bogdan smith

bogdan smith wrote:It's such a strange feeling, a few calm days. No frost, no floods, no critical situations, and for some reason this calm is very depressing. It happens, you have to go light a fire in the stove and know that this state will end and everything will be okay.

My hunch was right, it was really loud last night. It means there will be a few quiet days, I need to get myself together and get to work.

It's such a strange feeling, a few calm days. No frost, no floods, no critical situations, and for some reason this calm is very depressing. It happens, you have to go light a fire in the stove and know that this state will end and everything will be okay.

Inge Leonora-den Ouden wrote:Hi Bogdan and family (incl. dog).
I found you here through the Daily-ish. It was an interesting read, to read all your posts. I understand you are in a difficult situation there in Ukraine. Good to see how resilient you are.
Hope and pray for the best.

Thanks Inge, everything is fine, the severe frosts have passed, the snow is starting to melt and soon it will smell like spring.

It's snowing again, so I'm prepared to clear the snow away from the house. The brush and handle passed the test of heavy snow. Conclusions: the handle should be strong and flexible, and the brush at the end should be relatively heavy, as it also acts as a support point. It's a good thing I didn't experiment with different handles for the pool; I think they would have withstood the load.

The weather is changing again, frosts are expected, which means there will be more shelling. It's snowing, and I still love this beauty. It will snow until morning, and I need to clear the snow from the panels and clear the ditch to prevent flooding again. I need to figure out how to organize it properly; maybe I'll lay down some plastic and some large stones on top.

Unfortunately, the boiler started leaking. Before winter, I flushed my secondary hot water heat exchanger and decided to buy a second one to replace it in case of contamination or breakdown. I was offered a more powerful used one. When it arrived, the lower pipe was bent, and I couldn't install it. They replaced it with a new one. I don't know how I installed it back then, but unfortunately, it started leaking from that lower pipe. Today, I couldn't install it until the retaining clip engaged, so I had to replace the old one. After I installed everything, water leaked from the pump valve when I started it. GPT chat advised me to tap on it to activate the valve and stop the water flow)))))). Thank goodness this happened when I was home and there was no frost. The large heat exchanger worked, but unfortunately, not for long. It was probably misaligned.

marlene burr wrote:(This comment is based on my assumption that you find solar panels too inefficient in your circumstances, for whatever reasons, rather than that you have zero access to sunlight.)
Have you looked into _bifacial_ panels oriented vertically?  
It resists holding snow so snow maintenance is easier.  The panels catch a lot of light from the back of the panel and have a surprising amount of effectiveness and efficiency.
Vertical orientation means they reduce damage from heat so they increase the life of the panel.
They can be used as part of a fence or as a bit of a window screening for a little more privacy, added sun shade in the summer if oriented correctly for summer sun.
Have a white painted surface behind it to increase the amount of reflected light it receives.

Not meaning to offend by asking about this but using bifacial panels oriented vertically is a new thing.

You're absolutely right, vertical panels produce very good results in winter. We even have professional installers installing solar panels on walls and making fences out of them, since panel fencing is cheaper than fences made from other materials. Double-sided panels are especially good for individual structures when there's snow underneath them in winter. I upgraded my brush, and now it's 11.5 meters long, considering it's made of aluminum. I can use the gutter as a support point. It's very convenient for me to clean the roof. I have a video on my TikTok profile showing how convenient it is to remove snow with this brush. Unfortunately, I have a low-power 6.5 kW inverter, so I can't add more panels. If I did, I would have mounted them on the wall. But despite all this, the panels helped me survive the winter. I don't have a gasoline generator, and my neighbors use theirs 24/7, which is very expensive. Despite the fact that I have a cheap inverter, its advantage is that it can collect sunlight even in cloudy weather.There are also successful experiments that, after modernization, make it possible to obtain electricity in winter from panels placed on the north-facing sides of roofs.

After a severe frost, it's suddenly warming up. It's now +4. A lot of snow has fallen, so water has started flooding the entrance to the room where the battery and inverter are located. The ground is still frozen, so I used a hammer drill to dig a trench to drain the water. I'm completely soaked. They're predicting heavy snow tomorrow, so I managed to finish everything. The stove will dry my things quickly, and the chickens are helping me out by digging in the trench. We're expecting a big snowfall and new adventures. There's plenty of firewood, and the sun is getting brighter. I can now run the air conditioners using only the sun; city electricity only lasts 1-2 hours a day. The main thing is to survive until spring and prepare for winter.

Thank God, our neighbors' heating system worked properly, and we survived the cold weather. Refugees lived on their first floor; my husband had been drafted into the army, and it was incredibly scary in that situation, with ice threatening to destroy everything at any moment. A plumber was incredibly helpful, even giving us a large gas heater. A hopeless situation needs to be transformed into a complex one and resolved. The specialist who arrived before him simply took our money and declared the situation hopeless. If someone's water pipes freeze, you can use a garden sprayer with hot water and a flexible hose. And a stove is essential to quickly raise the temperature in a cold house. It's a good thing my friend and I installed a stove on his second floor, and after he went to war,  wife was able to warm herself by the stove.

Riona Abhainn wrote:Glad to continue to see your updates.

Thank you !