Ukiyo
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Posts posted by Ukiyo
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Would save me the hassle of fiddling with the electronics of my existing fittings, seems I'd just need to connect the positive and negative wires on the new fittings into my wire run, job sorted. They are also cheaper than led replacement bulbs.
Anyone used them, or any comments?
A lot of sensible stuff being said in this thread.
I would try one before you go changing out all your light fittings.
Sometimes the details about these things are not entirely accurate in terms of light output etc.
...and there is the question of is it worth it and will you end up with something worse.
Flo tubes are already pretty efficient.
I have a friend who much prefers the blue LED lights than the yellowish ones so taste can be a factor too.
You might even want different colour temps for different parts of the boat and usages etc.
Personally I like all the G4 type bulbs that sell for about £1 on ebay but I guess you need to have a fixture they would work with.
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Here's a tip: Find a big pointed stone and stand it up where the sun disappeared. You can put up some more when it reappears and when it makes you really hot. Then you'll know what's going on next year.
Yeah! Good idea, lots of them in a big circle so I can keep track of it properly.
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Ahem. 'Galleys'...
Wanted to thumb this up but not enough thumb credit left but it definitely made me laugh.
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Are you actually in an off-grid house and near London?
I'm wondering if getting a grid connection might be an idea as the sun isn't going to be delivering usable power again for a few weeks yet.
Or buy a generator like the rest of us!
Always amused when people people living aboard talk of people living in houses! Lots of people live in flats of course and a flat would be a much more sensible guess given London and the hallway has lights on 24/7. Although you would also be guessing wrong.
To be fair it's more of a corridor than a hallway.
Planning on fixing up a boat to stay on. Whatever I have come up with will be quite an upgrade.
I'm very much enjoying chatting to people about their setups here and seeing photos of their beautiful boat kitchens and stuff.
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We got up early today and went up the hill to watch the sunrise. We waited 15 minutes and gave up and went back to the boat. It was really late. It is obvious to me that the sun is just not reliable any more, I think all those who invested in solar panels have made a big mistake. I blame David Cameron myself, he is doing all this negotiating in Europe when he should really be looking after the English weather.
.............Dave
I'm not sure he is doing that much negotiating. I think the other parties just said no and that was the end of it.
More like a short chat, but you are right he should get back to England and find someone who can control the weather to sort things out.
To be fair to Mr Cameron he has (along with his party) been trying to discourage people from using solar power, I guess because he knew it would be this unreliable. I mean who knows when the sun is going to shine or the wind blow. (I mean other than weather forecasters and google and stuff) Personally I never would have guessed they would be moving the sun about all the time like this. It does seem quite impractical. I just want them to put it back and stop messing with it.
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How about rigging up some big lights in front of the panels...?
Already got some although they only come on at night (which to be fair is most of the time at the moment) but it just doesn't seem to generate enough power. I'm tempted to put my panels on my door in the hallway though which is generally well lit 24/7.
That might work but would probably be a bit of a give away.
In any case I've not really come across lights that are as good and economical as the sun.
Although the lights are handy when it is dark and you are stumbling around.
It seems that this November and December not only have they moved it, they have stuck it behind a curtain too.
Awful return from panels this winter so far.
Okay I'm really glad it's not just me. I had a falling out with some Sun Cult types recently and I had wondered if they might be partially responsible.
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Set your alarm for 0700 on May 1st and get up then.
Loafer that sounds like a great plan although it also seems like I might miss a bit of the sun coming back maybe.
I know when it went away it wasn't on such an easy to remember date.
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I'm almost entirely reliant on Solar for power at the moment.
Some time ago my solar controller suddenly went into load disconnect mode and has only just started to come out of that mode more recently which is ironic as today is the winter solstice!
I realised after a while that this was because they had moved the sun and now my North facing panels couldn't pull down so much energy. This happened last year and I remember the power did come back at some point. A friend of mine reckons they will put the sun back where it should be after a while too.
