Solar Power!

I'm late in posting this.  We have solar power!!!  Cooper Power Solutions, LLC finished installing our solar array and associated equipment on November 12th.  Brent made a very long extension cord to run power from the solar array down to the yurt.  We bought some metal conduit to run the extension cord through and ran it across the road that way, buried a few inches.  It was great to have all the power we could possibly need.  The array is sized for the house we will be building, so there's loads of power for the yurt.

This is the gimbal.  It will be attached to the pole.  This is what the strongback attaches to and it is what will allow us to change the angle of the panels seasonally.

Here the gimbal has been attached to the top of the pole.

A backhoe was used to lift the strongback up in order for Cooper Power Solutions, LLC to attach it to the pole.  The strongback weighs a few hundred pounds, so paying the backhoe operator for his help is well worth it!!

The "dance" between the electrician and the backhoe operator was fantastic to watch.  Cynthia was quick with her hand signals, but Owen seemed to know just what he needed to do anyway.  Great team!

The strongback is attached to the gimbal and ready for panels.

The sun is shining - let's get those panels on!

In the background you can see the Cooper sisters working on the panels.  In the foreground, Brent is working on getting the solar equipment shed pad ready.

Work smarter, not harder!  It was quickly determined that parking their work truck under the strongback made the most sense.  Brent would hand a panel up to Jen on the truck and she and Cynthia would get it up onto the strongback.

Back to the shed:  The concrete piers come like this, ready to accept a 2x4 frame.  However, we had done a doubled 2x6. So, this need modification.

This is one of the modified piers.  Brent used his angle grinder to do the cutting/shaping.  These aren't 100% concrete like the old style, so they were much easier to cut.

Here's the shed floor setting on the piers.  We needed to do some fine tuning to get it leveled, but it went pretty smoothly. The conduit you can see coming up is where the wires from the panels will come up and then go into the equipment in the shed.

Much progress made on the shed here.  We wanted to get that back wall ready for the sisters to be able to go ahead with installation whenever they were ready.

Here, you can see all of the panels are on.  They then worked on linking them.

Solar shed and the solar array - looking good!

The shed is nearly done and the panels are ready to go.

The front of the solar shed.  Still need to build the door.

This is the concrete backer board that was requested for mounting all of the solar equipment to.

Brent also built a battery box for our 8 batteries.  We got Rolls Surrette batteries and they are wired in series parallel.  The gray plastic looking thing is a shower liner and will capture any acid should the batteries leak.  These batteries do require some care.  We will be doing monthly checks on specific gravity and fluid level.  They need to be equalized quarterly.

Here you can see the charge controller on the far left (tall white thing).  The thing in the middle is the control panel for the inverter.  The thing on the right is  the inverter.

This is the east side of the shed.  What you are seeing here is the power center for the soon-to-be house.  Below that is an outlet.

This is the south side of the shed - the back of it.  This is where the wires from the solar array go in to the solar shed.  We will have a little "dog house" for our generator on the back here as well.  There will be an outlet that a "pigtail" made by Cynthia will connect our generator to the system.  It will be a manual set up where we will need to determine when to use the generator and then turn it on.  The generator will then charge the batteries and the house will still run off the batteries.

 Here everything is pretty much done.  The code requires a light inside the shed and outside.  I've painted the shed with an exterior paint.  When we build the house and have it stuccoed, we will have the shed stuccoed to match as well as put on a matching metal roof.

The panels are also now tilted at the correct angle for the winter.

On the back is our little generator.  There's an outlet box for it to plug into and it can then directly charge our batteries.  We will be building it a little house to better protect it.

On the outside here, you can see the main control panel that will be for the house.  Below it is an outlet where we have a very long extension cord plugged in for the power to the yurt.

Our well has its own solar array.  It won't have any batteries, but they aren't needed.  The well pump will run when the sun is shining and our storage tank (1550g) needs filling.  If it doesn't need filling, it won't run.  If it's dark, it won't run, but we'll have water in the tank for use as needed.  When the house is built, we will be putting in a little pump house with a jet pump and a pressure tank that will send the water from the tank to the house.  For the yurt, we'll just be using a hose and filling jugs to carry down to the yurt as needed.  The storage tank will have a frost free hose bib installed.

The back of the well's solar array. The well pump can be run either from the house's solar power or run from the well's solar array.  There's a switch that we do manually.

1550 gallon storage tank.