Building an Off Grid Yurt Part 14: Off Grid Power System and Woes

You can now support our channel! Learn more
www.simplegroun...
We now have off grid power to the yurt!... well kind of... It seems that every project that we do has a little bit of a hiccup. After hooking up the awesome silicone salt batteries we found that the schneider sw inverter wouldn't start. We found out that it was a problem with how the batteries were wired. We now have power in the Yurt.
Be sure to see the whole story. • Building an Off Grid Y...
Be sure check out our other content.
Website: www.simpleground.com
Patreon: www.patreon.com/simpleground
Instagram: simplegroundjourney
Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/simpleground/

[@Simplegroundlife]

There is an update to this video, you can see it here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gqu1eZiHpbCApNk

[@FG-lq4pz]

You are a very humble family guy. I admire you!

[@1timby]

Glad to see that things are going well finally. It seems that things seldom go as planned. But now you have an intimate insight to how the system runs. That type of education is priceless.

[@Simplegroundlife]

You are absolutely right.Imagine if someone else installed it. It still make you feel a little silly when the solution seems so clear in hindsight.

[@christalshurtliff1639]

Hi Jared and Audrey. I had a fun time watching your videos today. Looks like a very fun house. I'm so happy for you. Hope it gets done soon so you can have a cozy winter. I hope I get to come out there and see it some day.

[@Simplegroundlife]

It is fun to hear from you. I am glad you are enjoying what you see. And of course you guys are welcome anytime. You know who to contact to find us.

[@eightosaurusspelunk1598]

Once again, this is over my head. I have no experience with this kind of thing but it sure is interesting. Also, I've noticed that since the beginning of your channel that the people commenting and watching seem to be very kind, helpful and knowledgeable. I learn a lot from both you guys as well as the other viewers. Thanks!

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Eightosaurus Spelunk I am so glad that I have so many kind people who comment and help. Really, I will never know as much as the collective human race. No matter what anything I do will seem foolish to at least one person in this world. I am so glad that people seem to come together and share and in the end we all grow smarter together. Thanks as always for your great comments.

[@edwardkie380]

Electrical and plumbing pluming requires at least 5 trips back to the hardware store ... Awesome learning curve!

[@michaelwood5519]

The good news is...you are learning a whole bunch about all of things! And, you will soon have a cool new home!! Enjoying the videos btw.

[@Simplegroundlife]

Since the video's creation, I have been in contact with Backwoods Solar. They are sending enough cables to connect the remaining terminals and to tie the positive and negative terminals. I will let you all know how it goes.

[@michaelwood5519]

There's some good videos on KZbin that shows how to hook up the batteries and such.

[@koningbolo4700]

I guess the second string of connections is there so you can do with thinner cables. Now you have the fat gauge wires in there you should be fine...

[@papad9089]

Every terminal needs to be connected. Each individual 'battery' is called a jar, and each of your jars has 2 cells inside it. I believe you'll need to wire each jar in parallel and then connect the jars to each other in series to get the 24v/800ah capacity you're wanting.

[@bwillan]

that was my thought too. I suspect that way it is wired now, only half the capacity of the battery bank is available at this time.

[@Simplegroundlife]

+bwillan David Powell my intuition is telling me the same thing. Backwoods solar is sending me more cables to do just that. Thanks

[@trentonfree2694]

My first thought when I saw the 4 posts. Great video regardless. It’s good to see the successes and failures. And I would call it a success

[@trentonfree2694]

Looking forward to hear the outcome of the other battery posts once you connect them up. Great vid.

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Trenton Free They are still on the way. I have already determined that I will do a more specific system video and I will explain the outcome there if I don't do it before.

[@DerykRobosson]

I hope that the bank works out for you. Having had a look at the vendor's web site as well as the Canadian distributor, I found the lack of technical documentation to be disconcerting. As Voneschenbach postulates below, the limited information that was available does give an indication that they're targeted at industrial use, not for the renewable energy market. Xantrex make excellent gear. Good choice of equipment.

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Deryk Robosson I hope they hold up as well. I am intrigued by how they are built and I really wanted to test them out for the worlds sake. I guess I have taken a good first step. Thanks for your input.