So I'm wondering does anyone have any idea when the sun might be back where it ought to be and my panels will start pulling in the power again.
I wish I had taken notes when it happened as then I would know when it might happen again.
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Thanks for the photo Alan. That really does have a lot of style in a nice compact space!
Very impressed.
So the microwave is a bush. Do you know what model it is?
Perhaps you just need to find a microwave with the good old analogue controls for it to work with a modified sinewave inverter.
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on the river, remember this isn't messing around in a paddling pool its quite possible to sink, pollute etc however I don't know the details of the condition of the boat 3) if you overcame those it will cost ££££ and need to be done fast. Out the water, the clock's not ticking (as fast), storage on hardstanding is always cheaper than in the water.
This! I would actually feel safer with the little boat on the canal or a more inland river than taking the boat too far out into the wider stretches of the Thames right now!
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You need what is called a slipway. There are quite a few around.
Where are you - roughly?
There is a slipway nearby oddly enough.
I'm not there right now but the boat is not a million miles away from Eel Pie island but it needs to move on soon.
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A 23 ft GRP cruiser is not an ideal vessel for living aboard. You need to be very careful that any money spent will be perceived by a potential buyer as having added value when you come to sell it. It would be all too easy to spend time and money on it, and then find it's all been wasted when you come to sell. As you will.
My advice would be to get off the canals and upper Thames. You don't want the hassle of trying to jump through hoops to get a BSS. But, having said that, I would advise, if you make any changes to electricity, gas, or heating, that what you do is BSS compliant.
Not only will you be safe, but so will other people, and if you want to get BSS later, it will be less of a problem.
Good luck.
Great posting! Yes I definitely want to get everything legal and BSS compliant and get the certificate.
that's basically the end goal.
As to the value of selling, that is one thing but there is also the value of using it too.
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Sounds like best plan would be it comes out the water
Yes but you make that sound easy.
Even if I get hold of a trailer then there is still the problem of where the boat goes to for the time it is out of the water.
I assume being only grp and small it might be possible to get it onto a trailer without a crane or anything too?
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Yeah, what's more, a MSW inverter (Modified Sine Wave), not PSW (Pure Sine Wave). I think it was partly research, and partly luck, that I found a microwave that worked with a cheap MSW y with no real issues - go for one with a manual/mechanical timer, not a digital display/etc, and go for a low power one. You need to cook things for a bit longer but you'll get the knack of adding a little bit of time on.
The battery bank was 3x plain old cheap lead acid leisure batteries. Since this style of battery is commonly sold as a "dual purpose" start/leisure battery, and that starting currents can be typically 100+ Amps, then with the 3 of them powering the microwave its typically 80A total, so ~27A each, well within the capability of the battery. The wiring needs to be good quality, I used 50mm2 because of the distance; and items such as the fuse and isolator switch need to be correctly specified too.
Thanks for the info Paul!
I've been a bit off the map so sorry for the slow reply.
Not sure I'm going to get one as it seems like a fabulous indulgence but I'd like to know the make and model of microwave if you remember.
Who knows I might get one (I'm worth it!)
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I thought I would explain a bit better about the boat.
The boat hasn't even moved for a good couple of years now and is in terrible condition.
It has no license or boat safety or anything at this point and needs some work doing before it could get those I suspect..
It is presently privately moored on the Thames but has to move on which was why I was looking into the Thames as it wouldn't have to go far.
It is a plastic (GRP) boat and only about 23foot, so maybe it could be trailered somewhere somehow?
So yes I would love to go on a continuous cruise but it's not ready for that yet and it is in that strange not very legal boating twilight. I'd like to find a way to at least make it legal to visit the CRT places.
Feel free to ask me more questions about it all!
Freya
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Sorry I dropped off the map there a bit.
I sometimes have sketchy access to electricity and internet etc.
Thankyou so much for everyones great replies and suggestions!
