Finally we have our solar installed and just waiting for inspection!
Pretty soon our shed will be powered up. A trench will take the power line from there to the house when it’s built. In the meantime there will be a short power pole for the builders with a power point at the corner of the house site.
In addition to the solar panels, batteries, charge controllers and inverters is a 6.5kva generator. We chose a Hyundai generator from MYgenerator. It was a shade over $2K delivered and the suppliers were quick, efficient and painless – highly recommended. Our intrepid solar installer Tim will be hard wiring it into the charge control system shortly.
Although this model of generator comes with it’s own sound suppressing housing we thought it a better bet to give it it’s own shed for better protection from the elements (and prying eyes!)
To accommodate this we built a wooden floor on stumps at the side of our existing shed, adjacent where the Red Earth Drop bear unit is.
Angie helped!
Next challenge was to get a nearly 200kg generator up onto a 400mm high wooden platform. In the end we built a pair of angled and notched ramps from scrap wood to roll the unit up. It worked pretty well, much easier than expected.
For ease of access we chose a bike storage shed to put over the top, It has a top and front doors that swing away to leave easy access for servicing and refueling.
An alarm sensor was added as the last item and configured to work with our existing internet enabled system. It will alert us if anyone tampers with the shed doors. You wonder how anybody could steal a 200kg generator, but then we didn’t imagine anyone could steal a 500kg shed kit either!
The final additions will be a dc marine bilge ventilation fan connected to the dc output of the generator so it runs whenever the generator does and an extended exhaust pipe to take the exhaust fumes outside the shed.
A few words about generators.
Why diesel?
Low fuel consumption – about 1 litre per hour
They’re comparatively quiet
Diesel fuel does not “go off” in the same way petrol does and will last stored in the tank much longer
Automatic starting
Look for a generator that will accept an ATS or automatic transfer switch. These cut in the generator when your mains power goes out. You don’t actually need an ATS when you’re off grid of course, but the facility means the generator’s electric start can be triggered remotely. The charge controller will fire the generator anytime the battery charge gets low. You could save some money by using a pull start (as opposed to electric start) petrol generator, but the difference in cost isn’t that great and ourselves, we’d rather have everything autonomous.
Prime versus standby
This is a standby generator. It is not designed to run constantly. I think about six hours is the maximum stretch for this model. Prime generators are designed to run 24/7, but they are a heck of a lot more expensive. Well outside our budget, so instead, we bought the best quality standby generator we could afford.
Fun moment
The poor guy delivering the generator got the fright of his life when the shed cameras starting talking to him and telling him where to leave the generator – priceless!
He has a name now of course
For some reason everything we install seems to acquire a name – the Hyundai is now Big Gene alongside our small pull start petrol generator for running power tools who is Little Gene.