Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Anyone know anything about home solar panels?

I've got a roof that needs an immediate repair. However, since the roof is 20 years old, I'm weighing the cost of just replacing it now.

I don't know a thing about solar panels, but I like the idea of cutting my power bills, & it seems like this might be a good time to do it, if I'm gonna be working on the roof, anyway.

Are solar panels a great thing? Worth the hassle? A boondoggle? Am I just setting myself up for even more headaches? Where do I go to find out all the credits/rebates/incentives?

Thanks,

FC

One of my best buds is 'off the grid', using Solar as well as a generator, battery storage and wind power.
Talked to him recently, and he advised agaist using the AC output panels if you want to go off grid.
For what you are proposing, I think he would say using those would be the way to go.
My Son's GF has a large solar array on her home. She pays virtually nothing for energy, and is tied into the grid.

Yeah - I have no thoughts of going gridless. At least not at this house.

I was mainly wondering about cost vs. benefits, maintenance, life expectancy of the units, etc.

Thanks,

FC

One of the biggest benefits of solar is heating water. It's something you use year round and after home heating, the biggest use of enery you have.

they're expensive out the ass, hardly generate enough power to run much of anything. So you'll have to have a [bleep] of them to get anything. Plus, you'll have to also have about 20-30 [bleep] car batteries to store what little trickle-piss electricity they gather. A whole damn spare bedroom for batteries, switch configs, accessories, etc.

By the time you spend $50,000 on a set up, in 15 years they are brittle, sunbaked, and need replacing. And in that time, they've saved you really nothing. Not counting all the damn $100 batteries that crap out every 3-4 years.

only way i see it to work is to get Uncle Sugar to subsidize all your equipment on the solar welfare program


Now, a solar water heater, that might be worth trying. one of those to make all your hot water with a small ac powered circulator pump. And walk away from the above solar [bleep].

Like someone said. Using solar to heat water, and also using the extra hot water to heat the house gets your biggest energy users. AC is another problem especially in the south. A semi underground home facing north if you live in the south, and facing south if you live in the north will cut your heat and ac bills and require smaller solar heating equipment, mostly water heating.

Then you can use LED lights all over the house and not use hardly any electricity and require smaller solar panels/batteries just for lighting.

Then you have refrigeration/freezer. More solar panels/batteries for that.

Then you have cooking. One could use an old lens out of an old projection TV and make a solar cooker. There is firewood, propane, natural gas. Electricity for cooking requires 220 volt, forget it.

Then you have TV's sterios, radios, hair dryers, microwaves, drills, saws, etc.

Depends on how far you want to go with cutting electrical use.

If I were younger and starting out, I would definately build semi-underground, have solar hot water, and solar heat. Probably a ground water heat pump for AC. Or some type of natural cooling on a hillside with burried pipes bringing up cool air into the house and the house would work like a chimney.

Lots of ways to minimise use.

My brother has the solar water heater setup on his roof. He had been pleased with it.....until he developed a leak in the system this past week.

Solar power is really taking off in the West and Southwest for obvious reasons. To offset the cost, there are many companies that are offering leases on the equipment which makes some sense depending on your financial situation. I have a good friend who sells Solar and if I owned a house in the West, I�d be all over it. In fact, I think in the next year I probably will own a house in the west, and I WILL be looking at solar.

Don�t let people put you off, solar for your home is a very viable solution these days, but you have to seriously work out the numbers. The ROI is typically around 6-7 years (less than a decade ago it was 13 years, we�ve come a long way) so you have to make sure you�ll be there long enough to really see the benefit. But then again, with many plans you begin seeing some financial benefit day one. Look into it. I don�t know what the sun situation is in your neck of the woods, but it may work.

I have a LOT of wind where I live, but unfortunately that technology is moving at a snail�s pace; very little investment in home wind technology.

I had solar panels installed almost 2 years ago now and am very happy. I signed a long term lease with an option to buy down the road rather than purchasing outright. I'm still connected to the grid so any excess power is routed back to the system and I get a credit for it. This pretty much offsets the winter months when I'm consuming more than I generate. I don't really expect any electrical bills for the next 20 years. Solar works very well in the southwest.

I do have a friend in a desert community that is totally off the grid. That's a lot more work than I'd want to devote to a system. Might as well put on khakis and pretend I'm back in the Navy if I was going to do that.

I don't know if you could expect the same outcome in the midwest. You are going to have a lot more cloud cover on average and snow on the panels means no power. A good technician will be able to run the numbers for you and let you know what to expect.

