diy solar

diy solar

Strange request!

havoc Sun

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Joined
Dec 1, 2021
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32
Worked all my life then got sick. Had to sell my home in San Diego. But this is not a sad story! Equity was so high I was able to pay off all my medical & other debt. When it was all done I was debt free & I had enough to look for a ranch! Or I thought... Long story short I bought a distressed ranch that had been partially burned in a fire. I was able to repair all the electrical but the city wont turn my meter on until all the Ranch is repaired. At my pace that will take months. So I invested in a small solar kit from harbor freight. It runs all my night time needs like bedroom & bathroom lights for the night. Much quieter than my generator. My question is....And I finally got up the nerve to ask here. Can I build a complete Off grid solar power unit to power my whole ranch?
 
Worked all my life then got sick. Had to sell my home in San Diego. But this is not a sad story! Equity was so high I was able to pay off all my medical & other debt. When it was all done I was debt free & I had enough to look for a ranch! Or I thought... Long story short I bought a distressed ranch that had been partially burned in a fire. I was able to repair all the electrical but the city wont turn my meter on until all the Ranch is repaired. At my pace that will take months. So I invested in a small solar kit from harbor freight. It runs all my night time needs like bedroom & bathroom lights for the night. Much quieter than my generator. My question is....And I finally got up the nerve to ask here. Can I build a complete Off grid solar power unit to power my whole ranch?
Any contractor, or electrician can request a temporary power pole be set for construction. I do it all the time.

That said, we can certainly get you pointed in the direction of building your own off grid setup.

Link at the top of the pace solar blueprints have some great starting setup descriptions.

What all would you like to power?
Start there and let’s see what you need and start a budget BEFORE you buy anything.
 
I know nothing about what I use in power. But I know I have no gas & no electric. I have a small electric water heater, electric stove & a mini pro AC / heater. It sit on a 8 beautiful acres at the edge of the San Bernardino mountains. It's a small ranch, three small bedrooms, tiny dining room & kitchen. But it has a huge add on living room & garage. I don't really know what my power use will be. I do use tools on occasion that pull amps. Air compressor, Arc & Mig welder.
 
I know nothing about what I use in power. But I know I have no gas & no electric. I have a small electric water heater, electric stove & a mini pro AC / heater. It sit on a 8 beautiful acres at the edge of the San Bernardino mountains. It's a small ranch, three small bedrooms, tiny dining room & kitchen. But it has a huge add on living room & garage. I don't really know what my power use will be. I do use tools on occasion that pull amps. Air compressor, Arc & Mig welder.
Ok.
List the items that you power.
Assume all your lighting is LED. So, around 90W for the house lighting.
What part of the world do you live in? Winter temps? Summer temps? HVAC is a big consumer of energy, we need to know the wattage of the units. But we would also need to know the runtimes, so the climate you are in is important.

An electric range will be around 7000W with everything running, burners are around 2000 watts on high, so, the amount of cooking needs to be considered.
Microwaves are sold by output wattage.
Home electronics, TVs etc, will have a wattage listing on the back, or at least an ampdraw we can multiply by the home voltage to get watts.

Add everything up. It helps to graph each item wattage, then list the time per day multiply each out to get watt hours.
Add up all he watthours together, and you have the daily requirements of power.

Then you need to know how much sun you get. Irradiance map surveys are available for most areas, google solar has a cool visual map site.

Next, you need to decide weather related solar blackouts prevent regular charging, so multiple days of battery storage becomes a calculation… 1 day storage will require running the generator in poor weather. 2 days, gives you a small cushion of weather issues, 3 days improves your tolerance more, etc…


Next is the solar charging. You want enough solar wattage to replenish the battery in a day, so, total bank Wh divided by your irradiance solar hours. Tells you how many watts of PV you need to have.

Then it comes the inverter to choose.
Pick one that has the lowest standby wattage, or overhead consumption… low cost inverters have huge overhead… so shop and search for recommendations here.
You need one with output that covers all large loads and can surge, if motors or other inductive loads operate.

Post up what you come up with here and we can assist.
 
I was able to repair all the electrical but the city wont turn my meter on until all the Ranch is repaired... that will take months ... Can I build a complete Off grid solar power unit to power my whole ranch?
If grid power is eventually the plan don't get carried away. I don't know the size of your loads but my compressor alone take >5Kw. A system big enough would cost many $ thousands. Wasted after getting grid power. Perhaps a larger solar generator (minus the solar) will tide you over, so the gas generator isn't running 24-7. Whether home built out of deep cycle batteries, charger and inverter for short term or store bought for long term.
 
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Well, I'll start the default answer to these questions and we can work from there. Here's you To-Do list:

1: Power audit! This will give you some important information on how big your inverter needs to be as well as how much battery capacity you'll need. There is a link in the FAQ section (I think, or someone here will post it shortly) so fill in the blanks and see what it comes up with. You'll probably need some sort of Kill-A-Watt to get accurate measurements. Are you going to be running a 12v system? 24v system? 48v system? What are the specs on your solar panels? VoC? Vmp?

1a: Where do you live? Speccing out a system for Scotland is a LOT different numbers than Arizona due to the amount of light you actually get. Someone here can post the link to the Uber-Sun-Hours calculator site to help figure out how much you'll have to work with. That will be a box in the Power Audit form.

2: Parts list: You don't need a make & model list, just a parts list to start from for reference. You'll need an inverter, a MPPT charge controller, some sort of DC->dc charger to charge from your alternator without frying it, fuses, shunt, buck converter, batteries, wire, etc. Once you have a basic list it can be fine tuned to make & models after that.

