Solar Power

Post by **deankham** » June 8, 2015, 1:30 am

Sorry to change the topic slightly but has anyone considered / installed a wind turbine?

Post by **maaka** » June 8, 2015, 6:05 am

I will just start with a simple explanation I gave my stockman yesterday re how solar power works...

abit like the cistern on a toilet...you flush the water/ ie: use power from the battery, ( power comes from the battery, not the solar panel )then the ball cock opens / ie the solar controller box, and lets in more power from the solar panel until until the battery is topped up again to 13.5v which is a full 12v battery, then the ball cock / solar controller ( MPPT ) shuts off the power from the solar panel to the battery it doesnt over cook it..

Geoff...I am using one 120w solar panel, one 100ah deep cycle battery, and one 30a MPPT Controller..my light are 8 watt LED's guaranteed for 20,000hrs..helogen draw to much power..
my problem, and what you touch on, is the type of wire I am using..I am using normal household white colored wire with the usual three colored strands inside..however, the copper inisde is five strand, when three strand holds in the power better, and therefore you do not loose energy out thru the wire over longer distances..my longest run is about 12m with a water pump on the end...I loose perhaps 1/2 a volt each time..in daytime this is no problem as the sun is feeding me power all the time, even in fog this morning...but at night when the soalr is not working, and I am surviving on the battery alone, you just have to monitor your meter / gauge to make sure you dont go below 12.75volts ( considered flat by some)

Post by **maaka** » June 8, 2015, 6:09 am

bugger forgot my memory stick otherwise will post some pics of my solar powered fence unit I made over the weekend,,Its a mini version of a house switchboard..

Post by **bluejets** » June 8, 2015, 7:10 am

deankham wrote:Sorry to change the topic slightly but has anyone considered / installed a wind turbine?

Unless it's the size of the units one sees with main blades the size of a 747 wings, forget it.
Used here on the coast in Aus and wouldn't blow wind up the ** of a solar array.

Post by **glalt** » June 8, 2015, 11:34 am

If I were still living in or near Jomtien, that would be a very good option. Usually a nice breeze every day. As far as in Loei, the only breeze we get is from thunderstorms. That wind would blow the wind turbine off its tower.

Post by **maaka** » June 9, 2015, 7:04 am

sorry Geoff I didnt really answer your question..no, no light fade..
solar is not very complicated..I am a Number Eight Wire sort of bloke..I dont go to deep into the solar system..haha, but just buy the panel, controller, battery and make the switchboard, and thats that..I dont poke around with it once its going..its all automatic..if the green lights are green its all fine..a quick glance when passing, at the meter just to see its above 12.75v, thats about it..

Post by **rjj04** » June 10, 2015, 4:58 am

JohnG wrote:
rjj04 wrote:... I tried to make the point that they are not "buying" my power with an analogy. If I take an expensive bottle of wine to a restaurant, the restaurant will take the bottle and serve it back to my with my meal. They might charge me a small "corking" fee to do so. What PEA wants to do (has done), is accept my bottle of wine, then serve that quality wine (carbon free power/solar power) to other customers, and then they have the nerve to sell their cheap (lignite based) wine back to me and make me pay for it. .....
Your analogy doesn't really hold up.

What they are doing is allowing you to drink as much of your own wine (with no corkage fee) as you want and to drink their wine when yours runs out, but they're not allowing you to sell your wine in their restaurant to their customers or to give your wine away uninvited to their customers and then demand to be paid by the restaurant.

Maybe they'lI do so later, for a commission, but I can see their point.

How can I be "paid" anything? I was not part of the "roof-top" program and therefore could not be paid! I did not ask to be paid, just allowed to have my power back again. Compared to participants in the roof-top program, who do get paid more than double the rate at which they consume, I simply wanted my power back that they held (actually sold to others at the time of production). Locking my meter would be STEALING my power if I had stayed grid-tied.

First post... somebody from the "CimateGate" thread??

Post by **rjj04** » June 10, 2015, 5:18 am

Sorry, 11 posts... early morning

Post by **glalt** » July 24, 2015, 10:22 am

It must be truly the rainy season. We have had no sun for about five days. With both the panels charging the batteries, they are just barely keeping up. The grid tie is dead because there is no mains power. That's the island protection working. My computer, small fan and lights in my computer room still have enough battery power and the battery voltage is holding steady at about 12.7 volts using both panels. I'm getting about 120 watts from the two panels on this overcast drizzly day.

