From One Camp to the Next With Minor RV Solar Tribulations

The night before last, after a week, we were treated to a fairly nice Arizona sunset as we were shutting down tram operations at Phoenix International Raceway.

*Arizona Sunset over the PIR Tram Operations Office*

It was kind of an Off week. Part of it got off to a bad start when in the first two days they found two NASCAR fans dead in their rigs from apparent heart attacks... kind of a downer and to tell the truth crew, fans seemed a step off the whole week... even poor lil' Danica went from bein' in the front row in Daytona to crashing out in Phoenix. ;)

Then it really started looking up close and personal like a;  "Pick up boot... thump on head... repeat as needed" sort of a week! When our Solar Power system went down.

Juuuust a lil' "ooops!" in the middle of the night when I slid down the bed to shut off the inverter I'd forgotten to switch off. Sliding across the bed I collected enough static charge to zap things when I touched the panel... Dang!

That xantrex 60 amp charge controller and monitor had been doing great work for us for a long time! It was installed with the intention of adding two and possibly three more panels. Life has got in the way and those haven't been put on yet. The thing is, with all the computer time I spend... we've been living full time, with little generator time, on only TWO Kyocera 130watt panels controlled by that xantrex/trace engineering controller.

...and now I was fearful I'd totally fried it with a tiny lil' static spark... arrrrrggggghhhh.

I got  RV Solar Electric on the phone first thing Monday morning. They're the outfit that sold me the hardware for our RV Solar Power system 6 and a half years ago. You know what? A crooked or even just incompetent outfit, after talking to me and hearing my description of the difficulty would have said; "Bummer, that sure sounds fried to me. You need to order a new one. Just $180 bucks!"

I want to blow their horn a bit, 'cause that's not what they did. They asked me a couple of questions and sent me off to run another procedure on the jammed up system. His last words were; With any luck I'm pretty confident we won't be hearing from you again!"  That to me is Customer Service, trying hard to Not have to sell you more equipment ... customer service and honesty. They were in no danger of any "warranty" work, yet were more interested in taking care of their customer than squeezing out another sale.

I couldn't do that "reset Procedure" right then since we needed to get moved out of the track. I didn't want to get things taken apart and then have something leave me twisting... So I waited till we got set up in a new RV boondock camp to go to work.

*Boondocked near Cottonwood Arizona*

We pulled into a decent enough camp up near Cottonwood that we were pointed to by friends from the tram crew. This should be a pretty fair base to snoop around this country for a short while, before we roll for Death Valley.

Soon as we got set up... I went to work.

What I needed to do was completely disconnect the solar charge controller from any power. That meant both the input and output sides.

What it was doing was; it was frozen in a state that said the batteries were fully charged, so it wouldn't let any power pass from the solar panels to the batteries. I'd tried the "Reset" button on the controller in several different ways... but no go.

It's kind of like when your laptop freezes up and nothing but "crashing" it (turning the power off) will break it loose. For some reason it hadn't occurred to me to pop those wires. DOH!

Now the way this thing is wired in... and where... breaking the panels loose from the controller was a bigger pain than I wanted to subject my tired and cranky but to. SO... for the panels I just covered 'em with the heavy wool blanket you can see in the picture above. Result? No sun on the panels means Zero watts/volts/amps to the controller, same as disconnecting the wires.

From the other side I disconnected the positive wire that runs from the charge controller to the batteries at the batteries where I have plenty of room to work. So... zero power flowing back to the controller from the RV solar power battery bank.

Then... the thing that I didn't know was to leave that all dormant for at least an hour. I figured since he said at least... I'd leave it two. Ha! That made plenty of time to sit and chill with a sweet bottle of Land Shark Beer! ;)

When I got into the battery box I did find something unexpected. I hadn't seen it in six years... Corrosion! Yuck! At least it was only on that one single post. The crud really bloomed! It wasn't there at all just a few weeks ago last time I checked things...

*Uh Oh! Battery Connection gone ugly!*

... the rest look pretty near as clean as the day I installed 'em.

