Firewood - It has been a Long Time since the Last Post

Good fir firewood - all from one tree.
Shane split it. All I had to do is stack it.

Gutes Holz zum Heizen - alles von einem Baum.
Shane hat es gespaltet. Ich musste es nur aufbeigen.

More firewood being split by hired gun Shane.

Shane spaltet viel Holz in ein paar Stunden.

The beginnings of a new firewood stack in the background.

Der Anfang einer neuen Holzbeige im Hintergrund.

More firewood, but the first snowfall interfered with progress.

Noch mehr Holz das aufgebeigt werden muss,
aber der erste Schneefall kommt dazwischen.

Time for a new set.

Jetzt ist es Zeit für ein neues Paar.

Several days of clean-up and burning slash for the two of us.
See the stacked firewood in the background.

Wir beide brauchten mehrere Tage zum Aufräumen und Brennen.
Im Hintergrund sieht man die Holzbeigen.

Bratwurst as a reward for hard work.

Zur Belohnung gibt es Bratwurst .

Solar Input to the House

It is 08:30 and the sun has just come up over the trees in the northeast.
My shadow shows the oblique angle of the sun relative to the solar array
at this time of day.

We already get 1.4kW of power from the sun. At the moment,
the consumption in the house is only 0.1kW. The balance goes into
the battery

By 10:45 we were running the dishwasher, all powered by the sun.
At the same time, the solar array is also charging the battery.
The solar array output is 2.2kW and the consumption in the
house at this time is 1.4kW. The balance goes into the battery.

This is the screen on the charge controller, which is the unit that
regulates the battery charging from the power of the solar array.
It shows input from the solar array at 93.8V and 25.9A.
This MPPT (maximum power point tracking) charge controller
translates this input to 58V and 40.3A for charging the battery.
The battery bank has a nominal voltage of 48V.

Urs, the happy solar system designer and installer.
Everything is working just as it should.

Meanwhile, Judy is keeping busy in the kitchen.

Great Gramma Dart's sweet rolls.

Mounting the Solar Panels

The panels need to be carried one by one from their storage
location in the cabin to the work site. Each weighs 19kg.

The first panel is up.

Judy up on scaffolding to help sliding the panels up to their location.

The highest panels are 3-4m high off the ground, and
behind the array there is a steep drop-off.

Judy provides valuable help in getting the panels up to their location.

WOW - done.

15 Panels with an electrical capacity of 4kW, weighing nearly 300kg.
We both are proud that we managed to do it all without
outside help, except for the concrete work.

Building the Aluminum Structure for the Solar Aray

The whole structure was pre-cut and pre-drilled in Karl Hamson's
machine shop. The design was done on 3D software SketchUp.
The plan was that everything would fit together like a Meccano
Set, and it did.

As a small boy I had received a Meccano Set one
Christmas and had fun building a crane, and an excavator, etc. etc.
Now I had just as much fun 65 years later to assemble this structure.

An extract from the 3D design.

The Solar array consists of two parts, a 2-string array and a 3-string
array. They are sightly offset due to the extremely uneven ground.
The 2-string array is mostly done.

Working on the 3-string array.

The two arrays mostly done.

Close-up of intersection of diagonal and horizontal bracing.

Ditto

Close-up of the connection to the foundations columns.

Ditto

Ditto

The finished structure. Ready for mounting solar panels.

Pouring Concrete for the Solar Array Foundation

Paul is mixing the concrete.

Jordan is operating the vibrator

A sono-tube form (cardboard) for one of the columns, with re-bar and with the
3/4" galvanized bolt suspended in exactly the right place, as determined
by the 3D design. The solar array will be mounted on these bolts.

Shane is loading concrete from the wheel barrow into buckets for
carrying to the location up a steep trail - hard work for
Shane and Jordan. Shane's dog Buckwheat watching.

The elaborate jig 's purpose is to position all of the bolts in
exactly the right locations, such that the already pre-cut aluminum
structure will fit the foundation.

The forms have been removed, leaving the concrete foundations pads
and columns.Everything is sitting on hard bedrock, and the re-bar
extend into the bedrock.

Working on the Foundation of the Solar Array

Laying out the solar array on difficult ground, on the slope down
from the house.

There are 14 posts to be accurately located and fixed to the underlying rock.

Getting there, after checking and re-checking and re-checking.

Cutting and bending re-bar for reinforcement of the concrete.

Heavy duty re-bar cutter and bender.

Some of the pieces ready to be placed.

Sono Tubes will be used as forms for the concrete columns.

Drilling holes into solid rock for cementing
bolts and re-bar directly into Pender Island,
as we call any unmovable rock.

This is the re-bar structure inside one of the concrete columns.
The verticals are cemented 15cm (6") into Pender Island.

Making progress with putting together the re-bar structures.

A Third Blast of Winter - Followed by Spring

Another surprise blast of winter in early March

Needed to do some plowing of the upper driveway to get the car down.

When the weather is bad I can always work on the inside.
Here painting the upper parts of the ceiling joists from a
step ladder on top of scaffolding. Do I have enough ladders?

A nice winter sunset.

Finally, the daffodils have come out.

Judy gets the itch to dig in the dirt, establishing ornamental plants.

Arbutus trees on one of our favourite walks on Pender, Roe Islet.

Judy with Liz and Anders on a walk at Roe Islet.

Lady Arbutus.

Stonecrop growing in a crack in the rock.