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 101...Mike Goes Fishing To Stock Our Pond

Off Grid...Chapter 101 Talk about some crazy hot weather....whew. Thankfully our house stays very comfortable without any A/C as long as we close up the house by 11:00am or so. Ok, lets get to the story. Last Saturday 6-12 Jimmy gave Mike and I permission to go to his pond to take some fish out for our pond. He also left his watering barrel out by his barn for us to use to transport the fish. Mike and I hook up the trailer and go over to Jimmy's property. He is weaning his calves and while we were picking up the water barrel I got a picture of his calves. Mike got the water barrel and strapped it onto the trailer. Then we drove down to the pond. It's time to fish. Mike gets his pole ready while I get a 5 gallon bucket of water ready to transport the fish back to the barrel. We start walking the perimeter of the pond while Mike fishes. This is a very quiet pond. Finally he catches some small fish. He caught 2 small bass and 1 bluegill. It's OK that they are small because we don't want anything big for our pond. One of Mike's "small" catches. We added some water to the barrel before putting any fish in. Here is Mike putting fish into the barrel. Now that we have gone around the whole pond it's time to try the cast net and see if we can catch some more. Our cast net is 6 feet in diameter and it has weights around the edges. This is how it works. You throw the cast net onto the top of the water, it is a big circle, the weights drag it down and hopefully it is over some fish, then it gets pulled tight which closes the net, and then pulled to shore. Mike throwing the cast net. The net going over the top of the water. Closing it after it sinks and pulling it back to shore. Mike does this about 5 different times but doesn't catch any more fish. After that we bring the 3 fish home and release them into our pond. Then we wash out the barrel and return it to Jimmy's. Monday 6-14 Today we went onto town and while we were there we ran into Albert, the man who bought our old property. He told us the gate was unlocked and we could go over anytime to catch some fish. Since Mike and I aren't ones to waste anytime we get it set up. On or way home, Mike calls Jimmy to see if we can borrow his barrel again. We get home, get the trailer, pick up the barrel, and head over to the other property. The new owner has already made some changes. He had a brand new wood fence installed on the front of the property with a new gate....and no lock. We used to have so many fish this old pond. We knew because Mike used to catch and release the bass and bluegill all the time. We also used to feed the catfish. We had about 50 catfish including 4 albinos and a couple of "torpedo" carp(that's what they look like). Mike got his pole set up while I started to fill the barrel with water. It was kind of slow and the first fish Mike caught was too big for our pond so he threw it back. Here is one that is a keeper for our new pond. He's walked and fished the whole pond and has only caught a few bass and some bluegill. Here is, what Mike calls a yellow belly, which is like a bluegill. Next we take out the cast net to try and catch some catfish. We brought some dry dog food to lure the catfish in. It works as a backup when you don't have catfish food, lol. We sat for quite awhile feeding the catfish. Only 20 or so showed up and the albinos are gone. It looks like somebody came in and fished the pond out. That's what happens when you leave gates unlocked and there are no "no trespassing" signs. It's sad because we had those fish in this pond for so many years. Mike throws the cast net quite a few times and only catches some bluegill. Now it's time to get creative and try for some catfish. Mike uses some dog food that has been o the water, so it;s soft, and puts it on his hook. He throws it out and almost immediately he catches a catfish. and she's pregnant. The second one took much longer but Mike finally caught another catfish. Now we have a total today of 3 bass, 2 catfish, 2 yellow belly, and 7 bluegill. It's time to get these fish home. They are all in the barrel with water. Jimmy told us to add a bag of ice because when it melts it makes oxygen for the fish. We never heard of this but we give it a try since we have a 15 minute ride back home. We make it home, slide the barrel off the trailer, and pour the fish into our pond. We made it just in time. Just as we got back to the house the skies opened up and it poured. After a couple of hours it finally stopped raining. Mike and I clean out the barrel, which got a very good rinsing from all the rain, and return it to Jimmy's. On our way back into our property we stop and check out our pond. The water is gushing out of the pond. And. And through the culvert that is under the driveway and out the other side. And into the creek. Unfortunately with all this heavy rain our pond is now very muddy. It will be that way until we get some grass growing on the banks. I also spotted a deer on our side hill. Tuesday 6-15 Wow, it is hot as heck out and very humid. Mike and I got to work early before we can't work at all. It's time to work on the next section of our ditch. This is the last of the rock that we dumped o the side. Now it has to be hand placed in the ditch. Mike seeds the hill so we can put the curlex on. We roll out the curlex and then I staple it down. After a few hours we finally got all of the rock done and it is hot....but the bank and ditch look good. Now we need to protect it from the cows so they don't destroy our work. Mike hammered in rebar at the bottom entrance to keep the cows out. Then he put in more rebar at the top to keep the cows from coming onto the curlex. As you can see this is where they were once before. A job well done and we are past the curve. Time to get back in the house because it's too hot to work outside. While Mike and I put the tools away, Niki finds a nice cool spot. Wednesday 6-16 It's a wet morning. Good thing we got the bank done yesterday. Mike started the day by hardwiring our generator into our electric panel that goes to the house. Now if we need the generator as backup power it's one simple switch. I go up top to check on our ditch....and guess what happened? The cows destroyed our nice work. It rained on and off most of the day. That night we had a very cool sky. Thursday 6-17 We got a call from Jimmy. He is sending a guy over to deliver more gravel for our driveway and also some rip raft for the rest of our ditch...and you thought we were done. While we wait for Jimmy's guy to show, we load up the Jeep and the tractor and go down to do some work. After all of the tearing up when we installed the electric, we now have to put it back together. We start with the big hill and flat are that we had cleared for a turnaround. Mike starts throwing some rye seed, in hopes of it establishing quickly, while I go behind and spread the Fescue. The big area. After the seed is down I start a light rake to mix the seed with the soil. This way of it rains hard it won't get washed down the hill. While I finish that, Mike goes down the the pond and seeds that area. The poor fish. The pond is so muddy but at least we haven't seen any floating. We think they are all still alive. I got the big hill and the flat area done....now we need just a little rain each night, lol. Yeah right. Next Mike and I start working on the barn area. We rake and shovel any rock and throw it on the pond wall. Then we seed it. As we get closer tot he transformer the dirt is hard as a rock. Mike uses the tractor to pull the rock away from the transformer and hopefully loosen the dirt a little. Jimmy's guy shows up with the gravel. He dumps that and then goes back for the rip raft for our ditch. While Mike helps him navigate the dumping of the gravel I start working on another hill. This one is a rocky mess. Finally I get the rocks raked down and I get it seeded. Mike puts out straw by the barn area. Jimmy's guy shows up with the rip raft, 18 tons of it. Guess what we will be doing next week? It's too hot now and time to go in. Friday 6-18 Mike said he would take me out tomorrow if I cleaned the Jeep. So while he worked in his building I stripped the Jeep and cleaned it all. What a mess. I also got most of the mowing done and laundry. Later on I gave Niki girl a bath and that's about it. Saturday 6-19 We took a drive to the big city, lol. We went to Kingsport to visit a fellow Cd'er at her new shop. We had a very nice time meeting her and checking out her shop and her next project. We wish her the best with her store and the next project, which is massive. We got home late so no work today. Sunday 6-20 Mike and I were in a funk. I told you....it's all or nothing with us. Today is one of those nothing but piddle days. Mike organized the back building....again and I worked on my garden. I hope you all enjoyed it. Lisa