Made a hell of a discovery yesterday. I drove to a friend's house to borrow a tractor auger and noticed an unused 200ft tall radio tower. I had heard thru the grapevine that a telephone company here in SC had gotten a federal grant for rural internet and built towers but then fiberoptic happened and the towers are just sitting there. There's 14 of them. So a quick call to a local ham in one of the rural towns and turns out his son works for that phone company. So now we wait to see if we can climb the towers in the day time or guerrilla style at night.
I bring this up because this same thing may have happened in other rural areas across the country. maybe there are unused towers in your area? These mesh repeaters are solar powered and clamp on a rail in seconds.
you can search the FCC database for the name of your rural phone company and find any towers that belong to them... then see if they are not in use. https://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/AsrSearch/asrRegistrationSearch.jsp
I bring this up because this same thing may have happened in other rural areas across the country. maybe there are unused towers in your area? These mesh repeaters are solar powered and clamp on a rail in seconds.
you can search the FCC database for the name of your rural phone company and find any towers that belong to them... then see if they are not in use. https://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/AsrSearch/asrRegistrationSearch.jsp
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WATCH: Massive anti-government protests in India hit multiple cities
Indian government blocks mobile internet in central Delhi.
This is why you need an alternative network for communicating with your neighbors.
Indian government blocks mobile internet in central Delhi.
This is why you need an alternative network for communicating with your neighbors.
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One of the neighbors with 45kw of panels is struggling too.... out of 45kw he's making 3.3kw.
However the guy who is overpanelled by 2x (13kw of MPPT with 26kw of panels) is making 4kw. This guy hit 100% every day except yesterday.
When in doubt don't be bashful about adding more panels.
However the guy who is overpanelled by 2x (13kw of MPPT with 26kw of panels) is making 4kw. This guy hit 100% every day except yesterday.
When in doubt don't be bashful about adding more panels.
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Just something of note... the guy with 13kw of MPPT chargers and 26kw of panels is often done charging for hte day by noon and then his system makes only the power he's using moment to moment for the remainder of daylight hours.
Note that with 13kw of battery chargers, he's still able to make 77kwh in a day... more than the 50kwh that the average house uses.
Over panelling allows you to make predictable power even when it's cloudy.
Note that with 13kw of battery chargers, he's still able to make 77kwh in a day... more than the 50kwh that the average house uses.
Over panelling allows you to make predictable power even when it's cloudy.
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I fielded a call from a group member the other day, he said he noticed arcing between two panels mounted in his ground mount array. As it happened, he had dropped a 2x4 on a panel and cracked the glass sometime ago. In the past several months it got water inside and developed what we call a ground fault.
Ground fault occurs when the internals of a solar panel which are normally insulated from the metal frame end up touching the metal frame. Usually this is from water ingress. The result is that the aluminum frame is now "hot" with a few hundred volts on it. Now imagine your child playing in the back yard and touching the frame of the panel.
In his case he had mounted two rows of panels to two rows of unistrut and one malfunctioning panel had made every panel on that row hot.... and it was arcing between panels on the other row. The votlage of the arc was about 130vdc our of a 260v array.
Two things came of this... he had never gone back and grounded the frames of all panels together nor had he driven a ground rod. The idea here is that we want the frame of the panel to be at the same voltage as the earth around it. If the difference in voltage between where you stand and the frame of the panel is 0v, you can't get shocked. Ground bond all panels, all metal mounting rails and a ground rod driven into the earth together.
Secondly, another issue came to light. His combiner box took the negative leads from every string of panels he had and connected them to a bus bar. Only the positive from each string of panels was run thru a fuse. When his ground fault occurred, disconnecting the positive wire's fuse didn't stop the arcing because the negative wire from the panels still gave a common connection.
Fused combiner boxes are always needed when combining 3 or more strings together, but every commercially available one I've seen only fuses the positive lead of the panels. This is an oversight. You should use two pole DC rated breakers or two fuses when combining strings of panels.
Remember folks, it's not enough that something works... what is important is how it works with something is wrong.
Ground fault occurs when the internals of a solar panel which are normally insulated from the metal frame end up touching the metal frame. Usually this is from water ingress. The result is that the aluminum frame is now "hot" with a few hundred volts on it. Now imagine your child playing in the back yard and touching the frame of the panel.
In his case he had mounted two rows of panels to two rows of unistrut and one malfunctioning panel had made every panel on that row hot.... and it was arcing between panels on the other row. The votlage of the arc was about 130vdc our of a 260v array.
Two things came of this... he had never gone back and grounded the frames of all panels together nor had he driven a ground rod. The idea here is that we want the frame of the panel to be at the same voltage as the earth around it. If the difference in voltage between where you stand and the frame of the panel is 0v, you can't get shocked. Ground bond all panels, all metal mounting rails and a ground rod driven into the earth together.
Secondly, another issue came to light. His combiner box took the negative leads from every string of panels he had and connected them to a bus bar. Only the positive from each string of panels was run thru a fuse. When his ground fault occurred, disconnecting the positive wire's fuse didn't stop the arcing because the negative wire from the panels still gave a common connection.
Fused combiner boxes are always needed when combining 3 or more strings together, but every commercially available one I've seen only fuses the positive lead of the panels. This is an oversight. You should use two pole DC rated breakers or two fuses when combining strings of panels.
Remember folks, it's not enough that something works... what is important is how it works with something is wrong.
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More about ground bonding.... you can certainly install a ground lug onto your panels and then connect them with a bare copper ground, of you can use a proper solar panel clamp. Shown here is the IronRidge UFO mount. Look carefully and you'll see several little spikes on the washer under it. Thse will cut thru the anodizing on the solar panel frame and provide the necessary ground bond to the mounting rails. Then you only need to ground bond the rails.
Maybe this will come out sounding bad.... but....
The difference between an amateur and professional craftsman is that the professional knows how to fix his mistakes.
Similarly, the difference between a handyman and an engineer is that the handyman makes something that works and engineer designs around the potential failures.
The difference between an amateur and professional craftsman is that the professional knows how to fix his mistakes.
Similarly, the difference between a handyman and an engineer is that the handyman makes something that works and engineer designs around the potential failures.
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