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QUESTION - Can we use aluminum for battery connections? I have a good deal of heavy guage aluminum.
Thanks in advance
It's low voltage, big amps so it's fat wire. #4/0 is the wire size that's most typical in copper. It will certainly work, the question is what size you need. Here is a handy voltage calculator http://www.csgnetwork.com/voltagedropcalc.html to check the wire size you have versus the amps. For the amps I'd use 250.
Thanks so much for this post, it has answered questions and created even more for me...which is great since we are definitely still in the planning stage and the convincing of the DH that an off-grid life is what he really wants, he just hasn't figured it out yet stage.
We are definitely looking into several renewable resources: solar, hydro(depending on the land we purchase), definitely geo and possibly wind. I want to have all of everything figured out, planned and re-planned several times before we even begin to build. It just seems like the right thing to do.
Ditto on sharing your information and experience Seldom. You are light years ahead of Patriot Lady and me but as we continue to prep what you and others share helps give us ideas about what direction we need to take on various things.
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.
Ronald Wilson Reagan (1911-2004)
JOSEPH WAS A PREPPER!
NOAH WAS A PREPPER!
I'M A PREPPER TOO!
I'm still learning things myself. I think the biggest thing I've learned is how little I care about electricity and modern conveniences. I have a typical stove/oven in the kitchen, but more often than not I cook outside on the fire pit.
A real turning point for me was riding through the Sierra Madres and visiting the little villages along the river. Folks living on land granted to their families by the King of Spain way back in the day. They don't have a whole hell of a lot in terms of "stuff", but some of the friendliest and most content people I've ever met. They were just generally happy. I think mostly because they saw the world for what they did have instead of what they didn't have.
We're becomming more minimalist too the older we get but we do enjoy our conveniences. Oklahoma summers are hotttttttt and north winter winds are collllllld! LOL Being from AZ you can identify. If I wasn't tied to work we'd find a more temperate climate that would make it easier to live more "naturally". There is an underground home we're trying to find out about but the realtor hasn't gotten back with us yet.
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.
Ronald Wilson Reagan (1911-2004)
JOSEPH WAS A PREPPER!
NOAH WAS A PREPPER!
I'M A PREPPER TOO!
I know this thread hasn't been posted in in a few months, but I just wanted to comment and say how wonderful it is to read real experiences and advice for goals I'm sure most of us on the board want to reach. In the post talking about diesel generators...I have been told before its best to have diesel powered vehicles and power equipment as well because they are able to run bio-diesels which can be easily created on the homestead with a little know-how. That's know-how I happen to lack, but would be interested in knowing if anyone else has had experience with this or tested it? One question to going off grid since this is the main thread for it, it seems, when designing and looking for systems to go off grid, can solar, hydro, and wind be combined into the same system or would they have to run on separate systems? I've done a little googling on it, but of course, have had spotty results. I've been looking at a property that has a pretty substantial creek/small river running through it and thought why not combine all three if it would work?
Wow this is a ton of great information. I'm afraid I'm a bit slow on the uptake so if someone could give me the simplest explaination it would be wonderful. Sorry guys...I got some of it but alot of it was Greek to me. I would like to have a battery bank to run the fridge, freezer, shallow water pump and two ceiling fans to distribute heat from my wood stove. I understand and have purchased a 10 breaker transfer box. My generator sounds like it needs to be replaced from what I have read here. It only puts out 5000. It is diesel and I do have a cheaper gas backup one. I had thought of using a golf cart set up for batteries but that sounds like a waste of time from the provided information. I'm in the northeast in an area that has minimal sunlight throughout the day, no wind to speak of and hydro power is not even remotely available. My well is shallow and is underground spring fed water source for drinking etc is not a problem but there is no way to access it for a hydro source to replenish the batter power used without starting the gennie. Open to any and all suggestions for this quandry. Thanks a million for your patience. You guys are such a wealth of information it is amazing. Additional info.....I am NOT a rich person......just a four year prepper doing the best I can. Thank God for freeze dried foods.
Last edited by Maid Marion; 11-24-2012, 01:20 PM.
Reason: spelling and short other info
That's know-how I happen to lack, but would be interested in knowing if anyone else has had experience with this or tested it? One question to going off grid since this is the main thread for it, it seems, when designing and looking for systems to go off grid, can solar, hydro, and wind be combined into the same system or would they have to run on separate systems? I've done a little googling on it, but of course, have had spotty results. I've been looking at a property that has a pretty substantial creek/small river running through it and thought why not combine all three if it would work?