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PS I happily used a microwave (small one) using nothing more than 200W solar power to recharge the batteries. In the spring/summer/early autumn there was no need to run the engine to keep the batteries charged up. The thing with microwaves is, although the power requirement is high, they are not on for a long time so the energy requirement isn't massive. 2 mins microwave use, half the day available to charge the batteries etc
This was through an inverter?
I'm guessinga big part of making that work will be about batteries that are up to supplying the draw even if it is only for a short time. Would love to have a microwave tho.
Freya
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That is a great post Paul. Thankyou.
I know my original question was a bit lacking in detail but that's because I don't go to forums to get the answer to something because with a lot of things in life there isn't one right answer anyway. However I find it useful to hear a variety of different opinions and also it's really great to hear other peoples actual experiences.
I'm not quite sure what my future situation is going to be like but I want to improve on the current situation at some point and have a better standard of living. As Phil implied. Living shouldn't be just camping. Having said that I like that way of looking at things.
For the time being I'm just camping!
Right now my system is a bit limited in the ways you guys talk about and more. I only have so much space for my panels so I've used a slightly better controller to try and help. Perhaps the obvious next step would be to get enough panels to max out the 10amp controller I already have.
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The PWM controllers aren't fake. They're the simple ones, and very cheap, and do work well for the price. It's the cheap MPPT controllers which are fake, mostly. A good MPPT controller can give up to 30% more power from the same panels.
If we are talking the cheap chinese ones then they are also fake. You can get cheap PWM controllers from morningstar tho and sometimes other places too. PWM stands for Pulse Width Modulation. It works by sending pulses down the wires. These pulses can be picked up with a simple FM radio, so an easy test to see if it's really PWM is to put an FM radio right on the cables and see if you can pick up the signal. It's kinda funny because they have gone to a lot of trouble to make it seem like PWM but they still fail the radio test which is easy enough to do.
Hope that helps!
The chinese controllers are still great value tho because they do work, and they are very cheap, they just arent PWM.
Bimble sell Tracer MPPT controllers, amongst others, and these are genuine, and good value.
George you are awesome. I will look into these.
I will definitely also check out the meadotech stuff. Thanks very much Firesprite!
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4) Putting 12v directly into your battery straight from solar panels via a controller.
All methods of battery charging 'cost' (primarily either petrol or diesel) although plugging into the mains (landline) is without doubt the cheapest.
Once the initial 'capital expenditure' of the solar system ( you could get a good system from Bimble for £500 ish) has been paid the electricity is 'free'
The 'capital expenditure' for a generator is similar ( or higher) than Solar, and, you have the ongoing costs of (around) £1 per hour to run it.
We can live comfortably ( 12v Fridge on 24/7, unlimited TV, phone charging, PC charging, lighting, occasional twin-tub washing machine, water pumps etc) in the Summer with 200 watts. In fact, the SOC of the batteries ( 2 x 135Ah) when we got up in the morning was higher than when we went to bed.
We could moor up for at least 3 days without running the engine - probably longer if I really wanted to.
Just as an aside - I believe that an MPPT controller will give round 30% more 'power' than a MWP controller.
The controller may cost more, but, its worth it for the 'extra' that actually gets put into your batteries
I love hearing about what you are all doing with solar. It sounds incredible to me and is very inspirational!
I've been what Phil would call "camping" for about 6 months now.
Actually I've also been able to charge laptop and phone batteries in the library too, so that's kind of mains charging, tho I don't bring the marine battery with me
I'm quite limited in what I can do in my current situation, especially now it's winter and the bas***** moved the sun, but I'm thinking if I'm able to change things then I could have a much greater potential capacity and you guys seem to be backing that up although I guess some of your power is coming from the engine in addition to your panels.
Food for thought anyway!
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It is now very hard to find a residential mooring on the Thames in London, and if you do find one, it will not be cheap. Somebody recently paid over £400,000 for a mooring in Chiswick, with no security of tenure.
