Adding More Batteries & Load Testing the EP Cube Solar Power System. Will it power everything?
Вставка
- Опубліковано 10 лип 2024
- We now have a full stack of batteries on the EP cube. A total of 19.9 Kilowatt hours of energy stored. Now it's time to go off grid and do some load testing. And we will test it only on batteries, no solar panels to assist. Will it run the Air conditioner? Oven? Clothes Drier?
EP Cube all in one Solar Energy solution: bit.ly/47dLudA
Low Price Per Watt - Solar Panels: bit.ly/3Jx8EmQ
SureStart Soft Starter - 4 Ton and Under: bit.ly/3NgBjNp
Emporia 5% Discount Code “countryview”
Emporia Energy Monitor: bit.ly/3x4lUYT
Buy T-Shirts and Hoodies on Our Website:
www.countryviewacreshomestead...
Our Amazon Shop full of great Homesteading items:
www.amazon.com/shop/countryvi...
TYM Tractors: tym.world/en-us/
The Tractors we use are the
TYM 2515 - 24 Horsepower compact tractor
TYM T654 - 67 horsepower compact utility Tractor
J.I. Case 730 (1961)
Allis Chalmers D17 Series 1 (1959)
E-mail us at: countryviewacreshomestead@gmail.com
Send Letters to:
Country View Acres
P.O. Box 469
Robinson, IL 62454
Our UA-cam Channel: / countryviewacres
Our Facebook page: / countryviewacreshomestead
Our Instagram Page: / country_view_acres
We live in southeastern Illinois on a 41 acre homestead. We just finished building our log cabin in 2018. Now we are focused on trying to grow our own food and raise livestock. Follow us on our journey we continue to develop our homestead and farm, while becoming more self sufficient.
Any links provided above may be affiliate links which earn us a small commission.
#solar #offgrid #batterybackup
A cost analysis when you're finished with it entirely would be really neat.
That is fantastic to have all that ampacity with zero fossil fuel and zero noise. Way better than your standard standby generator system
this is real life..cant argue with the demonstratable results!!
Goes to show that it’s good to use the sun and wind for drying laundry. So nice to have fresh sheets dried in the sunshine.
Congratulations on passing the inspection.
Lol, I was going to say, next project, a washing line. But that would be cheeky!
edit: I felt strangely uneasy writing this and realised I hadn't seen Americans (I'm in the uK) hanging clothes out to dry for a really long time. So... googlepants makes it clear that there's a different viewpoint in the US ie it's BAD lol. Who knew.
I've been running off grid for almost 3 years. zero export to grid. I watch what loads I put on the system i.e. I don't run the 6KW dryer at the same time as I run the AC which draws about 2KW. I have 56KWh of battery storage, adding another 32KWh in July this year. I try to run the dryer on sunny days so that the batteries aren't being drawn down. On really crappy days there's enough power to run the house with not too much left over to charge the batteries but will be able to go several days without sun once the system is expanded in July. My AC also has a soft start as the power draw from the AC shuts off the Solark almost every time. Since I installed the soft start I've not had an issue with AC initial surge issues.
Good job. Looking forward to more of your journey.
That system will give you additional independence. Along with your garden and animals you will be putting up you and Rebecca can handle a sustained shortage if it ever came about. Very smart. Appreciate you taking us along. Videos are informative and the way you demonstrate how neat and tidy everything is is very impressive. Nice job!
I saw your video and i was searching online and i swear i came across a post in the DIY forum that looks like your setup from 2023.
Soft start is very important. It will help the life expectancy of the air compressor. We’ve used them for 30 plus years.
Out of interest, why is it not standard in the unit?
@@sroberts605 Probably cost. I added a Micro-Air soft start to my 5 ton AC unit (makes it easier on the 24k Generac generator when the AC starts); it cost ~$320 and I installed it myself. Surge was about 150 amps and the soft start reduced it to 40-50 amps.
Soft starts are cool but I am not convinced they will make a unit last longer. I have seen so many compressors that are 30 years old still rocking. No soft start.
