I agree! They had a great time and all of them made it home I believe. It's great to see members getting out and enjoy life out of the norm
Stop in for a cup of coffee
- Thread starter toolmanmike
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Must say whoever did that cake has talentand..... thank you to Wolfie - - we had our cake and ate it too!!! (for breakfast of course!!!!)
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Well just got the power back was out since early last night, cold as hell in the house today! Coal stove is lit like I was on Sat night!
ScampMike
Despicable Damn Yankee
IIRC it was Wolfie that decorated it
ScampMike
Despicable Damn Yankee
that storm packed a punch - there are several towns up here that were without power this morning - hell, ours popped off for a few seconds last night
zkx14
Duster De-ruster
You weren't that bad, still walkin and talkin -although we didn't know what language you were speaking...
Good Morning!
Ive been looking at rechargeable home battery backup system for just such things. We lost power saturday morning for a couple hours and the temps dropped big in the house.
zkx14
Duster De-ruster
No power issue here. (we rarely lose power though)It did rain pretty good. Windy now.
zkx14
Duster De-ruster
Does that really make any sense vs a generator? I've bought a lot of industrial batteries for forklifts and other equipment at work - $$$. And like car batteries they only last so many years even under light use.
Do solar or wind if you are doing batteries, any extra turns the meter backwards also! Just $$$ at first. We lived off grid and it is not bad at all, much better if you have a line in also!
zkx14
Duster De-ruster
x1000so one last time - AMAZING frikkin' time Saturday - I am so dang glad I went! Everyone was so cool and there were no surprises - I can honestly say that ya'all is who and whats ya sez ya is. Dave, thank you again for opening your home to all us misfits and your hospitality was/is beyond reproach. Guys, you all rock, it really was a pleasure and an honor to meet you all. Cheers!
I dont honestly know. That was one thing I was taking into consideration. Indiana has passed some really screwed up electric utility laws recently and I foresee the cost of electric doubling soon. So in designing the house, I'm looking at ways to incorporate solar and possibly wind into the design. One thing I'm also doing, is tankless water heaters at the point of use. Water heaters are one of the WORST consumers of electricity. To show you how much, last January, I had my brother in law, who is a contractor, re-wire the water heater to it's own breaker in the box. now, every morning, we flip that switch, killing the power to it. We have dropped out electric bill by 40 bucks a month since doing so.
see that's what I want to do. However, Indiana also just made it illegal to back feed the power lines. So now, all new systems installed after Jul 1, 2017, must not be connected to the lines. They did this after having a couple electric line workers killed trying to repair lines that were being back fed. But the catch, they also made it to where every house MUST be connected to the grid and have at least 1 utility provided circuit. So I'm looking at getting a terminal box that actually switches between the grid and the stand alone system.
The tankless are great we had one that ran on propane, screw the point of use, just like a regular cold water heater it will work, just have to size it for the uses when the kids are teens!
Called a transfer switch, once it senses the line in is off it switches to the backup. Batteries are not just hook up and forget either, every month you have to check the electrolyte levels and clean all the terminals, not fun to do either. They have to be vented also, I had a separate area under the house for them (house was up on posts, Earthquake code!
I was gonna put my in an outdoor spider shed about 20 feet from the house.
zkx14
Duster De-ruster
I installed a generator for my FIL years ago with the switch to kill the connection to the power co. I have heard others say about making money selling extra power and always wondered how they do it. I know it has been part of the solar sales pitch around here. I don't think wind or solar make sense around here unless you get a huge contribution from a state program like was available several years ago. Don't know if funds are available currently . As a buy it yourself, I can't see anyway you come out ahead unless power cost goes way up here.
I'm cool with monthly servicing. I do it now. the 1st of every month I change/check the batteries in smoke alarms, replace the air filter(pet hair clogs those FAST) and change the water softer salt and filters
For me, a small system designed to run just the essentials would pay for itself in about 7 years. The biggest draw back to solar/alternate power sources is AC, to have a system to run AC is $$$$ so I'll likely have AC has the one required circuit in the house.
zkx14
Duster De-ruster
uh huh
ScampMike
Despicable Damn Yankee
that's what sh... oh never mind
zkx14
Duster De-ruster
and that's right around the point your batteries will die or at least drop significantly in capacity
yep i know. Which is why im still leaning propane generator
The cost of good sine wave regulated inverters has dropped a lot, we had a 4k one and it was like 3k in the late 80's prob a grand now. Nice thing about ac is it hold the amps over distance unlike dc which loses it. The small wind gen I have I ran ac to the inverter to bring it up and just a regulator with a diode in one leg to keep the one battery charged (just for the water pump from the pond to the hops) I have a extra set of blades if you want them goes on a gm alt, just need to get the right rotor for it. Good to play with and get ideas from it, prob great for the barn to keep the batts charged on the equipment.
I had Trojan 105 6v wired in series paraell to 12v, I would do at least 24 or 48 for a house, lot more usable amperage.
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