3: Budget!: Steak is great but doesn't mean anything if your wallet says hamburger. :) Figure out what you're able to spend now vs what you'll have to cheap out on now and upgrade later.

4: Tape measure! Figure out where you're going to stick all the stuff you'll need. A dozen 3000AH batteries sounds great until you're sleeping on the floor because there's no room left for a bed. Is there a compartment that can house all this stuff? Will the server rack batteries fit? Are you going to have to make space? Physics can be pretty unforgiving.

5: Pencil out what you think you need and throw it at us so we can tell you what you've missed (because we ALL miss stuff the first go-round :) ) and help figure out which parts and pieces you're going to want to get.
 
Thanks for all the input & references. I have a lot of homework to do. Actually I'm beginning to realize this is going to be a monumental task. I also have a YouTube channel & I host a very large Facebook group called "All Things Tandy Radio Shack". So in my hobby room or I called it the Tandy cave is probably 12+ older computers. I don't have to turn them on all at the same time. But these systems were built way before energy savings was a thing. They also all run on CRT screens. I dabble in old retro rigs as well. Of course the move to my ranch has not given me the opportunity to relocate my collection yet. I'm thinking of building a good size barn to house my collection in. I can see this may need to be a build where at times I may need to eventually pull from the grid. I have a huge roof since the original ranch house & the large addition was done in one straight line. I'm located in Southern California so sun shine is not a problem. Also the sun rises & and sets along my long roof. Also they just started working on the only road in & out of the area. When I asked what they were doing the workman said we are laying internet cable & dropping the electrical wires, cable under ground for fire safety. Wow no more satellite which sucks here!
 
To get some great ideas on the subject. I would direct you to get on YouTube and watch Will Prowse, David Poz, and James of “signature solar”
I’ve met James at his shop in Texas and his system is what I have gone with. I’m just in a small 30’ rv at permanent location. But even my system so far is $5k in at this point and it’s very minimal.

Best of luck.
 
To get some great ideas on the subject. I would direct you to get on YouTube and watch Will Prowse, David Poz, and James of “signature solar”
I’ve met James at his shop in Texas and his system is what I have gone with. I’m just in a small 30’ rv at permanent location. But even my system so far is $5k in at this point and it’s very minimal.

Best of luck.

I also would like to add in that Engineer775 has a bunch of great off-grid electric videos I like to watch.

 
I don't want to spend all I have left. But I do want to build something that will eventually pay for it self.
With cost/KWh that isn’t always doable

The welders and compressor: generator for now

Solar: 1600W system with lead batteries and a pure sine inverter could go a long way and maybe $2K to $3K more or less depending on how you source stuff. A propane stove could make sense.

Tell about your budget: that isn’t to be nosey- it will give an indication to folks on how to advise you properly. If $3000 is all you have that’s not as good. If you have $30K and only need $3000 or whatever that’s better. No one will profit from your answer- only you
 
I use a 3600watt / 48 volt unit with 4500 watts of solar and 16 golf cart battery’s 430 AH s
I have no electric heating every thing is Propane .
It works for me in a area with not great sun ,it seams like some one turned off the sun a few days ago.
Im all in for 9k with a extra 4500 watts of solar I don’t use yet
 
Thanks for all the input & references. I have a lot of homework to do. Actually I'm beginning to realize this is going to be a monumental task. I also have a YouTube channel & I host a very large Facebook group called "All Things Tandy Radio Shack". So in my hobby room or I called it the Tandy cave is probably 12+ older computers. I don't have to turn them on all at the same time. But these systems were built way before energy savings was a thing. They also all run on CRT screens. I dabble in old retro rigs as well. Of course the move to my ranch has not given me the opportunity to relocate my collection yet. I'm thinking of building a good size barn to house my collection in. I can see this may need to be a build where at times I may need to eventually pull from the grid. I have a huge roof since the original ranch house & the large addition was done in one straight line. I'm located in Southern California so sun shine is not a problem. Also the sun rises & and sets along my long roof. Also they just started working on the only road in & out of the area. When I asked what they were doing the workman said we are laying internet cable & dropping the electrical wires, cable under ground for fire safety. Wow no more satellite which sucks here!
Cool! I'm into most retro stuff...
I have a few Tandy 1000's and some ast, some trs80 stuff...
Mostly commodore...
 
I think I will shoot some video on how I'm getting on with this Solar power kit. I will post it on my channel. The first thing I want to do is buy solar panels.
I still have my Tandy 1000RL with its 21MB hard drive and 768k dedicated graphics! Yes, it still works too. :)
The RL was a great system for the day. Most Tandy computers were built with Navy spec parts. Made in America, so that's why these systems still work. The Caps don't bleed!
 
Cool! I'm into most retro stuff...
I have a few Tandy 1000's and some ast, some trs80 stuff...
Mostly commodore...
It's not just my computers, I have a 1952 Dodge M37, two 1982 Honda Passports & one 1972 Honda Trail 90. A 1972 Trihull built by Roy Rogers! So you see I need power! LOL to keep all this things running. I will start with Panels I guess. Then I need something that will control everything. I want to be able to go to the grid when I exceed my build. 1st question, Best bang for your buck solar panels? I will film this build day by day. I don't edit my videos for the most part, some i do. I film just about everything I do. I started to do that just to be able to look back at it & say OH I already did that! Then a friend said Hey these video's are entertaining you should make a YouTube channel! The rest is history.
 
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