Nothing like planning everything out or thinking your set to have it turned upside down

[Crowz]

I was sooo happy that my solar setup was lowering my power bill on a nice flat curve as in each purchase just moved me that much closer to covering all my needs.

I had the power usage per day cut in half and was looking to cut it in half again.

The my grand daughter wanted to stay with use this summer. Which is great and we have enjoyed her being here. But she is staying in the upstairs bedroom and it was over 100 degrees up there so I had to add an ac unit. I had to put the 14000 btu roll around unit up there because that's all I had laying around on such short notice.

So having to run more heat pumps down stairs that we normally don't use (its a 4000 sqft house and we don't use most of it normally) with her here plus more cooking, clothes washing etc things changed.

My power bill WITH the solar pumping out all it can shot from 28 to 30kwh a day to 82 to 88 kwh a day.

Without solar I would be over 100kwh a day. Painful.

That roll around ac used 32 kwh in one day since it hardly ever cycles since moving it upstairs.

I told the wife we needed to ramp up production faster but she was like we would never use that much power....

Yeah right

Sorry just wanted someone to vent while sitting here watching my pretty power usage charts starting to look like the us national debt.

 

[DIYrich]

I would look into a more efficient minisplit. Seems like a regular problem you may enjoy having.

 

[Crowz]

I would look into a more efficient minisplit. Seems like a regular problem you may enjoy having.

The problem with the mini split on the second floor is three fold.

1. I'm afraid of heights. The spot I would need to reach to install that is probably 60 feet or more straight up. Nope not going there.

2. I can't get help around here to do ANYTHING. In the old days you could hire someone for any job you wanted but not anymore. Were very rural and all the kids here won't work or went off to college. The won't work part is what the old timers that are retiring are telling me. One said "I'm tired of paying people to watch me work. So I retired".

3. I want to put in the mr cool central air unit since the house has central gas heat but not central air. This will allow me to use the heating ducts for cooling.

 

[AntronX]

What the square footage of that upstairs bedroom and to what temperature does that 14k btu ac cools it down to? Do you have breaker level energy monitor like Emporia Vue?

 

[sunsurfer]

Problems many people would be grateful to have. Keep a good perspective, you are fortunate. Nothing a pallet of panels can't fix.

 

[Crowz]

What the square footage of that upstairs bedroom and to what temperature does that 14k btu ac cools it down to? Do you have breaker level energy monitor like Emporia Vue?

Wife is the room size expert and she's off visiting her relatives this weekend so I will have to wait for her to get back (Ive got the ac off upstairs while she is going today with the grand daughter and its HOT up there).

I have emporia vue monitoring the house is why I knew how much power the thing is using.

 

[Crowz]

Problems many people would be grateful to have. Keep a good perspective, you are fortunate. Nothing a pallet of panels can't fix.

Oh I'll get there its just frustrating at times

 

[Madcodger]

You have it much worse than me, but I did a similar thing to myself when I moved my office from a tiny little building I built for that purpose to another outbuilding on our property that I had wired for solar/off grid. We used that building as an exercise studio, almost exclusively early in the day, so only needed AC from a little portable unit for 1-3 hours. Solar kept up with no problem. But now with me working from there for 8-10 hours/day, the AC on a hot day exceeds what I can produce and I'm out of room for panels. Replaced the portable unit with a small window unit that doesn't take much more than a minisplit so that'll work until it cools off in September. But I still ended up having to trench in an AC line to the building. Sigh...

 

[Steve_S]

(its a 4000 sqft house and we don't use most of it normally)

Maybe look at the equation the other way around... You are obviously way over housed and do not need to have such a space that requires heating/cooling/maintenance. Two people can occupy 1000 square feet very comfortably... Sell the Big Shack and get a right sized place and bank the balance. Heck, get a place where you can also have a functional bunkie for the extended visitors.

 

[Doggydogworld]

1. I'm afraid of heights. The spot I would need to reach to install that is probably 60 feet or more straight up. Nope not going there.

Window units aren't as efficient as mini-splits, but some aren't bad and you don't need a ladder. It'd take several summers to save enough vs. the roll-around unit to recover the upfront cost, I imagine.

 

[JRH]

The problem with the mini split on the second floor is three fold.

1. I'm afraid of heights. The spot I would need to reach to install that is probably 60 feet or more straight up. Nope not going there.

2. I can't get help around here to do ANYTHING. In the old days you could hire someone for any job you wanted but not anymore. Were very rural and all the kids here won't work or went off to college. The won't work part is what the old timers that are retiring are telling me. One said "I'm tired of paying people to watch me work. So I retired".

3. I want to put in the mr cool central air unit since the house has central gas heat but not central air. This will allow me to use the heating ducts for cooling.

Your issue proves the Moorlocks had it right… a subterranean home solves most heating and cooling problems….

 

[Mattb4]

The problem with the mini split on the second floor is three fold.

1. I'm afraid of heights. The spot I would need to reach to install that is probably 60 feet or more straight up. Nope not going there.

2. I can't get help around here to do ANYTHING. In the old days you could hire someone for any job you wanted but not anymore. Were very rural and all the kids here won't work or went off to college. The won't work part is what the old timers that are retiring are telling me. One said "I'm tired of paying people to watch me work. So I retired".

3. I want to put in the mr cool central air unit since the house has central gas heat but not central air. This will allow me to use the heating ducts for cooling.

