new 3 panel mount completed

[Brian McGowan]

On Saturday 8/22/09 I completed and put up my 3 panel holder. Pictures are halfway down this page for your amusement.
http://home.comcast.net/~bigvid/mysolar.html

Brian

[Brian McGowan]

This weekend I finished my new system wiring to replace the rat's nest that was the old wiring and installed my new batteries also. I have already run 2 loads of wash from this system.
About a month ago I aquired 1400 watts (8 panels) of BP 175 watt panels and a Fronius grid tied inverter for very cheap from a local company that was having a "garage sale". The purchaser is my neighbor down the street and he let me know about the sale. This company now only does megawatt and bigger jobs. I am going to put up 2 of the panels to replace the 3 US64s that I have up now for my little system so I start getting some use out of them while I figure out if and how I am going to install the rest of the stuff.
Pics below. I haven't reduced their size yet so I am just putting links for now. The batteries are now attached to the system.
Brian


http://home.comcast.net/~bigvid/pics/100_6792.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~bigvid/pics/100_6803.jpg

[Rob Beckers]

Looking good Brian!
I feel a bit uncomfortable with batteries sitting out there, terminals exposed. Dropping anything on there that shorts those terminals (a tool for example) is instant fireworks. It's surprising how easy it is to melt significant amounts of metal with a shorted battery.

-RoB-

P.S. For uploading pics to the forum there's no need to resize them. Just upload what you have and the forum software will automagically take care of resizing as needed.

[Brian McGowan]

Rob,
Thanks for that. The exposed battery is very temporary. As you can see they are sitting on a 1.5" thick piece of pink insulation foam. I have more of that with the intent of making a box out of the stuff to keep the battery temp more stable in the winter. This is out in the garage which is only marginally better than being exposed directly to space. I still have to figure out stuff like a venting scheme and so forth. After that I also want to put a table over them so I have a place to put battery chargers for tools and other stuff I plug into the system so I don't have to put it all on the floor. I am hoping that should provide enough safety. I have experience of what a battery can do mostly due to others not thinking. I will try to do better on the picture posting thing.
Brian

[Larry Hollenberg]

Boy just looking at that wall set up is what keeps me from inching forward on a simple system beyond my simple battery, fuse and some household wiring. Been considering forever some panels to charge the battery, but I am not a natural when it comes to understanding all those interconnected items and what the heck they do.. Still it interesting to see when someone does do it.

[Brian McGowan]

Larry,
It was the rats nest on the floor that built up over time that caused me to mount it all up real nice. I say describe what you want to do and we (at least I) will do our best to help you.

Rob,
To put your mind at ease, I did lay a piece of foam on top of the batteries to avoid any shorting out problems while I engineer the actual solution.
Next up, build a mount for two of the BP175 panels so I can put them up and take down the three US-64s. That will almost double my power and is the max I can do on that charge controller. One more panel is too much. I got the wood on Saturday.

I ran wash on Saturday again with the system and my little windturbine made major contribution to recharging the batteries.

Brian