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Forum Index : Electronics : 6Kw Ozinverter build
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renewableMark Guru  Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
Got another 1500 watts on the roof today. That brings it to 8000 watts My schematic of the roof has me at 12,500 combination of E,W, and north possible. Space for 2000w south which will get done last, still not silly to do this considering Melb gloomy days it doesn't make any difference which direction the panels face. So far we can run the oven for 1.5 hrs of an evening, use every appliance we normally need and it all runs fine. I do cringe every now and then how my wife uses power, but her reply is " we need to live, build it to work or just go back to grid" Well thankfully the inverter can handle it fine, the battery is the part that concerns me. If anyone considers going off grid, you really need to consider how your family will adapt. This is something often not talked about, but it's a crucial consideration. Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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Madness Guru Joined: 08/10/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2498 |
The amount of power used by the oven is not as much as some think, once it has heated up it should have the element on around 50% of the time. Try to change your usage where you can, for instance, run the wash cycle of the dishwasher during the day. Some of your oven use could do the same also with the delay start. Washing and clothes dry them during the day is another way to take the load of the battery. Our biggest overnight draw is the fridge. There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. |
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| renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
Yes, understanding power and how to use it is a BIG BIG part of going off grid. I load up the dishwasher and set it to timer to run around noon. My biggest draw overnight is the young fella's heater, it pulls around 3-4.5kw in nasty winter, last night it pulled 1kw, so getting as many panels up to winter proof the system is the plan. But with a small roof I may need to just concede we still need a grid connection. Plan is to disconnect after second inverter is built, and possibly get another fork battery to take up the slack for winter times, maybe 14.5 kw of solar and 600ah of battery will do it though. We only use 10kw a day or less. Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| Boppa Guru Joined: 08/11/2016 Location: AustraliaPosts: 814 |
My sisters place is using less than $200 a quarter, thanks to the panels and an 'energy-lite' living lifestyle, her friend on the other hand couldnt have enough panels to support her house unless it was on acreage, her electricity bill is over $1200 a quarter and she thinks that is not only acceptable, but low???? (A very large house that you could fit 3 of mine in, just for her, and she leaves the aircon on 24/7, pool with pumps etc that has its own 15a breaker just to supply it, every room has dozens of 50w downlights in it, etc etc) Madness... |
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Clockmanfr Guru Joined: 23/10/2015 Location: FrancePosts: 429 |
Hi Mark, Yes getting folk and family to understand power usage is always difficult. Firstly all my buildings and the 5 houses here are to Passive House standards, ie lots and lots of insulation and new interior walls with thermal blocks or masses of wall insulation. Heating...... I use electric heater accumulators or what we call storage heaters. In Europe at night when the Grid power stations are not at max loadings, then they sell electricity at a quarter of the price. So the Grid connected storage heater is on a timer circuit, and when the Grid meter changes over to cheap rate, the storage heater switches on, and charges up the heat retaining bricks that are inside, then switches off early hours of the morning. .... All I do here is to switch them on when the sun shines on my PV, give them a 7 hour charge, and they will give out there heat to the following sunrise, although the batteries always get priority first. Normal storage heaters elements are about 800watt each, and the storage heaters just double up 1.6kw, 2.4kw etc. But the draw back is that storage heaters are heavy really heavy mass inside, and are normally a fixed appliance. Although I do have one on industrial castors. Photo ........ On the left of the pic is a 3.2kw storage heater, far to hot for my workshop so I have safely disconnected 2 elements inside, it was a freebie. ..... the 1.8kW storage heater is on castors.  Everything is possible, just give me time. 3 HughP's 3.7m Wind T's (14 years). 5kW PV on 3 Trackers, (10 yrs). 21kW PV AC coupled SH GTI's. OzInverter created Grid. 1300ah 48v. |
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| Madness Guru Joined: 08/10/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2498 |
Forget about heating (and cooling) from your battery and solar especially in gloomy Melbourne. That is unless you want to spend $20K on a battery, but then you have to charge it also. If you were building a new home you can build in thermal storage and insulation plus passive heating and it would be doable. There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. |
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| Solar Mike Guru Joined: 08/02/2015 Location: New ZealandPosts: 1138 |
>> Heating...... I use electric heater accumulators or what we call storage heaters. I'm surprised you guys don't have a DIY version of this to absorb power for later use after the battery bank is topped up. Place a open vented 40 gallon metal drum filled with water and an electric element inside an insulated side cupboard in the house, heat the water with excess power, then in the evenings circulate air through the space with a small fan into the house. Water has a much higher specific heat than a tin full of bricks or oil columns as used in those night store heaters, so would hold a lot more heat. Mike |
