August 25, 20169 yr 52 minutes ago, plonkster said: You guys convinced me. In the long run it's going to be cheaper just to buy all my power from Eskom. Phew... now I can afford to have a different hobby, like playing golf or something. NEVER!!! I will NOT stop my solar hobby, but I will be wise when buying batts as long as there is Eskom.
August 25, 20169 yr Buy yourself a flywheel system instead. That should last forever.... : http://www.activepower.com/
August 25, 20169 yr 1 hour ago, DeepBass9 said: Buy yourself a flywheel system instead. That should last forever.... : http://www.activepower.com/ I thought you were onto something but flywheel technology can store masses of energy for ..... wait for it 15 seconds. That less time than it took me to type this with 2 fingers!
August 25, 20169 yr 11 minutes ago, Chris Hobson said: I thought you were onto something but flywheel technology can store masses of energy for ..... wait for it 15 seconds. That less time than it took me to type this with 2 fingers! Looks like it is meant to deal with dips and spikes and short outages. I suppose if you could start a generator quickly enough, this might also work.
August 25, 20169 yr Yes, I see they are mainly user for server rooms etc, but there should be an application in off grid situations. Not cheap either though....
August 27, 20169 yr KLEVA started off a hot topic I see - Was my intention (Insert Joker laugh) Just to clarify my comments - I was referring to being as off-grid as possible, with an Axpert (which is not the best off-grid system, but doable). I hate wasting the solar energy that goes to my panels, there is just nowhere to store it... When my cheap battery bank is full, it is full... Would rather have enough to have 24 hours of stored power than 4 hours... This is the same reason why I have 1 solar geyser for shower/bath (150l) and 1 with with a power feed backup feeding kitchen and washing machine (15l). This has the dual advantage for me that if one breaks, there was an alternate source of heat (as happened recently when a pipe burst - we could still use kitchen hot water to bath). I want to be completely off grid, but due to battery storage I am still stuck with using nearly half my power from the municipality. And it is the battery capacity that keeps letting me down. As a Marvel or DC super hero would say: "I HAVE THE POWER - Just not long enough!"
August 27, 20169 yr Jip, believe me I tried same but the number just did not compute. BUT the last 2 weeks I have been running nearly 100watts off grid, 24/7. Lights, my routers, switch, tablets etc. Doing it with 2nd hand batts, so suddenly it becomes very cost effective. Truth be told, I had the panels and controller (sold old one and upgraded to new one) and a small inverter, so in essence, going forward, it costs me nothing. Now I am slowly seeing what other devices I can take off grid. Every bit helps.
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