Michael Qulek

I have Schneider's Conext SW4024, which I am VERY happy with.  It makes native split-phase 120/240VAC, and has built-in generator charging.  It's a very robust inverter that has powered a cement mixer, 1.6hp air-compressor, and a 7" circular saw, all at the same time.  If you want to mate it with a generator though, you need to get the optional COMBOX, or have a laptop for communicating with the unit's software, to calibrate the generator horsepower to the inverter.

Just like the top of most trees are radially oriented, the roots are mostly radially oriented also.  The soil that the hole is backfilled with is light and fluffy compared to the hard compacted soil outside the hole.  Easy for new roots to penetrate through.  But, as the roots continue to grow and spread out radially, they all will hit hard compacted soil all at the same time.

Because the young tree is used to uninhibited root-growth for some time it will have luxurous top growth that is being fed by all the new roots.  Suddenly all the roots hit the undisturbed hard, compacted soil at about the same time, which suddenly puts the brakes on growth.  The young trees suddenly go into shock because the lush top growth can no longer be supported.

By putting the new tree in a square hole, the radial growth of the roots does not hit the compacted wall all at the same time, so the tree has time to adapt to the changing soil conditions.  And yes, the right angles tends to direct the growing roots downwards.

I've planted ~120 seedlings in the ground now, following the square-hole for all of them.  The only dead trees I've encountered were from animal damage.

Mike Bettis wrote:Thanks for the replies. I guess no one is using it as backup as I'm understanding? My hope was in times of outages I can run a small turbine to run a few electrical devices. My plan would be to put a switch at my main lines from the transformer. So this would not be grid tied. But as you said they need resistance? Hmm I haven't heard of that but I've also never had any experience with wind generators.

No, you just don't understand.  A wind generator is not a device you just plug things into and expect to have them to run.  First, there needs to be substantial wind.  Not a light breeze ruffling the leaves, but wind that pulls your hat off your head.  Because the windmill is a variable speed generator, based on the speed of the wind, that means the power produced is going to vary in voltage.  It might be running at 12V, or 30V, but it will not, and can not make continous 120VAC that everything in your house consumes.  For that you MUST have a battery bank and an inverter.  And a charge controller that can take the varying voltage output from the windmill generator, and convert it into charging current for your batteries.  No way around that.

But, as others have indicated, you can right now today, put together a solar system that can accomplish what you want it to do.  The very first thing you need to do is to itemize your loads and calculate just how much power you need to make.  You made a partial list, being lights, fans, and a frig.  The very first thing you need to understand is that the power required varies with orders of magnitude.  That is, a light might need 7-25W to light, a fan, maybe 100-150W to run, and a frig maybe 1.0 to 1.5 kWh to stay on 24/7.  You may express this in watthours (Wh), or kilowatt hours (kWh).  So, one 25W compact flourescent light bulb might consume 100Wh if you left it on for four hours, or 0.1kWh, depending on what units you want to use.  The fan that runs on 100 Watts will consume 500Wh if left on for five hours (0.5kWh).  My 18cuft refrigerator/freezer consumes ~1.2kWh per 24 hours.

Just to speed this along, let's itemize a few things for you.  You can update the numbers yourself to customize for your own lifestyle.

Two CFL bulbs on for 4 hours: 25W X 2 bulbs X 4 hours = 200Wh (0.2kWh)
One 100W window fan on for 5 hours: 100W X 1 fan X 5 hours = 500Wh (0.5kWh)
One 50W TV/Computer on for two hours: 50W X 2hours = 100Wh (0.1kWh)
One standard AC refrigerator running on and off = 1.2kWh per day
AC inverter left on, consuming 30W per hour: 30W X 24 hours = 720Wh (0.72kWh)

This all adds up to 2.0kWh per day.  This reflects closely to what I've seen with my own off-grid system.  Lowest I've ever seen in winter with the frig cycling very little and zero lights or TV was 1.5kWh.  Today, with Starlink internet, and all the little electrical loads like the stove clock, weather station, and whatnot, I'm at about 4.0kWh.

So, how will you make at least 2.0kWh of power?  Solar will do that, assuming you have sunny days.  In Illinois in December, I'd suspect you get about 3 sunhours worth of power, and maybe 6 sunhours in June.  So, to make at least 2.0kWh of power in the winter, you'd need 2000Wh/3 sunhours = 666Watts of solar panels.  250W, 30V rooftop residential panels are dirt-cheap right now, so you could make a functional system with three of those.  Four or six panels would be even better, but three will make it work.

You'll need batteries to store the power you make.  Remember, even a windmill only system will need batteries.  I'd go with at least a 24V battery bank.  You can get 210Ah, 6V golf-cart batteries at CostCo right now for ~110$ each.  Wire four of them in series to get a 24V battery bank.

Next you need a charge controller to convert the raw solar DC into battery charging current.  You should get a MPPT charge controller.  An MPPT controller acts like a transformer, taking raw high-voltage DC current from the panels, and transforming down to battery-charging voltage.  The extra volts gets transformed into extra charging amps.  You would wire all three panels in series to make ~8.3A at 90V, so select a controller that can handle 150V.  Don't ask why you can't use a 100V controller.  That can be explained later (cold temperature Voc).  Take a look at Epever's Triron4215N controller.

