Well I have failed! So I’m starting all over with this whole battery upgrade…this is probably what I should have done in the first place, so by the time we are done we will have all 600 amp/hours of power and a 3000 watt pure sine inverter operational. I will update the install shortly with more details…last week seemed very long and difficult, it was kind of like trying to put a square plug in a round hole, and I can confirm it just doesn’t work…being a graduate from the school of hard knocks…just saying.

Sunday was a bit of a slack off day for me, after admitting defeat with the temporary battery install on Saturday, a quick disassemble of the battery configuration and moving everything to the basement, positioning, mounting the inverter, making a parts list, and a little time on Amazon and every thing is on the way…

Miss Laurie has been painting! On Saturday she had a helper that landed in the middle of her paint, of course there was a scramble to get a camera, so he was leaving by the time we got a cell phone unlocked…I know you don’t really have to unlock your phone to take a picture, but I’m old and don’t think that fast some days. Miss Laurie is not happy with her picture, but I’m thinking it’s better than most could do, and I know it’s better than anything I could do…like seriously when was the last time you took a photo and painted it.

Again we are running up on a deadline, the first of January is closing in fast, that is when we start into a period of dry camping that will give our new batteries a good test, so I need to get my butt in gear, after the batteries are finished, I have to reconfigure the basement storage which is kind of like a really big 3D jigsaw.

Day 804

Well it’s Friday the thirteenth, and nothing really major happening today…I received our new 3000 watt pure sine wave inverter and controller last evening, haven’t even checked it out yet. This inverter is a hybrid type of inverter, so as well as being pure sine wave it allows us to control our draw on our power source. In simpler terms it allows us to use our batteries and solar when plugged in, our old inverter would shut down and turn into just a battery charger, when ever we had shore power, while this one does not. The best example is when we are drive way surfing at a friends and they let us plug into a 15 amp circuit, the reality is we can really draw 12 amps with out a risk of tripping the circuit, we are limited to a total load of only 12 amps period…this new inverter allows us to program it that we only have 12 amps of shore power so if we tried to use an electric heater at 9 amps and Miss Laurie’s hair drier at 8 amps the inverter would draw battery power to cover all the load (5 amps) over the 12 amps of shore power. The second advantage is when we are on full hookups but we are being charged for our electricity usage, we can reduce our draw by using our battery power, and using the solar, reducing our electric cost, how much saving that provides will remain to be seen.

I’m hopping to finish some rework on the battery tray as we still haven’t totalling succeeded on that front yet, so I will need to cut some material from the back of the battery tray to accommodate our new batteries. I hope to get the engine air filter changed on Thunder today, possibly service the generator, and I’m going to have to make a dump run soon to get rid of some packing materials.

This is also pot luck Friday, Miss Laurie is making her chicken taco soup, while preparing for our off grid trial tonight. Happy hour has been none existent this week as I have had to wait for UPS every afternoon right at happy hour…but that will change now, most of our purchases has landed, so happy hour is back on the schedule.

So I spent a few hours today starting to set the program on our new Victron inverter, and hope to finish it off on Saturday. I have been planning the install and while it will be a lot of work to install and program initially, it will make it much easier to live the life style that we have chosen.