Wow. Impressive how much you have learned about solar systems. How reassuring it must be to know you are self sufficient living off the grid’ during an outage. Great for the Homestead. Kudos!!! 👍👍👍
Evan, I am really impressed with your knowledge of all of the solar and electrical devices that you have installed and you are going to be self sufficient before long and the farm is just growing and looking better all the time but it is because of all the hard work that you and Rebecca put into the farm. Great job.
I believe that Evan is an industrial electrician.
Installed the Hyper Engineering Sure Start 5 years ago, have had zero issues.
Amazing how precise and tidy your system looks!
Awesome work. You are literally helping me get my EP Cube system up. Appreciate the good content and the assistance. 🏆
Looks like you have all the power you will ever need its a nice system and you did a great job installing it Evan thanks for sharing
I am most grateful for your comprehensive bench test in real time. Im able to present your videos to my client and all there quetions were answered in your video.
Thank You 🙏🙏
It's nice to have put into action your trade to not only lower your day-to-day cost of living but it also is a feather in your hat to your abilities to complete the project and see immediate results.
Hi Evan, enjoyable video. You're really in your element doing this kind of work.
Thanks Pete!
@@CountryViewAcresEvan what size battery bank would I need if my power bill says I use 24kwh per day?
Congrats!
You must be pleased!!! What a great job researching, installing, testing and understanding your solar system. 👍👍👍
That’s amazing! Good job!
I appreciate that you showed the testing I understand solar a tiny bit more. Pretty cool!
Cool
Evan, glad to see you did what you said you would and that was to add two additional batteries and you ran a good load test on the system. More panels added will be good thing also. It is a shame the power company will not buy back power at the same price they charge the customer, that needs changed! Enjoyed the video!
Never ending ... more solar panels, updating batteries.
Great summary of the testing results Evan, I am really enjoying your solar system build and the information that you are providing on it's performance characteristics in real world operation. Wishing you the best and looking forward to your future vlogs as you build your homestead. Be well.../Bob
Thx
Wow that is a real nice system. Don't ever move I can't imagine what that cost. Great job nothing better then seeing someone getting free from the man. With what you got there and some good time management on appliances blackouts are a thing of the past. Awesome!!!
Thanks for sharing
Solid testing. Adding additional solar panels will benefit your cloudy day and winter charging. Nice turnkey setup.
That was a great video Evan. Lots of great information and its evident that you know your system very well. Great job!
You can never have to much battery capacity or to many panels ! I have 56kwh's of chevy volt batteries and adding more this year. Only 16000w of panels still have more to install this year also. I have been off grid 6 years now.
That turned out really nice man!!! Great work!
Send her on luxurious vacation, while you tough it out-lol. You explain things so well-I am still clueless on solar, but you have given me a better understanding.💖💖💖💖🎶🎶
Looks great!
Now double everything!
Eventually, you'll be providing power for the whole neighborhood. XD
Such an impressive system. Have thoroughly enjoyed the ‘solar series’ Well done 👍
Your dryer is a beast. When you are shopping for an upgrade try Heat Pump dryers, they will run on fraction of the energy but may take little longer to finish jobs.
Wow, this guy is soooo neat,, everything seems to be precise and very very organized.
Keep up the good work love watching you on UA-cam
This was a thorough, competent and well explained test and video.
EMP shield proof great idea 💡 👍😎
Great content, can’t wait for additional details on your new system. Thank you for sharing this with us
Nice! I am making notes :)
Looking so sleek Evan 👍 gorgeous set up❣️❣️❣️
Good work! You did a good job installing that system!
Would be interesting to hear what you anticipate the pay back period would be (years), using your average power usage and average power sold back to the grid at current price levels.
Appreciate you have done all the insulation work yourself and video it for us, so would be be excluding cost of labour.
Massive thank you for the info you have provided and appreciate the time you both put it to send us the videos.
Excellent job. Thanks for sharing. 😎
Run things like your washer and dryer during the day when you have more solar panel capacity during the day if you can. Bank your power like for lights and things you run at night so you don't run your bill up. You can put smaller systems up in the animal barn with battery backup and run things out there.
Hopefully, you will be able to get more batteries into your system and be completely off-grid. Good work.
Nice test on your solar system, but it was over my head or as they say, above my pay grade. You have this one under your hat for a good trial, good luck on the rest of the test that you do in the future. Thanks and have a nice week!
