Any Battery in a Storm

Alaska Man

We all go through lots of machinations trying to keep our batteries in good shape, get the correct battery to begin with and charge it correctly.

I have a friend that is Off-Grid up here. He lives way out in the boon docks hundreds of miles from town. I just found out when he comes to town, he goes to the Transfer Stations, i.e. "The Dump" and drags home car batteries that he uses with a few Solar Panels until they wear out. Knowing him his Charge Controller is probably a cheapo that costs about $35.00 same with his inverter.

LOL.... Not the best by any means, but it's free...... and like he says, "The wife can have that damn T.V. on all day in the back ground".

I suspect that he runs his generator a lot, but didn't get into it with him. When he told me what he was doing I just shook my head. It goes to show ya though, it really can be that simple.

2twisty

There are several people out here in the West Texas desert that cobble solar systems together, as well. Most of them only use the meager systems to run a laptop and their satellite internet. Then they do something stupid like hooking up a crockpot overnight and wonder why their inverter starts screaming.

You *can* make a solar system out of those discarded batteries. If your loads are low enough and you have enough of the free batteries and don't care if you kill them early, it can work, I suppose.

Now me... I like being able to run a refrigerator and chest freezer and my entertainment system. So I built a system to handle those loads and care about whether I kill my batteries or not.

I guess it's the same difference as when you have people who buy beater cars and junk them when they break versus buying a good car and performing preventive maintenance.

Alaska Man

Same here, I like to run my heater when we are not home. I feels better to me then leaving an unattended fire in the woodstove.