[@easterstedman236]

My works too. Used Avasva handbooks and build it with no problems.

[@janeromnicki6598]

Superb!

[@loganv0410]

What would cause the voltage drop on a light load?: a cracked connector within the battery can do it. If the connector is touching it'll read voltage fine, but on any noticeable load there's not sufficient cross-sectional area to carry any appreciable current and the voltage will drop OTOH I'm glad you chased it down to a hook-up problem

[@Simplegroundlife]

Me too. I was worried and certain that I would be seeing smoke and smelling melting plastic.

[@holgermessner851]

Very good video.

[@mbsbrown7838]

Backwood's solar is Awesome!

[@tommyjones751]

i like solar vids since im a newbie i try to learn off the vids so if u have time do a vid on everything about ur solar all in 1 and wat ur able to run in ur house thanks for a great vid!

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Tommy Jones I will work on that. I was originally thinking of doing a video about the parts of the system only. Now I will try to include what I am running in my house. Thanks for the input.

[@tamaraweber3296]

Backward Solar have great customer service.

[@andrewbell7696]

13.30 Idaho potato boxes!

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Andrew Bell Yes sir! Can't move without them. I wish one of them was full of good farm potatoes.

[@SpencerLAPower]

In your breaker box do you have your neutral and ground bonded

[@redundantlyredundantly5609]

Fantastic! If you get a chance can you add a list of the devices/batteries (make & model) you purchased to the video description? I'd like to learn more about them. Something that stands out is the lack of mention of documentation for the batteries. Was no documentation provided for them?

[@Simplegroundlife]

+redundantly redundantly The more I think about it, the more I want to make a video about the system and not about the drama of the system. That might be the place to add the details about the components . I will see what I can do and either way I will let you all know the parts to my system. So these batteries are a really new technology. Backwoods solar has been the only well known company selling them until recently. The only information I had was what they had on their website. I am a little lost as to why they don't seem to know more about them, but from what I gather, the batteries I have are from a fresh production and they are a little bit different than the ones that came before. I could be getting things wrong though. I'll see what I can dig up on this stuff. A brief glimpse​ through the comments shows that some people here know more than I do and I will be educated as I respond to everyone.

[@JohnSmith-ug5ci]

Thanks for sharing. Some questions and suggestions. What is the rated watts of your inverter? Is it a pure sine wave inverter or a modified? You mentioned only having two wires for the 240 volts coming into the house. So are you saying there is no ground or neutral? Are you going to install solar panels or just charge up the batteries with a generator? Now about the batteries. I would suggest that you contact the manufacturer and explain what you are doing and what you have. They should be able to tell you how to wire those batteries using all posts. They may even send a wiring diagram. God bless

[@Simplegroundlife]

+John Smith Thanks for the comment. This inverter is a 3500w pure sine wave inverter. When I mentioned the two wires I was meaning the two 120v hot legs. It also has neutral and ground connections. For now we are charging with a generator. We are thinking of adding solar panels as time goes on. Also great suggestion on contacting the manufacturer. One of the comments on this video has a link to a diagram of the battery. I haven't had a chance to look at it yet. Depending on how that goes I will reach out to them for more info. I really think I would like to call them just to get a little more information about the batteries themselves.

[@JohnSmith-ug5ci]

Thanks for the reply

[@martinjcamp]

You brought a beer keg with two taps, but you only used one.

[@michaelwood5519]

Where you going to install your solar panels?

[@Slyvr18]

I don't see any ventilation. Do those batteries need to be in a ventilated room? May be a good idea to put in a small fan

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Slyvr18 The batteries don't need a ventilated room. I do have a fan that I will be installing to ventilate.

[@simonforget280]

I don't have any experience with Silicone Salt batteries but I do have a lot of it with very large setup of deep cycle Lead Acid batteries (we use these Lead Acid batteries extensively in the telecommunication industry). The voltage test of one of those batteries bugles me... Testing terminal pairs is OK at 2-3V, across at 4V is still fine but the other way across at -4V does not makes any sense. This battery terminal configuration is unknown to me. I'd like to get the battery schematic but I suspect the screw terminals are "paired" internally, either by their connections to the electrolyte or simply by an internal power circuit. Manufacturer's information mentions almost every possible voltage battery configuration but nothing for 4V. I wonder what will be the result if the wiring was setup to use the outside screw terminals (relative to your existing battery bank) and if both inside and outside wiring were connected simultaneously and feeding the inverter/charge controller (do not try this at your home; have the distributor to do this test instead). Lastly, to which series these batteries belongs to? Are they DW Solar, DW UPS or GS? Keep up your excellent work.