Hiya George,
Yeah I wasn't even looking for a residential mooring but just somewhere to moor while I get the boat into workable condition but there are not really moorings of any kind available now it would seem. The boat yards are being converted to luxury mansions and from hear it sounds like the more temporary options in terms of a moving community has been moved on elsewhere.
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I'm not sure that's true. Certainly some of the cheap MPPT controllers from China don't appear to do very much at all but PWM is simple enough technology to get right.
Tony
I know what you mean but the PWM controllers are also fake. It's really bizzare because they have gone to a lot of trouble to make them seem real and you would think by that point they might as well just have made a real PWM controller.
Most of the chinese controllers are basically the same electronics in different cases. They say PWM or MPPT and cost different prices but inside it is the same stuff. Just a switching controller. Having said that if you get a really cheap chinese controller that can handle a lot of amps they can be great value.
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UKiyo, if you live on the boat and don't have mains, then get a propr solar system. It'll pay for itself in just a few (sunny) months.
Bimble is your friend.
George your posts have all been interesting and really helpful. Bimble do have panels at a great price so I'm going to definitely have to think about maybe upgrading my Morningstar for more amps or getting a very cheap Chinese controller or something.
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I have to say some of this stuff is kind of mind blowing for me. Dish washers, freezers, even considering a washing machine is just wow!
Is anyone here running a microwave?
I can run my little DVD player and watch movies, charge my nook/phone, listen to my DAB radio. Run an LED lamp and it's almost enough to charge my tiny laptop. It feels like luxury!
Freya
LED replacement bulbs question
in Boat Equipment
Posted · Edited by Ukiyo
Hiya Gareth!
I also love LED lighting but there are of course issues as there are with all the different kinds of lighting really.
I think it's a good idea to try things out bit by bit like you have so you can get a better idea about things.
LED's are, as you suggest, a more focused form of light and even worse they are often made up of multiple little bulbs too which can cast interesting shadows. It depends on the kind of LED bulb you are installing. Diffusion can be partly a function of the fixture in some cases. This is why some fittings have those white plastic covers that let the light through. If your fixture features no diffusion of any kind then you could maybe add cheap baking paper in front of the bulbs somehow to diffuse the light. Of course it not only diffuses the light but cuts some of the light output too.
I'm not sure what sort of fixture you have. The Disc type bulbs are often for G4 fixtures but it can vary as to the amount of space inside the fixture for a bulb. In any case there are other designs of G4 bulbs than the disc ones. This is what I love about the G4 option because there is a nice diversity in the bulbs and also the connectors are easy to use and adapt to a fair few situations.
There are some interesting new bulbs out there. Check out this one that seems to have a single high power LED and some built in diffusion:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/G4-3W-12V-Crystal-Warm-White-1-SMD-LED-Down-Marine-Light-Bulb-Lamp-Brightness-/111684802620?hash=item1a00eed83c:g:KJUAAOSwrklVbDb6
There also seems to be some new technology they are calling COB which looks interesting.
Check out these new kinds of G4 disc which seem to not only be more powerful but have some kind of built in diffusion:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/G4-5W-18-COB-LED-Crystal-Lamp-Spotlight-Spot-Light-Bulb-DC-12V-Wram-White-White-/381479447805?var=&hash=item58d1f26cfd:m:mFB3-AMM2okF9UGL08sbP_w
These look fun as they attempt to emulate a filament light bulb:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1-5W-G4-COB-Filament-LED-Light-Bulb-Lamp-Warm-Pure-White-AC-DC-12V-130LM-P5-/181917339507?var=&hash=item2a5b1e4f73:m:mKw4EfICTSu5wUW8oo9q0Ww
All of these bulbs are only 99p so you can afford to experiment a little bit and try different things to see what you like whereas spending £13.99 on some LED's seems a lot more risky to me.