Filed under Alternative Energy …

Nov 15 2011
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Alternative Energy, Our Cabin Posts, Solar

Installing Solar Panels On Cabin Roof

So I’ve put off this post for a while, probably because mounting them on the roof was really tough and I was short hand, hence not many photo were taken. These panels were installed in August this year. I used some uni strut made I found in our dumpster at work. It’s way heavier duty than I need but it works. It weighs more than the panels I think.

I found these 75watt siemens solar panels on craigslist here in Seattle a few years ago. They were a good deal at $125 each and I got 8, selling 4 for profit and selling 2 for a friend. I wired them parallel for a maximum 150 watts, 18 volts and 9 amps in perfect conditions. They are wired to a charge controller that then charges batteries.

 

To get this 65lb rack and panels up to the very steep roof I put the ladder at the same angle as the roof and pushed it up as my wife pulled on the rope that went over peak of the roof back down to the other side. She could only hold the panels from slipping back down so we inched it up then the rope was tied off so I could attached the brackets to the rack and the rack to the roof. The brackets were big thick 8″ L shaped brackets that I slipped under the shingle above them and drilled through the roof with a healthy amount of caulk. Then the shingle was glued back down over the bracket.

 

 

Currently they are charging 2 deep cycle boat batteries hanging under the floor of the cabin in a wooden battery box. You can see that in an earlier video but since then I’ve added another battery.

So far this solar setup makes more power than we need for our little cabin. We only use it on the weekends to run lights all night, charge tool batteries, power stereos and my laptop.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s me on the roof attaching the panels to the roof. This looks really boring but I’m hanging off a yellow rope that’s tied to my waist, definitely not OSHA certified. I ended up hammering in a few ladder jacks on the 12/12 roof but I only had enough room for a 12″ board to stand on. So glad that was done. They are attached by 4 3/8″ galvanized lag screws and raised off the roof 5 inches to let snow and rain pass below the array.

 

Oct 03 2011
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Alternative Energy, Off-Grid Tech, Security, Video

Special Features for your Remote Off Grid Cabin VIDEO

[Video Below]
I posted a log cabin building video from this guy last year. He’s taking us back and showing off some cool cabin features he made. He’s got a creek above the cabin that provides water pressure and powers his micro hydro system powering a single florescent lamp, no battery in between which I thought was cool and interesting. He also talks about how his cabin is weathering having been built like they did 150 years ago with site gathered materials. The cedar roof is keeping the cabin in good shape and no critters have gotten into this one that happens to be perched on the side of a cliff.

I was especially impressed with his security system that uses a FRS radio and a magnetic door switch to alert another radio if the door was opened with in the 25 mile broadcast range. Apparently he lives within 20 miles line of site from the cabin. Not that he has much to steal but I think he just does it to see if anyone ever checks out the cabin which is built in a very remote location on what may be public land.

One thing that I plan on adding to our cabin eventually is the copper coil he put in the stove pipe to heat water for his shower behind the cabin. Hot water heated from the waste heat from a wood stove sounds like a cool and useful way to get clean. Flipping through Lloyd Khan’s Shelter book series I’ve been inspired to build a rustic wood fired sauna in the woods on our property and I think I want to incorporate the shower in the sauna so that you can take an indoor shower/sauna in the winter or and outdoor hot shower in the summer.

Hand Made Hot Water Systems

Hand Made Hot Water Systems

A few years ago I found this gem of a book on Amazon. It’s called Hand Made Hot Water System’s and it’s got to be out of print but the ideas and drawings in it are priceless.

I think it’s 30 years old but it’s got great ideas in there that could save you lots of money on heating your pool, pre-heating your hot water heater or heating your shower directly.

May 23 2011
4 Comments
Alternative Energy, Off-Grid Tech, Solar

Do solar panels work when it’s cloudy?

