Chapter 142...Our New Solar Panels Being Installed

I love not having any electric bills:)  Finally the day we have been waiting for.  Time to get our new solar panels in the mounts and get hooked up.  It's so nice to not have to worry about power outages.

So back to our story and back to the second week of April.

April 8
Today I spent the day working on the garden of rocks around the solar panel mounts and Mike did the drilling for the solar panels.

On a cute note...here are some updated cow and calf pictures:)
Our big girl "Red" and in the background our unsociable cow and her light colored calf:

Mama and her baby.

And the one with the white face, like a mask:

Mike and I took a ride down to our pond and got to see some of the fish.  It's good to see the babies after the winter months.

And:

Enough animals...now it's time to work.

We have a couple of bags of concrete left so Mike and I decided to use them up and fill up all of the holes.

Mike is spraying the bottom of a pole with the rubber paint for protection:

All the concrete is used:)

Next Mike works on leveling the 4x4's so I can start filling the gardens with rock:

Mike is pounding rebar into our 4x4's and into the ground the make the garden more solid:

Now I can start filling them with rock.  First I put the weed cloth down, then I take the shovel and the 5 gallon buckets back to our rock pile.  I use the hand truck to bring the full buckets of rock back to the garden:

While I do that, Mike works on drilling holes into the solar panel mounts.  This is so we can install the solar panels.  He needs to drill a total of 50 holes, ten holes in each rack:

Finally after thirty 5-gallon buckets I get the garden finished and we have no more rocks.

Mike is hosing them down to make it nice and clean:

It was a good day and it feels so nice to have nice weather.


April 9
More blue skies.  It's time to paint.

We are going to paint all of the solar panels mounts green to match the building and while we are at it we will paint the side of the shipping container.

Laying out cardboard to protect the rocks:

Mike using his new paint spray gun:

All the solar panel mounts are done:

Once the mounts are done we start on the side of the building.  We might as well while we have the chance.  Once the new solar panels go up we won't be touching this side of the building ever again.

We start at the front top corner of the building.  While I hold cardboard up to protect the driveway, Mike starts spraying.  He also sprays my hands but at least the driveway isn't green, lol.

Almost done with the building:

The painting is done:)

We have to let everything dry before we can install the solar panels.


April 10
Today is the day we have been waiting for.  It's time to get our new bigger solar panels on the new mounts that Mike designed:)

The solar panels are big so Mike and I will have to work together to get them on the racks.  The first one is the hardest as we don;t have much land to stand on.  I really hope we don't drop one.

The first one is in the rack:

And presto...eight of them are in.  We work so fast, lol.  Since Mike and I had to work hard to get them in I couldn't take pictures.  You can see how much bigger these are compared to the old panels which are on top of the shipping container.

We also got the two panels installed that stand alone to catch a different angle of the sun.  After all the panels are screwed in, Mike wants to clean up the ground.  Here he is grading out underneath the panels:

Next I raked it all out and Mike starts seeding:

And:

I put the hay over the seed and Mike waters it:

Now it's time for the really important part and since I can't do any electrical, Mike is on his own.  Mike has to get all of the wires hooked up so we can make our own electric.


Mike installed two combiner boxes on the outside of the shipping container and under the solar panels.  A combiner box takes all the wires from the solar panels, combines them into one, and then sends them to the charge controller inside the shipping container.

Mike has 5 panels going into each combiner box.  Each solar panel has it's own circuit breaker.


Mike uses the torch to seal the shrink wrap over the connectors to make them weathertight.

Skip to April 16 as we had other work going on at the "store" property:)

Mike is getting getting ready to put the wire from the combiner boxes into the charge controller.  This is a really thick wire and you need strength in your hands to do this kind of work:

Peeling back and clipping the strands that aren't needed:

Mike hooking up one of  the charge controllers:

And the finishing touches:

Here are the circuit breakers onside the combiner box:

Our wire mess.  Mike will clean this up soon:

Now we are set to go.  Next I will help Mike take down our old panels and he will hook up our new system:)

I hope you all enjoyed this story and I will write again soon:)

Chapter 128...How To Build A Shed Part 1

Off Grid...Chapter 128 Mike and I have been working on building a shed on and off and in between landscaping since March. We finally have it finished so now it's time to start the story This is an unusual shed but hey did you expect anything else from us, lol? As you know we have metal shipping containers for storage. And the one in the very back is really....really ugly and it has a lot of dents. At first Mike and I thought we should just buy another shipping container and put it next to the other one....until we went to VA and looked at the containers and the prices New plan. Now we decided to build a new wood shed and incorporate the old metal shipping container under the same new roof. This would give us a building for "clean" storage, cover up the ugly old building, and cost a lot less than a new container. This is going to take a lot of trips to Lowe's. Lumber is heavy Our first load of wood. Next we have to move the old fence that runs behind the old shipping container. Mike taking out the old t-posts. You can see by the green 4x4 where the new shed will be. Once we get all of the old t-posts out, we roll up the barbed wire, and start to place the old t-posts in a location to make room for the new part of the shed Mike banging in one of the t-posts. Good enough. The fence posts are moved and the barbed wire is back on. The 4x4 in the back is where our new shed will be. Next we have to get the green(old) building as level as we can. It has sunk a bit over the years. First we try jacking it up. Unfortunately the jack isn't strong enough to do the job. So we bring in the tractor to help us. With using the tractor and the jack we got it as level as possible without calling in for big machinery. It is level enough at least it is within the level lines Back to Lowe's for another load of material OK..time to get started building We are going to use cement blocks on the ground, then add 4x4 pressure treated posts, and then build the deck for the new shed on top. We start off by laying things out to make the base level. The size of the new shed will be 8x20 which is the same size as the green building. We start to build the deck in two pieces using pressure treated wood. The first deck is done but we need to dig out some dirt to level it up. We move the cement blocks and 4x4's so Mike can dig out a little of the dirt. Mike uses the nail gun to nail in the second deck. Now it's time to put the floor on top of the deck. Since it is only a shed, we are using OSB and we never use OSB. We used 3/4" tongue and groove OSB for the floor. Installing the floor. The floor is on the deck It looks pretty ugly right now but we have a vision Next we mix all of the sample floor paint we had from last year. We decided to use it as a 1st coat on the floor. Hey....why waste anything? Mike starts to roll the floor with paint. It is all painted. Now we can start on the walls. Mike and I use 2x4 studs to make the walls. We build them on the floor and then we will stand them up and nail them in place. Mike working on the wall studs. We get the back and side of the wall studs done and stand them up. Niki is a prisoner, lol. And the front wall stud is done with an opening for a door. It's time to start closing it up. We used and exterior composite wood called barn board for the new shed. Here is the first exterior board nailed to the studs. Mike nailing the sides on. And the exterior walls are done with the cutout for the new door. It's starting to look better already...especially if you ignore the big ugly metal door, lol. Now we have to wait for the trusses. That will be the next chapter for our customized shed. I hope you all enjoyed the story and the pictures. Lisa