Great job looking great keep up the good work love your videos thank you
Very nice set up and looks very professional the install also look amazing well done very talented man
Good electrician always leaves a service loop!
I have a soft starter for my AC.
Excellent ‼️
I've got to compliment the metal ducting work looks beautiful. I've taken a screenie to give to my electrician with "if you can't do that then go home" :D
Great information thanks for sharing
Very good set up! Seems you have learned a great deal about it, Maybe put another row of panels on the shop above the last set on the other roof. Maybe consider propane to run major appliances, it is a lot cheaper than elect.
👍
Good job :)
Outstanding video. Enjoying the channel. Tks for sharing.
Nice Demo! Thank you.
EMP electric shield proof your system great idea 💡
Interesting stuff.
What you said!
Wow, all this electronic stuff is way, way over my brain capacity. But Brian, if I remember correctly majored in electrical engineering in college. So it's a piece of cake for him. Love your content sir. Especially the farming aspect.
Wow thanks for all that...I have never ever seen anyone actually try and brown out their system....trying it with no solar back up and everthing plus the kitchen sink running until it overloaded... and immediatley resetting itself after power was lowered and then re-testing it with a bit less....wow great, practical simulation. Thanks! I have been an electical contractor for 40 yrs now and that was a great job! I want to install this at my cottage and i hope you make your next video on how long loads can be run on your system. I know you will test everything to its limits and really appreciate that....I am sick and tired of seeing wannabes powering things with no battery back up and no hard tests!
This is RARE. It is the fourth video and not one single request for subscribing to his channel or liking the video. What it means to have enough confidence!! And I do not praise anyone easily. Thank you for your presentation.
Very good test and video. I've never heard of EP Cube other than your previous videos. Seems like a good product. I will have to look into it a little further.
Glad you drained the batteries ...otherwise they would have been so heavy you would have needed help lifting them !!!
Lol, good to have humor, to me I just pay the bill.
whats impressive to me is that ive watched all the previous of him doing his solar stuff. Doing all of these alone and with just research is somewhat amazing to me, Goodwork lad🎉
and btw, is he an electrical engineer by any chance?
Thanks for this video. Very informative.
Very timely video. I was just looking at adding a soft start to our heat pump. I was considering the EasyStart MicroAir 368 Soft Start unit (ASY-368-X48), but will check into the SureStart Soft Starter.
The easystart can be mounted outside the AC unit. The surestart will need to be mounted inside. Other than that, I believe they wire up the same way.
It's really cool to see this progress in your solar, battery and inverter setup. Isn't it interesting to see how much power each device uses? You might also want to check how much power your water heater uses, if it's electric. Over the course of a year, electric water heaters use more power than any other device, in a house that has an electric water heater. The really cool thing about all of this is you have learned how power hungry 240v appliances, like a dryer and water heater are. What if you only used the clothes dryer in the winter, on the low setting, and only used the A/C in the winter? You can also get much more efficient A/C and water heater appliances, where they use a heat pump function that draws far less electricity.
Interesting and informative video.
These tests are very informative and it is nice to not be totally without power when the grid goes down. However, I think you should size the system with enough solar panels so that you can run it in the wintertime when your solar production will be lower. As your system is now, you will probably not be able to charge the batteries fully from your panels. However, as you are now you are covered for at least part of the year. Another factor to consider might be that your electricity demand might change from summer to winter. I suspect that the airco running in the summer will be the biggest draw on your system.
Thats what you get for reacting before the video is down. Judging by your closing remarks about further testing and adding another string, I suspect you have thought about all of this.
😁
You will like the soft start for your A/C. I installed one on mine and it cut the inrush current by 60% on a 4 ton unit.
If the panels were on a solar tracking mount they would be more efficient in the amount of power they can create. A tracking mount follows the sun and keeps the panels in a maximum of solar energy.
I always use my dryer in the low mode and it drys everything without shrinking anything.
Way to go EE.
1. You really know your technical stuff.
2. Do you have a clothes line? Would you get one?
3. I’m impressed you know how to turn on the oven. 😂😂j/k. 🇨🇦❤️
I would think you would have been more impressed with that. I know how to turn on a clothes drier.