My 2.5ton truck (m109a3) has a multifuel motor. It will run on most anything that burns. I use a mix of waste motor oil (WMO), waste automatic transmission fluid and gasoline as an alternative fuel. The gasoline is mostly for viscosity so it's a variable amount. The mix is roughly 75% WMO, 15% ATF, 10% gas. More modern diesels can also use alternative fuels. The thing to consider are the seals, injectors, filtering etc. I've yet to run any alt fuel in my F250. The deuce is easy since it's all mechanical whereas a modern truck has computers and sensors that need to be tweaked. I just don't know how to work on that part. www.dudadiesel.com is a good source for filtering products and there's also some articles on the site.
As for combining power, yes they can all be part of one system and in fact would be the preferred way to go. The more inputs you have from various sources means that at any given time there's likely at least one that's producing power. Each input would need its own charge controller to manage it, but they can all be integrated to the same battery bank and even the same overall management system. The Outback Flexware system specifically handles these multiple inputs. Other manufacturers have their own powercenter systems as well. The technology surrounding alt energy has come a long way. It's a lot more plug and play than it used to be.
Wow this is a ton of great information. I'm afraid I'm a bit slow on the uptake so if someone could give me the simplest explaination it would be wonderful. Sorry guys...I got some of it but alot of it was Greek to me. I would like to have a battery bank to run the fridge, freezer, shallow water pump and two ceiling fans to distribute heat from my wood stove. I understand and have purchased a 10 breaker transfer box. My generator sounds like it needs to be replaced from what I have read here. It only puts out 5000. It is diesel and I do have a cheaper gas backup one. I had thought of using a golf cart set up for batteries but that sounds like a waste of time from the provided information. I'm in the northeast in an area that has minimal sunlight throughout the day, no wind to speak of and hydro power is not even remotely available. My well is shallow and is underground spring fed water source for drinking etc is not a problem but there is no way to access it for a hydro source to replenish the batter power used without starting the gennie. Open to any and all suggestions for this quandry. Thanks a million for your patience. You guys are such a wealth of information it is amazing. Additional info.....I am NOT a rich person......just a four year prepper doing the best I can. Thank God for freeze dried foods.
5kw is a fair amount of power for what you're looking to run. Unless it doesn't work, then there's no need to replace it. Golf cart batteries would work, but you would need a lot of them.
Deep cycle batteries are made up of 2 volt cells. Each cell has it's own charge and they are connected internally to make 2,4,6,12 volt batteries. A 12 volt battery is just 6 2 volt cells. Connecting batteries together just adds to the string of cells internal to the battery to make 24, 36, 48, etc. It all goes back to the 2 volt cell though. The reason this is important is that each cell can have a different charge and the whole system is dictated by the lowest common denominator. The closer all the cells are to the same charge the better everything works. So the fewer cells the easier it is to keep all of them playing well with each other.
So say you needed 1000 amp hours to make it in between charges. In a 24vdc system with golf cart batteries (~220ah) you would need 4 batteries in series to make the 24vdc and then 10 groups of those to make 2200 amp hours since you should only take those batteries to half their rated capacity. That's 40 batteries with 3 cells each. 120 2 volt cells and if one goes bad they all mess up. Using L16 sized batteries (~400ah) means half as many batteries and half as many cells. The bigger each battery is, the bigger each cell is, the less cells are needed. On really big systems they also increase the voltage since batteries work better when wired in series than parallel. It helps each cell stay on the same voltage.
Now 1000amp hours is a lot. So the first thing is to try and trim that down. The first thing I'd do is to only run the chest freezer off the genset. It doesn't need to run all the time, just keep the food cold. The generator can charge the batteries and also run the freezer which is essentially using the temperature inside as a battery. Maybe add some extra insulation around the outside, but it should keep from one charge to the next. The second thing would be the pressure pump. Adding a pressure tank, or multiple pressure tanks, will store the water pressure and make the pump run less. You could essentially run the generator one time a day for a few hours and pressurize all the water you'd need for the day. The pressure tanks also work as a form of battery. It's stored energy.
If you could get your usage down, then building a small battery bank from golf cart or L16 wouldn't be terrible. Though in about 3-5 years you would possibly need to replace them depending on how many cycles they went through. If you're just looking for something to get you through an ice storm, then absorbed glass mat (AGM) style batteries would be better then flooded lead acid (FLA). They are sealed so you can plug in a charger and they'll happily sit there without requiring any maintenance. They don't have the same depth of depletion as FLA so you don't get the same capacity, but would last longer in that situation.
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