[@shrike6259]

yah - minus voltage should not / can not happen between same colored terminals.. no matter what type of battery it is. LOLs who knows those chinese put wrong color decals on opposite terminals. but more strangly is that both red or black are not Hard wired internaly... I bet hooking up addition wires in same red to black will cause a massive short... since they seem to have reverse polarity... very strange indeed ..

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Simon Forget If it helps the reading was -0.4v I was wondering if it had to do with the power flow while the inverter was trying to draw power off the batteries under that configuration. Backwoods solar is sending me enough cables to actually connect the other terminals. I was thinking that it would be fine, especially if I test to ensure correct voltage before connecting it up to the inverter. What am I missing here? Also. I have not been able to find any indicator to which series these batteries belong to. There isn't any clear lable on the battery indicating what type it is. The Backwoods Solar website hasn't helped either. I will have to chase it around a little more. I will probably be calling the manufacture at very least before I hook up the rest of the terminals. I will ask them a little more at that point. Thanks again for all your great insight.

[@simonforget280]

Yes, it works but you need to get all informations and understand everything related to this system. For the price that you have paid for, it is simply unacceptable for you (as customer) to not have all the manuals and answers. This looks like more and more like the automobile industry, except you are the one that will maintain this system at the end, not the dealer. This technology looks amazing in every single point. Now, customer service (from the dealer and manufacturer) needs to step up and provide you the answers that you deserve. Keep up your excellent work.

[@taylorlightfoot]

Set it up like this? Just make sure all the jumpers are the same length at the connection where it makes the U turn. Use busbar for most connections. drive.google.com/open?id=12g1ekrl4LwM8UIOuB5BkCt9C_DeUOpwn m.ecvv.com/product/4789548

[@mmanut]

Where are the solar panels??

[@Simplegroundlife]

+mmanut No solar panels yet. I want to know more about them to make a more informed system. I really haven't had the time or mental energy to do so while building this Yurt. Now that things are slowing down, I have begun the process. Hopefully we will see them this winter.

[@salmonhunter7414]

Should have worked both ways I thought.

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Salmon Hunter I thought so too. I'm glad I'm not the only one. They are a touch too expensive to take apart to see why.

[@loganv0410]

Please provide a link to the maker of your inverter

[@Simplegroundlife]

This is a little slow in coming. solar.schneider-electric.com/product/conext-sw-na/

[@voneschenbachmusic]

These seem to be Chinese industrial batteries being sold as consumer batteries. The 4-terminal diagram on this site seems to indicate that higher loads call for the other terminals to be used. www.sunxtender.com/battery_banks.php

[@shrike6259]

but these batteriess still have one + and one - terminal... same colored terminal can not have reversed polarity... and the diagram shows that,,, red+ to black- further more that diagram show each lead pair as separate battery as in the pic above diagram

[@Simplegroundlife]

+Voneschenbach Thanks for the website. The diagram makes sense to me and that was what I had in mind.

[@usdpaulp]

Help me out here. Are you genuinely so nice in real life? I swear you guys seem too nice to be true. Must be either hippies or Mormons I think. Either way I like u.

[@eightosaurusspelunk1598]

usdpaulp Not sure about the hippie or Mormon thing, but I do agree that they're some of the kindest seeming people I've seen. As crazy as it sounds, I think they actually are that nice. I wish I could be...

[@Simplegroundlife]

+usdpaulp You have Audrey and I laughing. We may be nice to a fault but life is better that way. Thanks for the smile!

[@ElGatoLoco698]

Maybe they just appear to be charged when they're really not.

[@sitedev]

Everything is made in China ... even the "Free Tibet" stickers I see on the bumpers of cars are made in China! :)

[@williamhamill813]

I would have enough panels just so I don't have to listen too the generator and pollute.