@@CountryViewAcres lol!
You could change the swing on the bedroom door so it's not blocking the AC vent.
The battery's on the camera always seem to die at the worst times lol. Great test. Keep up the good work.
I was wondering if you had any future plans to upgrade to heat pumps: Heat pump clothes dryer, heat pump hot water heater, and especially a heat pump furnace/air conditioner. And how about a geothermal system for the heat pump furnace/air conditioner? I know that they are not cheap, but they would all reduce your electricity load, and save you from having to increase the size of your solar array and battery storage pack.
The best way to dry most of your clothes is to hang them for the sun to do it's thing free.
I think for the long term and completely transparent system, you might want to get a second inverter and bump up the battery capacity to 30kw and extra 6-8 panels. Great job building this great system though.
What is the estimated life span of the batteries?
You ever tried hanging your washing outside to dry? Anyway, credit to you for being one of a minority homesteader vloggers to make an effort with solar. And I watch em all, they get rated on an idiocracy metre, so far Justin Rhodes is up the top. My favourites are Simple living Alaska (they are quite mad, that is why I like it). And Martijn Doolaard; in Piedmont, northern Italy. You might like that one if you haven't seen it, very different and excellent TV on the big screen. I am new to your channel, I like it the presentation content etc.
In Florida we had a soft start on our air conditioner because of the surges. There were times we had 5 in a row within a few minutes. Since the air conditioner ran almost everyday and without it was murder. After the one hurricane Irma which took our power out for a week. Mainly because one can't talk to the linemen without getting screamed at. All my neighbors had power but us.
It seems like you need a energy storage system, bro.
Replace your air conditioner with an inverter Daikin or Mitsubishi and you no longer have to worry about power draw.
We have a 2.5 ton mitsubishi heavy industries split AC, another 1 ton mini split mitsu as well and two hitachi thru the wall units - both are 11,000btu/h units…
…on top of dishwasher, 4 inverter air purifiers, 2 inverter fridges, inverter hot/cold water purifier, induction cooker, etc.
I only have a 5kw solar array and 20,000kw battery back up and i can run all air conditioners at once. Even while cooking using the cooktop.
Inverter air conditioners are amazing.
Nice install the AC unit will draw lot less power in cooler weather. If it never gets above 100 degrees likely won't pull that much.
If you need to run your A/C and dryer at the same time, you should probably invest in a clothesline they're cheaper than batteries 🤣
So Evan, I think its pretty clear at this point that you have electrical expertise beyond most people. I have never heard what your day job is. Hopefully you are nit trying to keep that part of your life a secret…but maybe???? In watching your videos for more than a year, possibly 2, I realize now that you are way MORE than a daily homesteading Joe just showing up. So can you just tell us what your educated background is in…please!!?? Taking bets on electrical engineer. I am a 47 year career retired Nurse now…yes, I am old…65 years on now. I started Nursing at a very young age, possibly among the very youngest where I grew up in upstate NY. I can see the Nurse in Rebecca, but I can also see an engineer in you as well. SO PLEASE…DO TELL
If you are looking to get the most "bang for your buck" out of that system, I would think you would try to do something with the panel mounting to get them to a more optimal angle to the sun.
Well now you need to expand your system more panels, or another battery pack. As plan was to be fully self sufficient for the 24h time.
What do you do when there is heavy snow/ice on the solar panels if your power is off for a long time?
Thank you for your videos. When we build our house we are wanting to install solar and use on-grid for a backup only. We dont have any trees or shade. One side of our roof is 15x90. I dont know anything about solar. Only know basic new construction residential wiring.
I hope you reset all the clocks after your experiments.
Great video, Thanks
Can you do a video when you install the Soft Start on your AC?
Thanks
👍👍👍👍👍👌
As much as possible do not disconnect the PV under load.
I noticed that your air vents are behind doors. That is not good. It restricts air flow and actually makes the HVAC system work harder to heat/cool the room.
Suggestion: if you are running the HVAC system, pull the doors away from the vent openings. Air circulation is important. Be sure to use something to keep the dogs from bumping the doors open.
I recently renovated my house and moved an air vent out from behind the door and it's amazing how much better the room heats and cools, plus I use less electricity.