I have gotten many questions on how we made our solar powered survivalist home. The problem with people who sell solar power is that they are in the sales business. I have a friend who told a solar power sales person what he needed and the solar power systems sales rep sold him everything he could and went a few miles over the top. Suffice it to say he ended up with 1200 watts of solar panels and only 4 6v golf cart batteries. This was too much in solar panels and too few in batteries. You and no one else should determine how much power you really need for your solar powered home.

Let’s take a look at a solar power home system, an important part of disaster preparedness for your bug out. Many survival guides don’t include this basic information. It starts with a solar panel, which collects light and converts it to power. The power is stored for use in batteries, and the batteries are connected (directly or through an inverter) to the devices that require power. It’s that simple.

If must power your household devices (laptops, etc.) using the AC power supply you’ll need to use an “INVERTER”. An inverter changes DC (direct current - 13.8 Volts DC) into 110 Volt AC (like house current). Inverters should only be used if there is no other way to power your devices. Converters change the voltage, not the polarity, for example, they can change 13.8V DC to 30V DC. This is what my satellite internet modem uses.

We found the converter on eBay for $10. Inverting power from DC to AC causes too much power loss and inverters themselves are not efficient as they drain, on a continuous basis a certain wattage, even if it’s not needed at the moment. Direct connection to your solar grid at 13.9V DC is best and if needed a converter can be used. Our D-Link wireless router uses 7.5V DC. We got a converter for that on eBay for $7 that handles 1.5V, 3V, 4.5V, 6V, 7.5V and 9V for $6. That powers the router without the use of an inverter. In the few instances in which we need to plug a device into 110 AC, we use a 750 watt inverter and this does everything we need it to do without drawing too much power. Other than that, all our devices are connected directly to the DC power.

For most folks going solar means getting your mind into a solar power state of mind. What I mean by this is that you need to understand the electrical term, “WATTAGE”. Wattage is the amount of power an electrical device uses. All electrical devices have what is called a “UL” tag on the back or bottom of the device. The UL tag tells how much power the device needs to operate. For example, my Dell Laptop uses 60 watts and the power supply says 110v AC (house current) 60 watts, 60 cycles.

You’ll need to make a list of all devices you plan to put into your off the grid house. First thing to consider is how much power you really need. Many people go overboard on what they think they need. For us it is:

Laptop - 60 watts

Wireless router - 20 watts

DSL modem - 40 watts

Fluorescent (RV type) light - 50 watts

Radio - 30 watts

NOTE: We use DC fluorescent (RV) lights. These provide lots of light and use very little power (15 watts and 35 watts). This type of lighting can be had from an RV parts supplier or on eBay.

Now consider what it is you can’t live without and how many of these devices you’ll be using at the same time. Add up that total wattage for later calculations.

You need batteries to store the power. “Big Box” mart stores sell RV/Marine deep cell batteries for about $70-$75 each. These are very good because they are built to be drawn down and recharged repeatedly. Still, at some point they will lose their ability to stay recharged very long. But there is remedy for this, for those who like to tinker with things. Battery reconditioning is a simple process of removing the minerals that cause the premature death of batteries. (SEE http://placeofrefuge2012.com/solar.htm for HOW TO RESTORE BATTERIES.)

Goggle “battery amp hour calculator” to determine how many batteries you will need to maintain solar power in your home.

We use 6 of these RV/Marine batteries, hooked in parallel (negative to negative and positive to positive, maintaining a 12 volt system).

When hooking up all electrical devices, the first thing to consider is that DC looses power the longer the run of wire is, so do your best to keep all these components close together and use heavy gauge wire. 8 or 10 gauge copper wire works best.

Sorry, out of room here, so go to http://placeofrefuge2012.com/solar.htm for how to restore batteries!

Peace,

Dan & Sheila

placeofrefuge2012.com