Solar Shed, part 2, and Splitting Wood

We’ve put the panel up on the solar shed and it’s now connected to “stuff” inside the shed. The south-facing roof of the shed can take up to 3 panels so there’s room to expand.

If you look closely you can see that the south windows are in, though not trimmed yet. We also have the west window in and the door hung.

Inside the shed on the south wall is the “stuff.” There’s a circuit breaker disconnect on the upper left for the panels to the charger. The charger is below the disconnect. Below and to the right of the charger is the circuit breaker disconnect for the charger to the batteries. Two deep cell batteries are in an insulated battery box a short distance away, inside the shed.

The next step which we might get done next weekend is installing a small inverter. We have an inverter for when we connect the shed to the house. An inverter takes the 12 volt DC charge in the batteries and ups it to 120 volts AC. The small inverter is so we can charge phones and stuff in the shed until we get everything connected. I don’t think we’ll be fully connected until next winter, if things go as planned.

I’ve been finishing up splitting the last of the hickory trees we felled this spring. After everything is split the wood needs to be hauled and stacked at a site next to the road, closer to the house. These trees were to the south of the garden and we cut them to let in more light in winter.

May 5, 2014