Posted 2016-02-04 8:32 PM Subject: Solar water heaters and Solar lighting in barns
Expert
Posts: 4766 Location: Bandera, TX
Anyone out there have a solar water heater system in their barn. If so would you share your experiences with the system. If your running off the grid would you recommend some lighting systems to me please.
Posted 2016-02-04 10:32 PM Subject: RE: Solar water heaters and Solar lighting in barns
First thing .... buy you one of the 60-100 LED solar powered lights off of Amazon or Ebay for 30-40$'s ... that has a watt selector or use of how many LED switches so you understand the not so great power of solar power and that everything is run off of a huge stack of batteries for any house/barn use with limited amperage and voltage use.
Use this thing as a realistic learning curve and do not believe the crap you read on converting the nation or cities to solar or wind power ... lol ..
Even with one of these small units ... first thing you will notice is the instructions to put the solar panel in full sunshine for 2-3 days to charge up the tiny battery before you use it .... then note how many hours it works after sundown for limited to full light usage ...
The ones with motion sensors on them are great to flash on so you can find the regular light switches ... or as an alarm that something is walking up and down your alleyway ...
Compare the 1000 lbs of batteries it takes to run an electric car for less than a 100 miles even while it is running a lawnmower engine to help keep the batteries charged and then they lie to you and say the car gets 45mpg but never give you the cost of the battery re-charge nor the time it takes for the re-charge .....
Then you die a slow death when you find out the battery pack may last 5-6 years and costs $5000 to $12,000 to replace or trash the car ... lol ...
Think batteries, control systems, invertors, convertors and how much time you need some light and don't forget emergencies ..
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On an isolated cabin or barn needing a hot water tank .... think of the small 6-10 gallon RV water heaters using propane and include the RV water pump in the system. .. (low power use) .. Turn them on when you need them .. about 30 minutes to heat one up ... and you will need an on-off nozzle to limit the amount of hot water you are spraying ...
Now go buy you one of the cheap <$600 Chinese knockoff 5000 watt generators to run some lights and the water pump ... or use your welder as your generator.
If you put all of this in a tack room or solo room ... you can heat the room from the heat off the generator engine/exhaust pipe ... just make sure you have an add-on exhaust pipe run thru the barn wall and extends 2 ft above the roof line.
And have a CO2 alarm and propane alarm in the tack room ... $40-60 ... for your own safety ..
There are a lot of youtube videos on solar stuff ... and when you run into a commercial company video they make it sound easy and inexpensive until you get their bill for $1000's and start replacing batteries just like you would in your car ...
When evaluating solar light bulbs always look at the lumens which is the light they emit ... when they say ... uses 24 watts of power to replace a 75 watt incandescent bulb (950 lumens) ... you get less than 600 lumens ... which is about the equivalent of a 25 watt incandescent or the bulb in your oven ...
Just a few things to think about ... before you find out it will take 15-25 years to payback your setup expenses ...
Solar water heaters and Solar lighting in barns
