Solar update
October 11, 2001
Well, I went out on Monday, and bought another MSX120. At the price I am getting these things, they are a screaming steal. Maybe I can sell some blood and get another one :-)
Regardless, I'll assemble it this weekend. Despite my earlier logs, I think I will put it on the roof of the main shed. I was going to put it on the smaller one, but as the sun dips lower in the southern sky, the little shed's light output is falling quickly. I think the big shed is as well, but when the leaves dump, it should get a lot more light.
That's one of the ironies of this project: The shed is sitting in a field of trees with only about 3 hours of light a day. However in the winter power output is expected to drop by 50%. Except for the fact that in the winter I will not have any leaves, so power output should be doubled (at least :-). Ah well, such is the ways of the world.
Update: The lights are in and they work. Extremely well in fact. I was in the shed for about 2 hours this evening and really didn't bring the batteries below 80% capacity. Not bad given that I was draining them pretty hard last night while installing the halogens. Current reading on the lights show a perfect 3.0 amps of drawn current (at 24v) for four 20 watt bulbs.
The next step is to actually clean up the fuses and bring the system up past NEC specs. While I am technically in compliance (main fuses, fuses on the secondary circuits and using the ProSolar as the disconnect) I would like to have a real design with explicit disconnects, combiner boxes, and a nice big DC panel with real breakers. I can then wire in things like a 24-12 volt converter, some other bits of stuff, and more lights. Maybe a 12 volt battery charger as well :-)
Anyway, here is the schematic of the proposed design.
Time to call it a night!