I ripped out my solar water heater years ago. I was spending more for electricity to run the water pump than I was saving by using solar. The water would get so hot in the summer time due to the intense sun that it would continually boil off out the overflow valve. I now have a gas heater which isn't that expensive to run.

Dixie, you hit just about ever nail right on the head, until the ground water heat pump. However, if you live in an area where there isn't rock within 4 to 5 feet, have plenty of land where you can install lots of footage, or maybe you have a big pond, you can make money. But here in the area where I work, we have rock. Not many places can utilize a cheap installation. Holes are drilled tha same as well holes, and lots of them. Then the pipe loop is installed down the hole and the hole is grouted solid. The heat transfer is to rock. There is no way you can ever re-coup your investement on the original equipment. You'll wear out the compressor, pumps, valves before you ever see the savings over an air exchange unit.

I have lived off the grid on solar and wind now for about 8 years in the NW. I would investigate local power company incentives for before putting in solar when you can sell excess power back to the grid. People promote wind power and I live in a high wind area. I was surprised though when I charted my wind generator usage how little the wind actually does occur and generates power.

Living off of the grid is expensive and requires some technical background dealing with inverters , charge controllers, generators etc. Seems some piece of equipment always needs fixing or replacement.

I have propane fridge, hot water heater propane stove. I cannot use an AC on solar or fans to help heat in winter because they use too much energy. I rarely use microwave for the same reason.

Solar makes some sense with incentives from state and Feds and if you live in southern states where the sun is more prevalent year round. In OH where you live your output will not be so great a few months out of the year.

Solar is not cheap and does require maintenance and panels will not last forever.

A great resource to answer your questions is backwoods solar in Idaho.

Speaking of wind...A while back I looked at some of the small home style windmills. Their advertized wattage output looked pretty good. However, if you read the small print, they say that you only get that wattage with a sustained wind of 25+ mph. That's a whole lot of wind. You could probably figure to get maybe 25% at best of the rated wattage on a continual basis.

Hello Guys i am Henry ......
I have a Solar Panel System installed some months ago in my home .
Its working is best and it produced Electricity free of cost .
I will send its demo to you soon .
Best of luck ......

An excellent post based on misinformation & total BS. Its also real important to make reference to [bleep] batteries when they are deep discharge batteries.

+1 you called that one right! ignorance must be bliss. have lived off grid for 20 years and do all my own installations and maintenance. the op doesn't sound as if he wants to go off grid just wants to try solar. there are sheet panels that act as roofing and you could tie these into the grid for savings on your bill. research sun exposure in your area and also the orientation of your home.is one side of your home facing south?
that is pretty much a must for best results. you can find all the info you need through the web. don't expect great returns but don't be afraid of it either. I get great satisfaction in not making out a check to the power co. every month. also it is gratifying to turn on all my lights when I see the valley below me go dark in a thunder storm.lol

Really.

I HAVE no "Batteries",........none.

420 Watts of PV 12 (or 24V) V DC routed through a linear current booster run a gearhead driven "Simple Pump", piggybacked into my well beside the Line current AC pump.

Sun comes up, water flows, Sun goes down, water quits pumping. ONE small deep cycle battery will keep an RV pump running through the night, if needed.

.....Solar Hot water ROCKS !

My problem keeping pressures down, and not BOILING it.

Ignorance isn't bliss, ....it's just ignorant.

GTC

Much of the payback depends on the incentives provided. In Oregon (depending on location) a homeowner can get the federal tax credit, an Oregon tax credit and a utility incentive. With the dropping price of solar panels combined with these incentives a 5 - 7 payback would be fairly normal. Typical systems simply turn the meter back when they are generating so no batteries are needed. In our area a 3 KW system will reduce your power bill by about 20 - 25%.

Hello Cross, are you sitting on top of an artesian basin?

Affirmative

200' borehole,

1 Horse Gruenfos 220VAC 1Ph hangs at 180, charges conventional residential pressure tank setup.

Sucker rod "Simple Pump" hangs at 127', charges a surface gravity tank.

Static is currently 120', and can't be drawn down with my small capacity pumps.

I can pump the simple pump by HAND, if needed, or wind, or a Burro walking in a circle.

Water's a good thing, at a meeting this AM we were assured by the former chief of Az Dept of Water resources that we're in GREAT shape, at current population / utilization stats.

The big URBAN players WANT our water,....and that makes for an interesting meeting,.....

GTC