holstein13 wrote:
I loved reading about your mods. Have you considered using solar water heating rather than electrical? Heating water takes a tremendous amount of electrical energy but is easily accomplished with solar water heat boxes on the roof. They even work on cloudy days, unlike PV.
Thanks.. I have not actually thought about that idea... I was looking at removing the propane water heater and replacing it with an on demand water heating system... I see two issues with the solar system, that is unless it has a backup heating method, and that is if the sun is not out, no hot water... and the second is the amount of hot water you can keep hot.. Actually there is a third one as well.. if you need hot water now, well not going to happen..
The more I think about your idea the more I realize a few other things.. First the amount of work to install a system like that not to mention the additional roof weight for all the panels. Other things like the piping and a tank also come into play.. at least with propane a small tank works because it does not take long at all for it to heat the water when needed...
As mentioned though, I am not worried too much about power draw now.. The only thing I need to do that is definite is replacing all bulbs with LED's. I am still considering adding another 6 deep cells to the solar/wind system but that is not a priority at the moment since the system seems to be keeping up pretty nicely as it is..
