Recent content by Ironman

Yes, building one now. I drove 2-7/8" pipe down 6 ft into the ground as my base, and 2-3/8" slides right into it for the frames. Weld to base pipes as required. Be aware that this is not mild steel, and if using a cold saw it will rip out carbide after a few inches cut as it work hardens as it...

Yes, I've had the same experience, and it was salt water. I would defineltly drain those box tubes, and drill a couple of hole so that rain could flush out the salt. All it tales is one pin hole or shitty weld and the ocean gets in.

Inrush current filling the capacitors, most likely. Use a carpenters pencil as a resistor and put the positive on one end of the lead and the CCS terminal at the other end of the pencil. Wait 30 seconds and then hook up with no spark as the caps are full.

A simple electric eye for a farm yard light is configured to turn on after dark. Wired to a normally closed relay it would be activated by the electric eye to open the relay and your pump is off till daylight.

And if they are 12v each black box in the picture would be two 12's in series

You would be better to post a diagram of your battery bank connections if you want advice, and read the above recommended files. There is a good way and a bad way to connect.

The unit I installed for a friend's 24v system has an adjustable output voltage, so his breathing machine, although on a 24ft run of 14ga wire, can be fed a 12.75 volts at the machine. It is a couple volts higher at the converter, but the adjusment is a great thing.

First off, the OP 'thinks' it is hard on the inverter but not sure. We need sure. Second, a soft start would be a disaster for a welder, slowly trying to form an arc and giving no penetration for a spell til it came up to speed. Third, there are transformers out there, I have one and the type...

If you are in a city or it's control area, you are kinda boogered. I may be wrong, but I have never seen a UL approved panel over 350 watt. They do make them over 600, but not approved. If you are insured and troubled about legalese, you are limited in your wattage. And yeah, I think grid tie is...

I'm with you on ground mounts being the best in our environment. But also I'm a big fan of steel roofs. In my case, with an almost always western wind, south facing means my panels are edge on to the wind. I've also learned to build my buildings facing gable end into the prevailing wind, and the...

Thanks for your response Eggo. I read the Wiring Unlimited and it was a good informative article other than from page 9 consistently getting the DC flow direction wrong. They have shown electron flow from positive to negative. Electrons are repelled by the negative charge and attracted to the...

My neighbor is running a battery bank consisting of 8 Powersafe SBS 190 AH 12 volt agm batteries. He has them wired in 2 banks of 4 batteries in parallel. These 2 parallel banks are then wired in series so there are 4 batteries on each side of the series connection cable. Electrically this...

Thank you. Love the welders boots in the last pic:love:

It's a laughing matter today, but a lot of foolish things we laughed at twenty years ago, are rammed down our throats now.

Would used 2-7/8" sched 40 pipe work for you? Used as it is dicarded from oil fields. Miles of that stuff available at farm auctions and oilfield service co's. They usually ask $1/ft