1 Turkey, 2 Moose and 2 Deer

Written by Daniel A. Bergamini

Sunday, 15 May 2005

This weekend was a good one indeed. It's been a while since an update so here it goes. The inverter is up and running and working like a champ. It appears we sized everything pretty well and are very happy with it all. We can run a typical weekend load on one charge of batteries (running them down to 50%). (Read on) A few weekends ago I got up the effort (and the ground started to thaw) to dig the gas line trench a little deeper so I could drive a few more 8' ground rods and connected them. We now have a total of 4 ground rods connected with bare 6AWG wire which should provide plenty of grounding. It was finally nice to start covering up that trench as well. Fear that we weren't properly grounded was the one thing that was keeping me from connecting up the inverter. Our Xantrex SWPlus4024 is a very pricey little unit and I'd rather have it well grounded before powering it up. With the ground in place, I fired up the inverter and ran through some quick tests. Success! Hopefully the weekends running a $25 400 watt portable inverter is numbered. Unfortunately at this point it was Sunday afternoon and time to go. This gave me a week to figure out how to configure the inverter. The next Saturday I started early, by rewiring the well pump to run through the step-up transformer. The quick explanation is most houses run what is called single-phase 240v. There are 2 120v legs, so each leg to neutral (or ground) is 120v. Across both hots is where you get the 240v. The inverter we have only provides 120v, so we need to use a few transformers. One is to step the 240v out of the generator down to 120v (this balances the windings) and the other to drive the well pump. With this out of the way, I connected the generator to the step-down transformer, from the transformer to the inverter, and the inverter to the main panel. Then came the scary part, turning it all on. Having tested the inverter last weekend, I was comfortable turning that on and powering the house. Next I started the generator and confirmed we were getting 120v out of the transformer. When power is applied to the inverter, it matches voltage and cycles, throws the internal transfer switch (to run the house off the generator) and starts charging. There are a lot of unsettling noises out little system makes during this whole process, but I'm starting to believe it's "normal". With that out of the way we started wiring, insulating and drywalling the garage (1st floor). It's a slow but steady process, the rough wiring is pretty much done and some of the switches and outlets are in. Most of the insulation is finally in and we ran out of drywall. This weekend was amazing for plants and wildlife. Saturday morning we had a visit from Madoline, our resident turkey. She wonders around the driveway eating who knows what (mostly fallen birdfood). Later in the day while we were insulating/drywalling I walked out the front door and much to my surprise there were 2 Moose walking down the path next to the house. They were standing perfectly still staring at me, much in the way Daisy does when you call her name. Aparantly that game isn't just for doggies anymore. We had the radio on inside and I didn't want to spook them, so I called elaina. Elaina. E-laina! ELAINA! and finally she walks out of the garage. Her eyes drift towards where my finger points and she was in the same awe as me. We tried to get the camera and get a few shots, but the Moose figured that was a good time to walk briskly away. Sunday morning Daisy woke us because there were 2 deer wandering around the bottom of the field out the guest window. We watched them for a while, probably 10 or 15 minutes, and took a bunch of pictures. This weekend was the Canaan "town wide yard sale". We picked up a bunch of cheap tools and the best $25 purchase EVER. A trampoline. It's fun to really feel like a kid again.

Last Updated ( Sunday, 15 May 2005 )

 

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