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| The panels have been relocated to a nearby south facing roof. |
The harsh realities of living off-grid in a country where sunlight is often infrequently seen began to make themselves apparent over the last couple of weeks. The solar panels on top of the truck became increasingly shaded, and controller problems meant the wind generator wasn’t pulling its weight. Couple this with shorter days, more computer use, and suddenly our almost permanently full batteries began a slow but steady discharge.
The solution? Firstly to move the panels to an adjacent roof where they get as much winter sun as possible. I suspect we’ll have to get a couple more, as even a few hours of sun could keep our batteries topped up. Secondly we have gone back to the mostly functioning karasouli wind controller, until we can get it swapped out. The guys at Karasouli have been really helpful, but it’s hard to do without the wind generator so we have dragged our feet, and really need to get it sorted before we end up with no power.
Certainly we are lucky here and have buildings to put our panels on, but we’ll have to be a lot more careful once we hit the ground in Wales.
UPDATE – It did the trick, and now our batteries are on the up. A couple of very windy days together with the new site for the panels has worked.