*Clean and Stout 6 1/2 years old RV Battery Bank cables*

Today I'll go through and clean the contacts with soda and reseal. To tell the truth, even though we plan on replacing the battery bank in a couple weeks; There's a part of me urging me to wait it out to see just how long these Trojan T-105 batteries will perform. At six and a half years, they're still doing the job. We barely go below 12.4 volts, with pretty much Zero generator use between about this time in March and November... and very little use really, three or four hours a week maybe through the winter.

That's with making my coffee every morning and a few hours of charging laptops and such on top of that nearly every day. Pretty awesome performance of a solar power system if you ask me.

Ha! You're still wondering about that controller aren't you? :)

SuhWheet! It did just exactly what my guys at RV Solar electric said it would do. It reset! I hooked it all back up in the dark and it seemed to be back to normal. Couldn't get the final GOOD TO GO until the sun came up this morning... She's convertin' sunshine and running like she always has. No New Controller Needed! HooYa!

If you read the comments yesterday you'll see that others recommend other controllers and companies. A couple speak highly of the Blue Sky controller unit. Also the Northern Arizona Wind and Sun Outfit up in Flagstaff. (I've heard good about them before) I can't recommend those only because I haven't used 'em. BUT... the experience of readers here is as worthy as mine, so that gives you a selection to choose from! ;)

Powered Back Up and Converting Sunshine
Brian

***Sorry, but the spam is getting out of control. I have turned on "Registered Users" to comment. I've been getting 200+ spams a week and lately, far too many have been sifting through bloggers filter. Hopefully this will take care of it and I won't have to turn the "Verification Word" gadget back on***

Seriously? Again? :)

Yeah... NASCAR is Done... Poor lil' Danica took the wall again. Her first win will have to wait for another race, but... THAT was not the "Again" I'm speakin' of.

Know how I whined that something always seems to come along and consume our NASCAR wages?

Uh huh... it's THAT that. A couple nights ago I got into bed and forgot to turn off the inverter. Sooooo I slid down the bed... I know, some of you have already caught it ;) ... I slid down the bed and reached out to punch the inverter button...

... zap!

A static charge jumped from my finger and hit the charge controller monitor panel.

I was only a small lil' zap. Wasn't even visible in the dark. Only enough for me to feel it. Buuuuut, it was enough to cook something in the Solar System Charge controller. I've disconnected the monitor. I've hit the Reset button on the controller in the dark, in the daylight, with and without the monitor connected... Nada.

The only thing I ain't done is do a hula dance on the roof in my jockeys drinkin' a beer and hummin' taps.

No joy. The charge controller is frozen in a mode that is telling it the system is fully charged, so it won't let any power flow through. Unless one of the guys at RV Solar Electric knows some trick to get it unfroze... I'll just replace it.

So before we start our slow Northern Migration via Death Valley, I'll spend the next day or so tracking down a fresh solar system charge controller and getting it installed. I can't complain much. This one is six and a half years old and done fine work that whole time.

Maybe we'll be lucky and the price of those has come down too. I checked the panel price the other day and those are down by 50%!!! The Kyocera 135 panels we have cost $640 a piece as I recollect. The new panels at the same place last week were $310!!! I was looking forward to at least another panel and maybe two in the near future.

With two more panels we'd likely not even need to run the generator if bad weather lasted only three days or so.

Ah well, They say when you're as purty as me you have to endure at least some sort of disappointment so you keep things in balance.

The sun's coming up here at PIR. The springtime flowers are Poppin' in Death Valley... and it's time to get packed up. Soon as we're loaded I'll make my parts phone calls and we'll figure out where and how's the best place and way to deal with this blip.

Stay Tuned... summer roaming is close to the start line!

Itchy and powerless ;)
Brian

Hope is the Lighthouse that Guides Me Through the Dark

It's easy to get derailed. If you listen too long it will weaken you... and you'll find yourself diverted... No worries... Putting the wheels back on the rails is a doable task. I'm an old hand at it! ;)

When you get up in the morning do you read the news? Do you turn on the TV or the radio only to see brutality and cruelty that seems to be swelling like a cancer and leaves you stunned? Everywhere you look in the world there seems to be insanity that has an uneasy knot squirming in your gut?

