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Warpspeed
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Joined: 09/08/2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 4406
Posted: 07:15am 14 Mar 2020
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Simple reason is that natural gas is so cheap here in Melbourne that its just not worth the trouble. I use natural gas for heating, cooking, hot water, and drying washing.  I get all of that for about twenty dollars a week (about ten Euros) in the depths of winter and about half that cost in summer.  Admittedly our winters are not cold here (zero chance of snow) but we still use some heating here for at least half the year.

If I could get ALL of my hot water heated completely for free from solar, I might save just a very few dollars (two to three Euros ?) a week, and after crunching the numbers, its just not worth doing.

I have no idea what natural gas costs in Belgium, but here in Oz we have about the cheapest natural gas anywhere in the world as well as a warm climate.
Edited 2020-03-14 17:27 by Warpspeed
Cheers,  Tony.
 
Davo99
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Joined: 03/06/2019
Location: Australia
Posts: 1578
Posted: 08:31am 14 Mar 2020
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  Warpspeed said  Simple reason is that natural gas is so cheap here in Melbourne that its just not worth the trouble.


I haven't lived in a house with gas for 30 Years but do miss it.
From what I have read, I was under the impression that gas was Very exy now and electricity was cheaper.  Read that a lot of gas water heaters were being replaced with electric for that reason.

Other thing I have read numerous times is that Bottled gas is the same price as town gas which surprised me and also made me thing  natural gas must be pretty exy by now.


I have read of  treadmill motors many times and understand they are permanent magnet but what are there advantages over a car alternator? I have a load of them up the back which are twin fan ( enclosed) 80A self regulating.  I understand ( and am practically aware) in stock form they aren't overly efficient but geez, they sure are tough!

I have run the things over loaded for Hours with no problem and got them very hot but they don't fail. I have run them without batteries and direct connected to all the load they could carry and that didn't worry them.  I have over powered and under powered the sense wire to get higher voltage and amps and that never phased them either.
I have spun the alts at 9000 Rpm all day Off a huge pulley and couldn't tell a bit of difference in them afterwards.

Before Christmas I had one fail when I just left my fathers place up the country.  The reg went and it was pumping out full amps and lord knows what volts.  Time I got home 4 hours later the large battery in the ute had all but boiled dead dry. There was nothing in it.  The alt was still kicking out full power though.  Neighbour had another reg/brush assembly in his collection and I put it in and thing is as good as ever. Battery which wasn't that old was toast. literally.

I have also read a lot about the external regulators that can do multi stage charging and are programmable ( and not expensive at all) which transform the efficiency  and abilities of the standard alts. They are widely used in the marine market to get batteries up as fast as possible.

I have a pair of these running on my 6Hp lister with a serpentine belt and a tensioner.  The lister is working hard with 2 at full load which is a symptom of the inefficiency and I believe I could run 3 for a total of around 3KW with an external reg which is all the power any engine this size will generate with any alt.  

Also got a pair on a Chinese 8 HP Yanmar knock off diesel but those engines need to be buried in a Pit or hidden deep in a cave to  quieten the mechanical clatter to acceptable levels.
Using the alts connected to batteries driving an Inverter works well.
I'd like to work out how to use 2 12V alts to charge a pair of 12V batteries hooked up for 24V to drive my big inverter and UPS but I don't believe it can be done with internal Regs.

Maybe the external once can take 2 Inputs and couple them up?
 
nickskethisniks
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Joined: 17/10/2017
Location: Belgium
Posts: 458
Posted: 08:45am 14 Mar 2020
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Natural gas is not that expensive, I think about 1000€ for 20MWh energy. It's the cheapest heating source/system.

I was refering to a mechanism between your (or others) generator and battery for regulating the charging proces.

A grid tied system is the cheapest there is. I see my off grid system as an amazing journey to keep learning and to keep my brain fit. It's challenging to combine programming, basic and power electronics, draw schematics, design pcb's, etc.. and make it all interactive, working and Safe as well.

I used to do repairs of electronics @ work, sometimes I still do, but it's more shifting to paperwork nowhedays. But I must say I learned more with inventing/developing small test environments to test the electronic devices. In the beginning I used plc's now shifting to uC and rpi's...

Also I never had a decent electronics education, so I always used others schematics and designs, now I want to design something myself, it's verry rewarding when something works afterwards. I'm not going to reinvent thé hot water but want really know how it all works. Allthough I really want to make that warpverter one day! First I want to fully understand poida's nanoverter code.

It's easy tot crawl behind tv and watch Netflix all day...
Edited 2020-03-14 18:53 by nickskethisniks
 
Davo99
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Joined: 03/06/2019
Location: Australia
Posts: 1578
Posted: 12:27pm 14 Mar 2020
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  nickskethisniks said  
It's easy tot crawl behind tv and watch Netflix all day...


My father used to ask why I sit there on my laptop when visiting him while he watches TV.  I just watched a Movie with the mrs and it's about the first TV I have watched ( apart from when with dad couple of weeks back in probably 6 weeks.

I said to Dad, where do you think I learned how to put that solar setup on your roof?
Where do you think I learned how to fix your mower that the repair shop said couldn't be done? Where do you think I leaned how to put in the power point you wanted changed and what that noise was in the car everyone else couldn't fix and I managed in 10 Min Flat? How do you think I learned how to do all these different business avenues I have done and get so much of the knowledge I have in sales, marketing and advertising?

Wasn't dumb luck, was The internet!

I'm not too bright but I am just smart enough to know where to find information I need.  You can use the net to watch porn, pickle your brain with social media or play mindless games or you can use it as the greatest resource available and educate yourself in a range of things like people have never been able to before.
What I have learned from this one site alone I could not have done from books in probably 10 years.

The next day I took my phone and tablet up the shed and fixed the automatic Roller door step by step as I watched a Vid.  I said to him THATS why I look at things on the net and don't bother with TV.

Now he's for ever saying " Bang this up on your computer or window ( tablet) and see...... " Even rings me at home and says " are you in front of your computer, I want to find out....."

ONE day he'll remember what I have told him 25 times before about how to print a PDF invoice from his emails.  :0-)
 
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