Colorado B.S. Thread

Fuck that POS DB lift!

SAS or replace a ton of parts to get back to close to stock.

 

Is anybody selling a 3rd gen 4Runner or know of one for sale? Thinking about making some changes.

 

We could use just the front shocks and coils. He found his rear leafs.

 

Another taco down

 

Not down, just possibly relocated if I can find a clean 3rd gen 4Runner. Baby bills are adding up.

 

Gosh I hope not!!

 

bruh I know the feeling. Got my wife into a 16 T4R and things were so much better

 

I want to cut down on bills, not add them! Wife has the 2011 Sequoia to drive.

 

Having my appetizer, just waiting on my prime rib now

 

Is this I keep knocking and nobody is answering!

 

Delicious!

 

Thank you!

 

Anyone designed or know much about building a solar system? And well pump questions since I haven't had one of those before.

For my near future plans, I am trying to get stuff sorted out but electrical is not my strong suit. But I am trying to lay out the numbers and details for building a small property close enough to power if I want it, but ideally I wont be hooking up to electric. Electric would be for a future garage since machinery would suck up power real quick (lift, compressor, welder, etc).


Found some formulas to get the basics. (These numbers are pre-well pump)

I think I can easily do under 2kw/h per day, only main appliance I see needing is fridge/freezer (apartment size unless I go with a propane unit).

400W of panels seems like it'd do the trick (numbers come in just over 300w). And its looking like 800Ah hr of batteries. This is all factoring in 20% extra.

Wood fired stove for heat, separate one for garage area.
Propane for stove/oven, and water heater.
Leaning towards a steel framed building with small garage attached for now for ease of building and lack of maintenance needed.

Anything I should keep in mind? Looking for an inverter (pure sin). And are most systems expandable if I want more power or will the controllers be what would need to be upgraded if I added more? Can you hook a wind turbine to a solar inverter or is that a different system? I'm sure I'd dabble into that for fun.

Also I'd be pumping well water into a storage tank. I would assume I could just use the well pump when I wanted to fill the tank? Will there be issues with me doing that? The well pump is a huge power hog, so just wondering on that. If I could use it when the tank dropped below halfway or something I likely could go weeks without using it.

 

Are you going without water pressure?
Well pump (and expansion tank) creates pressure so it's more than just filling a tank.
Unless you're going to fill a tank a hundred feet higher in elevation.

 

I am not your man but also interested in this.

One thing I will note, most boondock campers are replacing 3-way frigs for regular 110 volt ones, and few are "apartment sized" either. This say current (2010+)Frigs energy use is minimal. They just make their battery storage able to handle this, say the cost savings are significant and Electrical is re-newable, Propane not so much.

Also, You are planning on a 100% solar efficiency which is never the case (snow on panels, clouds, etc) I think this will have you add both Panels and Storage to overcome.

Anyways, very interested in how this gets solved.

 

Before noon

 

I figured a smaller water pump and expansion tank in house might be more economical... but not sure. Well pump to get it up to the tank and then pump from there for pressure into house. The cheap 12v ones can get good water pressure on very little power (I'd use something bigger, but seems like it would easily be less than the 1kw (up to 4kw startup) ive been seeing for well pumps. Mainly since the well pump sucks a shit ton of power on startup and when running.

Nice, yeah fridges look to be pretty efficient these days. Those numbers were based off using 20% buffer on power usage. Pre buffer, I'm at 150 watts needed after dividing by the lowest solar number for this area (4.33 hours a day). So, using those numbers, adding the buffer then rounding up, being at 400w seems to be a nice buffer. Same with batteries at needing a rounded up number of at least 800ah. Of course, this is before the well pump, but its all in excel so I can change it as I add stuff.

And I would likely throw the propane tank in first and buy a decent sized gas/propane generator so if I really needed emergency power, I'd have that as a solution.

But, its early in the actual planning stages, so theres a lot to iron out such as the water situation.

 

Mine was on Tuesday and nobody cared. You can make up for it with some cake. Just sayin'

 

Happy belated birthday to our favorite Boulderite!