It's not only in Syria, Croatia, Asia, a half dozen African countries, Mexico... Everywhere you look in our own land it seems you see a sickness of the soul and a blackness of the heart that has man turning on neighbor.

It would seem the world is gone mad and depravity has conquered civilization.

But... hasn't it always been so? Didn't the conquistador rain genocide on the Mayan and Aztec? Didn't the British Kings slaughter Scots in the Highlands, manipulate famine in Ireland? The Muslims have fought Christians since the first Muslim and Christian were born.

Cheyenne fought the Blackfoot. Both fought the white man. Tribe has fought Tribe in Afghanistan since the beginning of time, and will till the end of time. One Afghan nation is a western concoction... for which they hate and fight us.

Our leadership teaches us to revile each other and judge according to income and creed. They split us by race and gender, city and farm, conservative and liberal.

To raise up their greed they tear down respect.

Man has raped and cheated; murdered and pillaged since the genesis of the species. It is an old story. There is nothing new.

The only thing that's changed is the speed of the messenger. It twists the mind so it seems as if perversion has run wild; and yet, that is only another deceit. The world itself has not changed, not for better or for worse... nor the people in it.

Times are good for many. Times are brutally hard for others. The strong prey upon the weak. It has always been so.

But people! Take Heart! Listen to the whispers. Those tiny lil' voices in the back of your mind. That soft whispering from your heart.

There is a power that stands up to and defeats the world of sorrow and misery. There is a force that soothes the fear and the sorrow. There is a voice that shines a light in your life.

There is a belief, that if you hold it close enough in your heart, your strength shall never fail. Its strength flows back on itself and grows with irresistible power.

It is a belief  that whether you realize it or not, you possess it. You own it.

That special gift, that strength... that shining star that is my lighthouse... Its name is Hope. Many will call it faith. Some will call it a simple toughness. I call it Hope.

When you stand alone... and those you held most dear and precious lay broken and torn around you, and you are left alone, all you have is Hope. When you feel your heart will burst with the pain as you scream your agony at the sky... Fall to your knees and in their memory... grasp the Hope that they hung to with their last breath.

Raise up your eyes, lift yourself from the ground and with the Hope they passed to you, continue. For them, in their honor if not yourself, live on.

Sure, we have been betrayed. It's not the first time nor will it be the last. Those cowardly few who swore to stand up for those who could not; those malicious frauds who promised to defend and protect have proven their deceit.

They are unworthy of our thought or consideration. It is no surprise. Deep down we knew it would be, we expected it. Our hearts knew their true character, even as our eyes were deceived... but we Hoped. The fraud of their word is not our shame but theirs.

We retained hope. It is our Glory. It is the fuel of our soul and the lifeblood in our hearts. Hope.

As the sun rises each morning... the dawn after our last failure... we shall pick up our tools, we shall stand in the morning breeze and we shall say; It is a fine day. I Hope others are as fortunate as I, for I am still warmed by Hope.

It is the purpose and the goal of all life. Though your dreams may fall to dust, your heart be broken and torn, you only fail if you surrender Hope.

It is not the man who easily rises without strife, standing on the success of others to claim the pinnacle, that is the champion and my moral compass. The one I revere is he who tries... she who strives without ever relenting, and never achieving their dreams; yet they never surrender, they refuse to yield. They live on with Hope.

Don't just look out the window and dream... break out the glass... crawl on through and seize that life you see...

It is that person who tastes the sweetest breath of Life. It is that glorious soul that fully appreciates the friendships and the losses. 

With their final breath they reach out to take yet another step and point; "It is there... just over there..."

You look and see nothing. You turn back to them and ask; "What? What do you see?"

Their eyes gaze upon you... bewildered. To them it is as clear as the sun. With glittering eyes they cry; "There! How can you not see her? It is Hope!"

Retain your Hope... and you prevail. You shine a light that beats back the darkness.

It is a Fine Day.
Brian