3R Home and Barn Project

[weldingisfun]

Hey, some of the lawn is really starting to grow now!
I know these are boring pictures, but to us they are great.



We had some deer eat one of the little trees we were growing and the ground squirrels have been eating the little sunflower plants! Dang.
There are ground squirrel mounds and holes at the bottom of one lawn. I did get one of them with the 17HMR though.

Bet you never thought watching grass grow could be so entertaining.
Regards the wildlife eating everything. Welcome to the country.

 

[firefighter9208]

Rob,

How is the solar power keeping up with the house and workshop? You thread on solar is the one that got me hooked on TBN.

Chris

 

[3RRL]

Hi Lee and Chris.
Yeah, we were introduced to the local plant eaters several years ago when we were still camping there. Loretta started a garden and I had the food plot going. Her garden got eaten alive!!! Now it is happening again, but we sort of expect it.

The solar has been doing very good for us. We've been able to run everything including the 5 ton air conditioner during the hot spells. However, since we had it installed almost a year before we moved in, there is a lot of "little" tweaking to do. First, we noticed some lights flickering so the solar contractor had to "adjust" the milliseconds (??) to fix that. Some of the smoke alarms went off for the same reason and also when the generator kicked off, the clock on the stove would start blinking like it had been unplugged. Well all that has been done now.

We are finding that the batteries never got their initial charge, so they have not been performing and maintaining a charge like they should. He set the system to a very low performance while the home was being built and forgot to switch his settings. Turns out he did not have all the battery banks hooked up. We noticed this because the generator has been running more than what we expected. We are at this point now, although he was up there this weekend while we were at Rancho doing the connections. He also needs to "equalize" the batteries by overcharging them. He's afraid (not sure though) a couple might be "sulfated", but apparently, there is a cure for that too he says through some procedures. While working on the system a couple weeks ago, he accidentally blew the HUB 10 so he was putting a new one in this weekend too.

I have used the barn 110v and 220v single phase on a regular basis and also when welding. It also runs the 220v well pump all the time now that we have the lawns going. No problems with that. But I started to run my 3 phase 220v system and tried to start the 10hp rotary converter motor and it blew a fuse. He said it was because the HUB was out of the system and the inverters were not communicating to give the large motor the surge charge to get it going. We'll see when I go up tomorrow. (You know we still spend 2 days a week at Rancho). For everything else, it has worked great so far. Once he finishes his changes, we can get the batteries to hold charge better and the generator won't run except a couple hours a week plus it's 20 minute exercise period. BTW, that Cummins 20kW generator is awesome. It is quite and smooth and starts without any problems. It was worth the extra money. I just changed the oil and filter after 75 hours last week. So really, it has not run that much.

Loretta has really gotten into the solar power. She joined a solar forum and gets all kinds of information. She is teaching me. Slowly, we are learning more and more about it. Checking and adding distilled water to the batteries is a pain though, as is checking the specific gravity. I'm going to invent something to make that easier.
I will say though, it is pretty neat to not ever having an electric bill other than propane as fuel and what little maintenance the system needs. No water bill either. We have a garbage collection bill, cell phone and Direct TV bill is all ... no landline. Our biggest joy is waking up every morning and looking out to the forest. It is peaceful and therapeutic for sure. Living like Swiss Family Rob.
Hahaha

 

[RavensRoost]

Rob, thanks for the update on the solar system. I have been wondering how it has been working but have not seen any updates from Loretta over on the solar forum.

Did your solar installer figure out why the monitoring system said there was more amps going in than coming out of batts yet voltage was dropping? I opined that he had the shunt wired into the wrong spot. I was also curious to know when he was going to hook up the TM500 so you can (easily) see amps in and out of the batts and get a feel for what is going on.

If the batts do not come back to full performance, in my humble opinion your installer should at least participate in paying for replacements, if not pay all the cost. Sounds like he goofed big time. (Batts do not want to sit in a discharged or under-charged state: deficit charging.)

Regards,
Ravens Roost

 

[RavensRoost]

Rob, forgot to add the below URL to earlier post.

I feel your pain on battery watering. My neighbor has these caps, may want to have a look or perhaps try on a few abtterioes and compare water consumption results against other batts.

Water Miser Battery Caps

Regards,
RavensRoost

 

[tommu56]

Rob if all else fails and the hub is down you can put each invertor in manual, one at a time by moving the mate to each invertor and putting in on not search mode.

One other thing to remember the "hub" is not a regular computer hub.
tom

 

[3RRL]

Bruce and Tom, thank you for the replies.
The contractor supposedly has installed the new HUB-10 and said in an email it's all good. We'll see when we get back. I'll try starting the large motor again. We are bringing up another load including some desks to go into the home. That means busting my back to get them up the stairs. I'm not looking forward to all that hard work.

I have 96 of those water miser caps on the batteries right now.
Here's what I've noticed. Every time I "snap them shut, I need to push both front and rear down or they do not seal right. Plus I get an eyeful of acid from the little "click". They work as far as reducing the amount of gas in the shed, but apparently not real good at retaining liquid in the cells. At least not as good as I thought. I still have to re-fill frequently. The solar contractor noted his other customers saying the same thing. He is working with us to make these changes and has not charged us yet, so that is good. Except I just got an email from saying he has to charge us for some acid he's bringing up and 3 trips up to the property. Crap, I spoke too soon.

Bruce, you were right about the shunt too. He relocated the charging cables thinking that was part of the problem.
Loretta got the Tm 500 up and running so we can monitor the amps and actually see when we turn a light on ... man it is cool. Now if she would only tell me what that means ...lol. It appears he figured out that our system would produce 32kw daily before the generator kicks on. I know when we use more energy than that, it will come on. But Loretta also got another program from one of the guys on the Solar forum and is learning to use it. It logs 24hrs a day and tells when we are making power and when we are using it. Again, she knows much more about it than I do. She has been sending the logs to the contractor who is studying them. He said he was able to use some of the information to help with his adjustments. You might know what it is she bought? Watt Plot I think.