Unless you are permanently moving in the grand daughter it also does not make sense to alter things all that much.

2. I have noticed this also. Partly in my area there is not a lot of young folks but the few that are around do not seem to want to do odd jobs for a spot of cash. Not like when I was a kid and desperate to make some money so that I could buy things (like a new fishing rod, bicycle, used car (when slightly older) and such). Maybe kids today are all rich.

 

[MichaelK]

What worked for me was a second-floor wall unit. Just a generic brand I bought at HomeDepot, 8000BTU, consuming ~750W at startup and ~350 cycling on and off.

The big advantage of a wall unit instead of window is that once it cools down, you simply open your windows back up. With my insulation, I'm finding I don't need to turn on the unit till about 3pm, and it runs 100% off incoming solar to after 6pm. After 6pm I start drawing down the batteries, but by then the bedroom is cool enough that the air-con is just cycling on and off.

 

[Zwy]

I was sooo happy that my solar setup was lowering my power bill on a nice flat curve as in each purchase just moved me that much closer to covering all my needs.

I had the power usage per day cut in half and was looking to cut it in half again.

The my grand daughter wanted to stay with use this summer. Which is great and we have enjoyed her being here. But she is staying in the upstairs bedroom and it was over 100 degrees up there so I had to add an ac unit. I had to put the 14000 btu roll around unit up there because that's all I had laying around on such short notice.

So having to run more heat pumps down stairs that we normally don't use (its a 4000 sqft house and we don't use most of it normally) with her here plus more cooking, clothes washing etc things changed.

My power bill WITH the solar pumping out all it can shot from 28 to 30kwh a day to 82 to 88 kwh a day.

Without solar I would be over 100kwh a day. Painful.

That roll around ac used 32 kwh in one day since it hardly ever cycles since moving it upstairs.

I told the wife we needed to ramp up production faster but she was like we would never use that much power....

Yeah right

Sorry just wanted someone to vent while sitting here watching my pretty power usage charts starting to look like the us national debt.

Sounds to me you need to insulate better.

 

[JWLV]

Just endure it for a few months. You did say that your grand daughter is staying just for the summer. No need to spend a wad of cash just for something temporary. If getting more panels is part of your future plans, then you were going to do it regardless of the additional power usage.

 

[Tulex]

The problem with the mini split on the second floor is three fold.

1. I'm afraid of heights. The spot I would need to reach to install that is probably 60 feet or more straight up. Nope not going there.

I'm with you on the heights thing. Back in my prime, there was a time, I could reach over the peak of our house.
But I'm struggling with the 60 foot. That's like 5-6 stories.

 

[Crowz]

Maybe look at the equation the other way around... You are obviously way over housed and do not need to have such a space that requires heating/cooling/maintenance. Two people can occupy 1000 square feet very comfortably... Sell the Big Shack and get a right sized place and bank the balance. Heck, get a place where you can also have a functional bunkie for the extended visitors.

Oh were BAD over housed. The reason I bought this house is because it is beside my parents home which was also my grand parents home before them. The house we bought was my great grand parents home that they had sold to the city when my great grandfather passed away. It popped up on the market so we snatched it up. Now I have both and own a large block of downtown here. Was a good move but the house is huge.

The house was built in the 50's or even earlier (no one knows for sure) and the second floor doesn't have insulation to speak of and no real attic space too so it gets HOT up there without ac.

My plan/goal was to slowly expand out usage wise as the solar system grew. Well that and furniture wise We went from 1200 sqft to 4000 sqft so you can imagine the lack of furniture problem.

 

[Crowz]

I'm with you on the heights thing. Back in my prime, there was a time, I could reach over the peak of our house.
But I'm struggling with the 60 foot. That's like 5-6 stories.

I'm not sure the exact height. Anything over 10 feet ladder wise might as well be 1000 feet to me

I know my gorilla ladder is 30 feet stretched out fully and it won't reach the second floor outside the house.

The house has 10 foot ceilings I think. When going up the stairs to the second floor you go up 15 feet or more to a landing and then you turn and go up another flight of stairs to actually reach the second floor. So I guess its technically 3 stories tall height wise?

Not really comfortable sticking modern pics up of the place on the internet but here is a shot of it from 1964.

 

[Crowz]

What the square footage of that upstairs bedroom and to what temperature does that 14k btu ac cools it down to? Do you have breaker level energy monitor like Emporia Vue?

Wife tells me the upstairs is about 1500 sqft and that room were trying to cool is about 308 sqft.

 

[Tomthumb62]

I told the wife we needed to ramp up production faster but she was like we would never use that much power....

I know you already know this and are just looking for an excuse to expand your system and thinking this would be a good example to convince your wife of that...but unless your granddaughter will be spending every summer with you, it would not probably be a wise financial decision. Suppose it matters what it costs per kWh to use the grid vs your off-grid setup. For us, it's WAY cheaper to use the grid. We live in a very sunny location, but the grid power is so dang cheap and the upfront expense (not to mention ongoing maintenance (adding more battery or maintaining a lead acid setup) for off-grid just doesn't pan out financially-wise. People are looking at 20-30 years to break even on solar around here and that's assuming you don't have major equipment failure (that being on grid would be covered by the utility) along the way.

Now if you were get a renter to live upstairs...