Things in the freezer started to thaw out so I did have to start the generator. The generator runs the refrigerator, TV, satellite dish and all the lights in the house. I have no idea when the main power will come back on. We never get a warning or any information as to what the problem is. Fortunately the brother in law sells motorcycle gas and uses a hand pump. Modern gas stations cannot pump any fuel when the power is off. I will let the generator run until the power comes back on or when it runs out of gas.

Post by **rjj04** » July 30, 2015, 9:04 pm

Glalt - we have found that, when there is a power outage, calling the local PEA is almost useless. Calling the Bangkok PEA number seems to get much faster response. This has happened a half dozen times or so, so I think it is more than coincidence. Perhaps the response times don't get reported to HQ when the call comes in locally and thus there is less pressure for them to get off their collective behinds! BKK will actually call you back to see if the problem is resolved. Give it a try next time.

Post by **glalt** » July 31, 2015, 6:47 pm

Thanks for the information. Fortunately I have gotten the main power problems down to a minor inconvenience. My battery bank keeps up pretty well even during these rainy overcast days using both panels. It always seems like the main power outages always happen after several rainy days in a row. Once in a while I use the generator to charge the battery bank during the long outages.

I have the two sealed batteries that I salvaged from the dead UPS. I use them for 12 volt LED light bulbs. My wife can easily move them to wherever she needs light. It still amazes me how much light you get from those low wattage LED bulbs.

Of course whenever I have to start the generator, the TV and all the regular house lights work. I think it's good to run the generator once in a while anyways.

Post by **kubotatim** » July 31, 2015, 9:33 pm

rjj04 wrote:Glalt - we have found that, when there is a power outage, calling the local PEA is almost useless. Calling the Bangkok PEA number seems to get much faster response. This has happened a half dozen times or so, so I think it is more than coincidence. Perhaps the response times don't get reported to HQ when the call comes in locally and thus there is less pressure for them to get off their collective behinds! BKK will actually call you back to see if the problem is resolved. Give it a try next time.

Just start the generator, problem solved.

Post by **glalt** » July 31, 2015, 10:14 pm

The power normally goes off for a few seconds or a minute or two. If it is off for a half hour or so it will usually be off for a few hours. It seems like I can make the power come back on just by starting the generator. LOL!

Post by **rjj04** » August 1, 2015, 8:56 pm

Okay, I get it. Easier to flip a switch than to go through the hassle of dealing with the PEA. For those people without the god-like powers of a generator... call BKK PEA # not the local PEA #

Post by **glalt** » August 2, 2015, 8:18 am

You hit the nail on the head. The less I have to deal with government organizations, the better I like it.

Post by **kubotatim** » August 2, 2015, 9:02 am

If you live here and don't have a generator, god help you.

Post by **FrazeeDK** » August 2, 2015, 7:26 pm

when our power goes out and stays out for over an hour we usually call the Puyaiban (village chief) who generally knows why it is out and can give an estimated fix time..

Post by JR » August 16, 2015, 9:57 pm

rjj04,
Your inverter, what type is it, PIP HS, MS or MSX 4048 or?

Post by **rjj04** » August 17, 2015, 9:31 am

PIP4048MS (parallel ready version) 4KW/5KVA inverter, 60A solar MPPT, 60A AC charger, 48V battery bank

A couple of days after I paid for it on AliExpress I saw a few new videos were posted on youtube. They scared the daylights out of me regarding the quality of the unit. But so far, knock-on-wood, she is running fine. After a couple of days of working I used a IR temperature gun to find the hot-spots on the unit and mounted external PC fans to cool that area (they burn maybe 200Wh/day...24/7). Like I said before, at $750, if it only lasts five years and then goes tits up it will still be a damn good deal. Fingers crossed.

I thought I'd do a report on the PIP4048 after it had been running for one year (about six months now). I would not want to be partially responsible for somebody else buying a piece of garbage so I thought I'd wait

The unit and it's PC software have some quirks, and it took me a couple of months to understand them.

Certainly I am saving time by not having to reboot my PC's, etc every time the power goes out

I never even know when the power goes out these days... it's like I am back in the USA again

Post by JR » August 17, 2015, 1:30 pm

I am planning to use those too. How many batteries and panels do you have? You have one inverter?