The new Solar/Wind system installation

I traveled last week. The first stop was to install a complete new off-grid system for my friend Bruce K. I arrived Monday at noon and was done by Wednesday at 4:00ish. Bruce didn't spare expenses on equipment- He went with his dealer's recommendations. It was really nice working with quality equipment and materials. We installed his main AC circuit panel, his e-panel, wired his PV panels, an Outback 60 amp solar charge controller, his battery bank, lightning arrestors, battery monitoring system, remote control system, his Magnum 4000watt 240volt inverter, the connections for his generator and got the control panel for his Bergey XL-1 wind turbine placed and preliminarily wired.

The moments of truth happened in several stages. I made Bruce make the last battery connections and then flip the main DC circuit breaker. Then he turned on his solar array...it was cloudy and he was still making .5 amps at 28 volts...not much, but it showed us the system was functioning. After I left he tested the generator/charging circuits and all functioned flawlessly.

Most of the equipment came with pretty good factory default settings. All we had to do was to set up the system parameters...battery type, voltage, etc. All of this was pretty easy from the LCD screen prompts.

His friend Bob came by and did some of the AC house wiring. I think he was impressed with the complexity of the wiring in the e-panel...I found it a bit crowded by the end of the project. I generally prefer to wire the DC stuff separately from the AC stuff and like more shut off switches. But this system was professionally designed...I guess I'm more of a "belt and suspender' designer with probably too much redundancy....

I also visited my friend Roy H. In Fairhaven, VT. We went for a hike around and across a nearby lake and had some great conversations.

From there I went to visit Hans K. in Indian Lake. I knocked on his door and had no answer so I did the survey of his landscape and determined that I will be pouring mostly above ground concrete pads for his PV arrays and his ETC water heating system. The property is located on the top of a low mountain and has the typical rock exposures of Adirondack mountain tops.
I will be fabricating the 10'-6" poles for the PV racks. It turns out that he was home and just didn't hear the knock! We've had that happen here too.

I came home and worked on a spiral staircase I'm building for a friend and did the estimates for a plumbing and electrical job at the local yoga center. Not getting the job at JCC doesn't mean that I'm any less busy...It is kind of nice to have so many differing tasks at hand.

I also have the panels for the workshops at FFA Camp Oswegatchie designed and the materials selected. I found a place that will sell me the 3" x 6" Evergreen photovoltaic cells for $1 each.
We'll be building six panels of around 65watts each in each workshop. The pv cells come pretabbed, so the work should go smoothly. I will be cutting the wood and other parts in my old shop with Anthony Cronk so the kids will have to sand, paint, assemble, caulk, solder and wire
the panels over the 3-day session. We will probably be offering this workshop to the general public here at Woodhenge. Drop me an e-mail if you are interested and if you just want to learn how to make the panels or if you want to make some for yourself to take home. It will change the focus and price of the workshop. The PV cells produce more than a watt of power apiece! This means that you will be building panels that will cost under $2 a watt and know how to build more! If you are a good scrounger they could conceivably cost under $1 watt!

You can reach me for questions at jsjuczak@gisco.net.