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| Madness Guru Joined: 08/10/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2498 |
Using a heat pump would give a lot more energy also, putting a small reverse cycle AC in your son's room would use a lot less power. There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. |
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| renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
Yes it's a work in progress, I had thought about that. Funny thing talking about the heat banks,I just googled them just a few days ago. Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
Gary, I was surprised at 8.45am my E 3kw array was doing 1800w and it was cloudy, don't underestimate gloomy Melb. Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| Madness Guru Joined: 08/10/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2498 |
Winter and now spring here usually means clear blue skies, battery fully charged by midday and warm sunshine. Wouldn't swap places and end up with one of those number plate that say's victoria the place to be! see lots of them up here. There is cloud and there is cloud, there will be days where you will be lucky to get enough solar to stop the battery discharging during the day. There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. |
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| renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
Yeah, recently we had two days of what I would call total crap Melb weather, the cloud was present ALL day and it drizzled 90% of it for 2 days. We don't seem to get the really bad cloud cover you get up there, maybe every now and then, but it's mostly the light cloud with annoying sh*tty drizzle rain, no proper drenching rain like you get in Qld. During the recent nasty weather we had 6500w at the time but surprisingly still pulled in 6.5 kw or so each day, not bad considering the complete crap weather. We needed to connect back to grid to get some big load stuff done. But If we had 30% more panels on the roof we would have had enough to power our normal loads. We now have 8000w, that will grow, time permitting me to fit panels, I have enough hardware to do 14,500w, that's cramming every surface we own. That's the absolute max we can fit. There is a long strip on the blind side of the house where probably 2kw of panels could go between the fence and house, they would only see sun for maybe 1.5-2 hrs but it all adds up. Funny how panels even in a crap angle still make decent power, so it's worth considering when you can get panels cheaply to put them in seemingly stupid spots. Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| Madness Guru Joined: 08/10/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2498 |
Next thing you will be putting them on the walls, not as stupid as it might seem at first. There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. |
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| renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
When you build your next house why not just make the whole thing from solar panels?  Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| Madness Guru Joined: 08/10/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2498 |
It won't be on a postage stamp size block of land and I will have a shed roof also.  But there may be the day when we paint on solar panels.There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
The "several gloomy days in a row problem" is difficult to solve because either extra panels or extra batteries large enough to completely cover that situation are just not practical or economic. It probably only happens two or three times during the depths of winter anyway. I am beginning to think that a standby generator capable of recharging the battery might be a more sensible approach. It may only need be run very rarely, but it would provide a very reliable backup no matter how many gloomy days in a row there were. As I am located in the suburbs, something that runs off natural gas may be worth consideration. Cheers, Tony. |
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| renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
Yeah, I'm working on this Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
Well, a little update on how my system is going. Fantastically!!! I have been pushing the battery a little more lately and it just seems not to get too pissed at decent loads, did a load of dish washing just now after sunset and the voltage is till above 50.20. Even after using the electric oven for 1 hr plus the voltage the next morning is never below 49, so it looks like the system is really well sized for our needs. Currently we have 8kw on the roof, but have heaps of panels laying around the side of the house, just waiting to go up. I can put up another 3.5 kw fairly easily, and a few more kw with a bit more difficulty in mounting, but probably will do at some point to winter proof the house. Anyway, it was a long road, but hell it was really rewarding to get it all done and now I'm totally self sufficient for electricity. Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
Bloody great to hear mark ! Those extra panels can go just about anywhere to help even more with the many gloomy days in a row problem, as orientation makes very little difference with an even grey sky. Cheers, Tony. |
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Revlac Guru Joined: 31/12/2016 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1026 |
I agree Another "Off the grid" I also like your Avatar, thats a good one.  Cheers Aaron Off The Grid |
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