The answer is yes but at reduced power. Check out this video I made yesterday showing you how much power I was getting on a very cloudy day in Seattle. I’m a super nerd I know… and this is just a temporary solar power test. I don’t recommend connecting wire like I did or didn’t do here, this was just temporary. I didn’t have my coffee before I made this video. :)

This was the same solar panel and battery we had before we got robbed. I took it down after that but it was attached to the shed and lighted 3 lights, charged tool batteries and ran a radio. We have never run out of power but we also didn’t have the cabin hooked up yet so we hardly used any juice. I’ll let you know how our small system does when I get the cabin wired up to make it convenient for people to use AC and DC power. Look for future posts on this, I’m planning our cabin solar system wiring diagram now and having fun doing it.

Solar Components I have so far:

2 – 75 watt solar panels (probably use just one)
1 – Group 29 Interstate Deep Cycle battery
Xantrex C40 – charge controller
3 Circuit Boat fuse panel

Jan 14 2011
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Alternative Energy, Off-Grid Tech, Video

Wood-fired Shower and Sauna

Check out this cool off the grid hot water heating setup in Northern California. It’s a tower built out of metal scaffolding with a plastic water tank on top. Water is pumped up into the tank and gravity feeds out of it. The part I like is the Shower and Sauna is under the water tank and takes up little room while giving great water pressure. He’s got a wood stove providing the heat via the smoke stack to a a metal keg full of water that the smoke flows around. There are 2 videos below that tell the story, so stop reading this and click play.

Wood fired shower/sauna in the making

2nd Stage of the wood fired shower/sauna

Would you change anything?

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Jan 03 2011
2 Comments
Alternative Energy, Video

Micro Hydro Powered Systems

How awesome would it be to make all the naturally clean power you can use? Very Awesome! We have a heck of a hill but no stream. Something to think about if your looking for land. Hydro power is usually running continuously day and night so you don’t need the storage capacity of a similarly sized solar system. Here are 3 Micro Hydro Videos with totally different systems.

This guy in Northern California explains his system well and it’s one of the larger private micro hydro power systems I’ve seen. The generator is putting out about 475 Watts continuous or roughly 10-11 kW per day. The entire system cost about $5,000 to build. The hydro location is about 250 ft from the cabin. With the solar panels, I get about 12.5-13 kW per day in the summer.

micro-hydro power bucket

Very cool portable system

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Dec 08 2010
2 Comments
Alternative Energy, Video

Moonshine? Making your own liquor…

Anyone want to make their own liquor? Of course you do, this country was founded on it.

What does Moonshine have to do with off the grid tech? A lot! If you’re in the middle of no where you gotta make your own for personal use of course. Maybe to trade for some labor? Make the trade after they build things though… :) Here’s me making mine in my friends kitchen on a lovely island called New Zealand. As of 2008 Washington State offers micro-distilling license for $100… tempting. This was just for fun though. It’s not serious. I thought it might be cool to try difference recipes and see I can make different kinds of liquor though.

This recipe was water, apple juice, sugar and yeast fermented to about 8% alcohol then distilled in this pot still.

The still is a “pot still” made from a 12 quart pressure cooker as the boiler and a 3/8″ copper pipe in a bucket as the condenser. After trying to load ice in the condenser bucket, I ended up making a water recirculating setup off the sink to keep things cool and me not doing much.

Blah Blah Blah.

Watch the video and please Rate, Comment and Subscribe.

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Sep 13 2010
2 Comments
Alternative Energy, Off-Grid Tech

Hot Showers from a Compost Pile

Pretty interesting, I never knew compost piles gave that much heat.

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Apr 08 2010
1 Comment
Alternative Energy, Off-Grid Tech

Wood fired Hot Water Heater

Very interesting, I need to find out more about wood-fired water heaters. Let me know if you have any information on them.  This company  makes the coils you can add to your wood stove to heat water. http://www.hilkoil.com/

water heating wood stove

water heating wood stove

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