Anyway, it looks like the generator is coming on even when we are not there when the home uses substantially less than 32kw hrs. So there is something wrong and that is what he is trying to get to the bottom of. I hope he does. Even when we are there, we have learned via the TM500 to use very little kW's. We unplug little thing like our toothbrushes, computers, phone chargers, everything we can think of. We are often way below what the panels can make and the generator still kicks on, mostly later in the night. We are constantly seeing 56v or more on the Mate during the day and as the sun goes down it goes down to 50v and even 48v, when the generator kicks back on before it gets too low. That tells me the batteries are just not holding their charge.
But what do I know?

 

[3RRL]

I do have another question about how the house and shop inverters are hooked up now. I will need some help understanding this, so any comment that helps me understand is appreciated. Try to put in layman's terms for me.
Right now 2 Outback inverters are designated for the barn/shop. The house has 4 of them going to it. When the 20 kW generator kicks on, it charges the batteries and at the same time also supplies the house with generator power, about 50/50. So the batteries get about 10kw and so does the house.
But not the barn/shop... It gets its power from the batteries through the inverters only. If the barn uses more energy than the batteries have, or uses it up, the generator would come on and start charging the batteries automatically because the batteries register low. When the generator comes on, there is no direct connection to the barn to feed a power demand. I think a huge amp draw from the barn would have to wait until the batteries are fully charged again. Am I right or way off base?

My question is, ... if the batteries are so low for the generator to kick on, will they have enough juice to power the barn/shop when there is a big draw from it? Will they be charging the batteries fast enough to do this? Yes or no? I'm thinking no. It's like when you try to use a battery charger on a car (dead or low battery) to start the car right away...there's just not enough juice built up in the battery to turn the motor over, right? Wouldn't it be better for the generator to also power the barn like it does the house? Could I attach 2 cables from the generator to the barn inverters like however the generator is hooked up to the house inverters?

Next question is, ... what if all 6 inverters were hooked up together. They supply both the house and barn/shop together making no differentiation. I presume that when the generator kicks on, it would also supply the barn like it does the house when it kicks on. Not only that, I would have all those inverters working together to supply a huge amp draw now. Am I asking the right questions? Does it make sense. I would like to know advantages and drawbacks. Also any suggestions for other methods.
Thanks,

 

[mopacman]

Rob I enjoy reading about all of your adventures and projects.
I am a retired rail road electrician. I worked on locomotives for 39 1/2 years. Each locomotive has 64 volt batteries and we had about 7000 units to maintain. So I have been around batteries a lot. When you say your contractor is charging you for acid he is bringing to your place I dont understand what he is using it for. When you charge batteries only water leaves. Acid goes into the plates when you drain the batteries and is driven back out when you charge them. When you have a dfferent gravity reading between cells they are at a different charge. When the batteries get older the lower reading cells are the weak ones. The only time we used acid is when we would change out old cells in a battery with a new one....Larry

 

[GuglioLS]

Hey Rob,

Love the new wrap around deck with the removable section for loading firewood, what a great idea that is. Cant wait to see your roll away wood bins and the FEL pallet fork attachments that must go along with. Only you could make watching grass grow an exciting event, it's looking great. I suppose the goal of all that grass is to reduce erosion and as a fire break? Keeping the ground squirrels and gophers at bay will be a life long challenge. I imagine you will wear out the rifling's on those .170's trying to wipe them out, my experience is for every one you exterminate, they make at least two replacements, good luck with that hahaha.

The solar power - Last visit I remember taking a closer look at the system trying to make some sense of it all. I thought something looked "funny" with the wiring of those batteries and inverters. Hopefully your solar guy will get it right this time. I still think all the inverters should be wired such to give maximum power output for the home and barn as opposed to 2/3rds for the home an 1/3 to the barn. But hey, what do I know, I'm just an electrical hack. I also remember there was no real good way to check and fill all the cells as they were stacked so close on top of each other on the shelves. Maybe a "solar Shed" makeover is in your future? Those batteries are expensive, keeping them properly maintained is paramount to getting long life out of them. After reading some of the manuals and correspondence your solar guy wrote, I question his real knowledge, my guess is he knows about half of what he is doing. What makes me think that way is the fact he is adding acid to the batteries, that is a big no no, as Mopacman (Larry) wrote, you only add distilled water to batteries, never acid - if he (the solar guy) is adding acid to the batteries it will further destroy them. Also, some of the "Techno babble" he wrote trying to answer some of your questions made absolutely no sense at all, another reason I am suspicious of him. Perhaps a second opinion from a qualified solar technician is in order. No doubt it will cost, but having so much invested in the hardware it would be worth the expense to get it right and be done with it (IMHO). You have a fortune invested in that system to have it start failing or outputting at diminished capacity only two years into it's life. I am thinking the generator output should supply AC power directly to the home AND barn while charging the batteries at the same time, as opposed to just supplying AC power to the home and only charging the batteries to the barn having it run off the inverters? Di I get that right? if so, that seems weird.

I am wondering why the batteries are boiling off so fast? Are the solar panels tied directly to the batteries? Normally there would be a regulator between the solar panels and batteries to prevent overcharging and boil off of the electrolyte in the batteries, maybe there is none? or if there is it's malfunctioning? Just one more thing to look for.

On the lighter side-
It's really nice to see and read about all the work you two have been up to. Do you still have time to make it down to south camp every once in a while? Hows it holding up? Have you moved a bunch of stuff from camp up to the home site and barn? Is south camp a ghost town now?

Larry