|
Posted by Kris Krieger on May 14, 2008, 4:13 pm
> "Kris Krieger"> wrote
>> Hi, All, I don't know where to ask this; also tried Google but dunno
>> how to phrase the Q. so as to get fewer than 50,000+ hits...
>>
>> What i'm wondering is wherer tehre is a basic/beginner's/'how to"
>> book that
>> will tell me how to build simple solar-powered items. The thing is
>> that I am *not* an electrician, never studied electronics, don't want
>> to rewire a whole house, etc. - I just want to find out (1) how to
>> match the power output of cells and the power requirements of simple
>> things (lights, mostly), and (2) how to put them together - not "how
>> to solder", as I know that; but how to connect the above-mentioned
>> and matched components.
>>
>> Basically, does anyone know whether is there a sort of "solar
>> cookbook" that will bypass the things I don't want and tell me how to
>> build or wire- together a variety of simple lights (or maybe clocks
>> and other *simple* items) - or, alternately, a source for this sort
>> of basic information?
>>
>> Most of my hits were retailers of completed units, OR components
>> retailers (but no instructional material that I could see).
>> Thank You!!
>> - Kris
>
> First off, there's been a terrible misconception thrown around for a
> long time which has lead to alot of confusion on this subject.
> Let me get this part out of the way first: the book.
> There is no book that I am aware of that dispells the popular myths
> about solar.
> There are books that will *teach* you how solar stuff works, but why
> pay money when you can get the info for free on the web?
> Here's the deal, are you sitting down?
> Solar doesn't *power* stuff.
> Photovoltaic solar cells simply recharge batteries.
> And then the solar recharged batteries can then power stuff.
Right. Same tends to be true of wind (and I say "tends" only because I'm
not absolutely cwertain that wind turbines "never" work any other way...)
But what's the rule for balancing solar cell output, to battery
capacity...?
> Thats the simplest explanation you'll find anywhere.
> From that point on it gets exponentially more complex.
> Everything I've read, or was told, says the same thing: first find out
> how much power you require for any given task.
> Say for example you just want a simple *solar powered* lamp over your
> desk, sounds easy right?
> When you run the numbers of the costs of whats involved you'll be
> flabbergasted.
> Take it from me, its far, far cheaper to just get a $10 lamp at
> Walmart and plug it in the wall.
The whole point, tho', for me personally at this time is to see whetehr I
could do stained glass garden lights. Yeah, you can buy all sorts fo
solar lights (from cheap black plastic things, to stainelss steel and
otehr emtal units, to silly/cutie glowing resin animal charicatures), but
what I'm interested in doing is "stepping it up a notch" and dong a hand-
crafted thingy that's unusual - for example, a design using variously-
textured clear glass the way one uses lines and whatnot in doing
pen'n'ink drawings, larger than typical path lights (i.e., more LEDs) and
acting as a sculpture that attractively catches sunlight by day, and just
happens to have lights in it for nighttime viewing.
I'm certainly no stranger to WalMart, but I want to *make* something (if
I can figure out the lighting part), and specifically, try to make
something beautiful, or at least unusual, that people might be interested
in buying.
> On one end of the string you have your PV panel and on the other end
> you have your desk lamp and in between there are a whole buncha dollar
> signs to make it happen.
> Unless you just go out and buy a $50 solar lamp thingy at Lowes or
> wherever that you sit in the yard you're going to find solar stuff in
> general is hugely expensive.
> None of it is cheap.
Neither are hand-crafted stained glass objets d'art - "cheap" isn't my
point in this. I can estimate how long it'd take me to do the glass
parts, but I also need to know what sorts fo parts I'd need, and how
toassemple them, before I can make any sort of estimate regarding my
costs (and therefore, reasonable profit margin) for that part.
What it is, is that I'd like to at least try to see whether I could make
some things that would harmonize with a given house style, IOW, somehting
that's more stylistically individualized - the target audience being
people who care about that sort of thing.
>
> Here in my office I have a computer and a lamp that I wanted to put on
> an *entry level* solar system that I could expand at a later date.
> No way.
> It would cost me over $2,000 right up front just to get the thing
> started. If I reverse engineer the power grid costs of running my
> computer and lamp it would take me 20 years to recognize any benefit
> and unfortunately the solar products won't last that long.
>
> From what I've seen the real solar users in the US fall into 2
> categories and both have lots of money.
> Well, maybe 3 categories.
> 1) The Ed Begleys that have zillions of dollars and no brain power, so
> he throws wheelbarrow loads of coins at the thing to assuage his media
> purchased guilty ass conscience.
> 2) Wealthy people that live in isolated areas where a power grid is
> not an option.
> 3) Less than wealthy people can live off the grid too but they have
> greatly modified their lifestyle so that electricity is not a major
> necessity to them, sort of like living 200 years ago, candles, fires,
> going to bed when the sun goes down, no TV, library computer usage,
> etc.
4) people who are just interested,IOW, natural "tech-heads" ;)
5) people who want to have some light in the yard without stringing
electrical wires all the heck over the place ;)
I'm going for the arsty-fartsy subgrouping of #5 <g!>
>
> If you want to know anything else about this stuff you can ask me, I'm
> no expert but I have learned a few things, or lurk in
> alt.solar.photovoltaic or alt.solar.thermal or alt.energy.homepower.
> I've been hanging out in those groups for a couple years and there's a
> wealth of info to be found there.
>
Oh! OK, good idea, for some reason (well OK, lack thereof!) I never
thought of checking the newsgroups...thanks!
| 
Yahoo! 
Google 
Windows Live 
del.icio.us 
digg 
Netscape 
XML Sitemap