(
|
|
|
Total Views
|
|
193 Scoop users have viewed this posting.
|
|
