What Solar Charger, Battery and Inversor should I Use ?

[cindynsg]

I don' have an SAT converter, cable box, or a dsl modem, I don't have much at all. Not much more than what I told you. What I could do is maybe not have to use fridge in winter. I spent the summer building a cold cellar which is almost ready. I will stay around 33 degrees in cold months.

I will search around for a phantom load perhaps some things plugged in are using more energy than I thought even though they are not used.

[cindynsg]

yeah, I just got a kw meter (killawatt) thats what I used to measure the fridge. I measured it for 3 days.

[Mike90250]

21KWH is way too much, you will need 7-8KW of solar to even begin to supply that! You have to get a watt meter (kill-a-watt) and measure. Unless your fridge is a recent EnergyStar one, you are likely more than 1.4KW daily. Measure the fridge for 3 or 4 days, get a good average. Same with TV, sat convertrer, cable box, DSL modem. Look for phantom loads, 30W @ 24/7 is a bunch of power. Add in a couple of those, and it adds up.

Friend Tony, off-grid, with his wife, on an island in Canada:
300 watts Siemens/BP panels,plus a Sun 90,, making ~300w. ~30 amps into Rogue MPT-3024 controller,into 450 ah of Trojan T-105, powering a Morningstar ts300 inverter, and monitored with a Tri-Metric meter.a collection of antique generators, plus 2 Honda eu-1000i's (propane fridge)

[cindynsg]

The are not as efficient. you can loose 30% of your power in internal losses. Solar deep cycle batteries are better efficiency, about 20%. AGM batteries even better, about 3-5%, and no EQ needed.

You mean like surrette or trojan. I didn't like the idea of AGM because they seem to be more sensitive, more easily ruined by a rookie. Also a bit more costly.


this was supposed to go to anothed thread, i don;t kow how it got here. computer issues lately.

[cindynsg]

I looked through bills over the last year and a half and figured my average was around 21 kw a day. My water heater, cloths dryer, and stove run on gas. I have a 46 inch high def tv I use for about 4 or 5 hours tops. My fridgerator uses 1.4 kw a day. I use a couple of lamps but they have cfl bulbs and only use them for 4 hours max. I have a laptop with an energy star rating in fact manyof my electrical appliances are energy star rated. I think what drives up my usage is my furnace. I burn wood but it has a blower fan for forced hot air. I adjusted it to come on when it's a bit hotter so I see how that helps. I don't use very many things in a day and am careful to turn off any lights and the like when i'm not using them. I uses much less than what I did years ago when I had kids running around. I can't figure out much else I can do to save on electric. I live ina big two hundred year old house with five bedrooms mostly used for storage now. Ive spent my whole life here making repairs and updates and I love the six and a half acres I live on, so I wouldn't have the heart to sell it and move into somthing smaller, even if it would help with electric.

I read an earlier thread about the guy who uses 39 kw a day, I thought 21 wasn't too bad compared to that. So give me a goal to shoot for, how many kwh a day would be considered good? I will try to tighten my belt a bit more.

Oh, I don't plan on running the furnace on solar.

[Mike90250]

Ok, so theretically if I use 21 Kwhs per day but I can only afford to power about 12 Kwhs per day on solar but want to step it up over time (a year - 1.5 years) I would be better off getting enough batteries to hold the amphrs I need on 21 Kwh system? I might as well just take the house off grid all at once?

Yikes !! 21KWH daily. That's a massive system. Better check your #'s and make sure that is what you need, conservation of power, will pay off in the long run, in the price of panels not bought, and batteries not needed.

[cindynsg]

BAD IDEA.

Adding new batteries to a bank, will quickly degrade the new batteries to the level of the oldest. If only a month or so apart, not too bad. Over 6 months age difference, NOT SUGGESTED.

Ok, so theretically if I use 21 Kwhs per day but I can only afford to power about 12 Kwhs per day on solar but want to step it up over time (a year - 1.5 years) I would be better off getting enough batteries to hold the amphrs I need on 21 Kwh system? I might as well just take the house off grid all at once?

[DeltaFox 25]

I was thinking a #2 wire would do. I see where you are supose to conect your batterys up to go to your inverter but now how would you put the wires to charge the same batterys. That book was very helpful .

[Mike90250]

Is there a specal way to hook the batterys in searies. Or can you do that.

Since very few places sell 48V batteries, you have to series connect 12 or 6V batteries to get the desired voltage. You need cables that can carry the full amps of your charge and drain. The smartguage website covers that pretty well.

http://www.smartgauge.co.uk/cable_type.html

[DeltaFox 25]

Is there a specal way to hook the batterys in searies. Or can you do that.


. This is a book I bought and everyone should have one

[DeltaFox 25]

Here is a book that I have been reading and it has alot of items in it that I didn't know . It has a good part on batterys.
.<a href="http://s635.photobucket.com/albums/uu73/WayneBlake/?action=view&current=photovoltaics.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i635.photobucket.com/albums/uu73/WayneBlake/photovoltaics.jpg" border="0" alt="photovotaics"></a>

[Mike90250]

I'm designing a battery bank that I can expand as I go.

BAD IDEA.

Adding new batteries to a bank, will quickly degrade the new batteries to the level of the oldest. If only a month or so apart, not too bad. Over 6 months age difference, NOT SUGGESTED.

Here's a great article about connecting batteries
http://www.smartgauge.co.uk/batt_con.html (connect batteries on diagonal )
and some other battery stuff:
http://www.windsun.com/Batteries/Battery_FAQ.htm (short & sweet)
http://www.batteryfaq.org/ (very large)

[DeltaFox 25]

Yes I know I found out the hard way. I'd like to get some AGM sealed batterys but it cost. I just don't have it right now.

[Mike90250]

What do you think of industrial deep cycle batteries? These are the kind used in electric forklifts and floor sweepers. 4D 180-215 amp hours 12 volts, or 8D 225- 255 amp hours 12 volts?

The are not as efficient. you can loose 30% of your power in internal losses. Solar deep cycle batteries are better efficiency, about 20%. AGM batteries even better, about 3-5%, and no EQ needed.

[DeltaFox 25]

The batterys I bought were $119.00 and I got 4 of them befor someone told me that they were wrong for solar. Go to your web broswer and type in solar batterys and It should show you a list of several battery listings.