Lastly, an inverter.  Lots of choice here, but if you want to run a frig, make sure you select a pure sine wave inverter.  MSW or SW inverters make motors run hot and will quickly burn them out.  They are only good for resistive loads like traditional filament lights and such.  Samlex makes a quality UL-list model, the PST-2000, that would work well for you.  The frig, having an electric motor, will have starting surge that is higher than the running watts it is rated for.  

Remember, with electronics, you get what you pay for.  Cheap overseas inverters are made with bottom rung budget parts that might barely make it through the warranty year.  Whatever you buy, make sure it is UL-listed.  You should be able to make a functional system that will work for you for ~1500$.

I've been casting my own lead-bullets for reloading for about 30+ years now, refining thousands of pounds of lead over the years, and I myself used to be concerned about lead exposure/contamination.  

I've taken both urine and blood tests for lead exposure, which have always come up negative.

I would suggest you do the same.  That would help dispel overreaction to what turns out to be a non-issue.

40$ for a book?  No thank you.  I scour flea-markets to find the books I want, mostly for a dollar.  If you can't find cheap books you are not shopping in the right places.  I'm sure there are other texts out there that cover what Mollison covers.

Eric Hanson wrote:
Now I don’t understand the full context and perhaps Michael can explain this better, but where I live, we can trade extra solar power back to the power company to offset power purchased during night, etc.  I assume that this means power is running away from the house, but I am certainly open to correction.

Eric

Eric, you have what is known as grid-tie solar.  With a grid-tie, you don't directly utilize the power your solar panels make.  All your power gets directed to your power company.  Contracts vary from location to location, but basically, every watt you make is bought by the power company, and every watt you consume is bought from the power company.  I have however an off-grid system.  That means every watt I make belongs to me.  But, I don't have the extra power to run big-ticket items like my well-pump in the middle of the night.  But, my batteries are just fine for watching TV, and making microwave popcorn at night.

The typical contracts you might see today is that every kWh of power you make is bought by the power company at maybe 5 cents/kWh, while every watt you consume is bought at maybe 10 cents/kWh.  So, depending on what you make, vs what you consume, you either might get a credit on your bill, or a reduction, depending on what you made and consumed.

All grid-tie inverters that feed your solar power into the grid have an automatic shutoff if there happens to be a power outage.  That is to protect the electrical linemen out fixing the power outage.  It prevents you from energizing a powerline that the workers think are cold.

The newest type of grid-tie is the so-called hybrid system, that normally feeds the grid, but has a battery backup.  So, if the grid goes down, your hybrid inverter does not shut down, but re-directs power from the batteries into your home.  If set up properly though, it can not send power outside your home to the grid.

I think the issue should not be a new panel, or adding solar, I think what the issue should be is HOW solar would be added to the panel?  Is this going to be an either or situation, or emergency backup, or supplementing the grid with your own power?  

The one constant that you MUST always observe is the solar and grid power can NEVER be allowed to mix.  Under so circumstances should solar power and grid power be mixed on the same wires.  That means solar powered circuits are kept totally separate from the grid circuits, with either different wiring paths, or with a either/or transfer switch.  This is to protect the electronics of the system and more importantly protects electrical linemen working on the outside powerlines.

One way you could do is is to install a split-phase electrical panel with L1 and L2 terminals, and only wire L1 to the grid and L2 only to solar.  That means some outlets in the house would only be powered by the grid, and others only by solar.

If you want split-phase 120/240V AC, then you have to use a transfer switch to separate the grid from 240V solar AC.

At my own cabin, I have solar-only split-phase 120/240V AC which powers my well-pump.  I use Schneider's split-phase 6848 inverter that makes both 120V and 240V AC.  I do have generator backup, but the generator power is routed through the inverter, which acts as the transfer switch.

A third option would be a completely separate electrical panel.  One panel for the grid, and a second for the solar.  Each would power a separate set of outlets so the two electrical waveforms never meet.

Because high-voltage residential panels are getting dirt-cheap now, I overpaneled my system by ~1/3rd more that what it would be designed for.  In the real-world, what this means is that I can fully charge my solar batteries, even on cloudy/rainy days.

The other real-world result is that the gasoline generator I designed into the system sat totally unused for several years, until the piston rusted in the cylinder and froze up the generator.  I was finally able to break it out by removing the spark-plug, spraying in WD40, and finally working the piston free.

Fast-forward to today, and I run the generator every few months, just to run it.  I really don't have any practical use for my generator except welding.

So, instead of investing in a generator, your money might be better spend increasing the amount of solar.  Most charge controllers have an amp limit that you don't want to greatly exceed.  You can overcome this by what's called "virtual tracking", that is pointing some of your panels in directions other than South, which is what most of us here do.

For those that want to see numbers, with my 48V batteries, the math says 3600W of solar is needed.  I started out with 4500W (15 300W panels), facing South.  I've subsequently added an additional 2000W of panels facing due West, instead of South.  This really helps in the late afternoon around dinner time, when power consumption goes up in the kitchen.  So, this almost doubles my total solar, while still staying within the 70A limit of my Midnight controller.

This really works the best on cloudy/rainy days when there is almost no direct light, but a lot of low-level diffuse light coming from all directions.  Although the arrays are only at maybe a max of 10% of what they are capable of, it's enough to get to the end of the day with a full, or almost full charge.

BTW, if you decide to add panels, design carefully if you want to add more solar serially instead of in parallel.  Charge controllers have very closely defined voltage limits that you MUST NOT exceed.  Remember that panel voltage goes up as the temperature goes down.  So, the voltage must be designed for the coldest day of the winter.