Spring has sprung!

Almost exactly a year ago, I first hooked up my solar electrical system and started drawing power from the sun.

I can tell spring has come now, because I looked over at my solar controller and saw it pulling in 10 amps! That's something I haven't seen in a long, long time, probably not since September.

I'm stunned at the tremendous variability in sunshine here in the northern latitudes of California. It's a huge difference: from 10 amps a lot of the day in the summer, to maybe 1-2 amps for a few hours of the day on rainy days in the winter.

There are several problems. First, San Francisco is in the upper latitudes, so the angle of the sun is lower, especially in winter. So my flat-mounted panels just won't pull in during the winter. Secondly, and also because of the high latitude, the hours of sunshine varies a lot between winter and summer. And, finally, California has a wet season and a dry season. It does not rain all spring, all summer, and all fall! Then we get all our rain in the winter... and then it's over.

Which means: LOTS of rainy days in wintertime, combined with few hours of sunshine, and a very low angle of the sun. So the factor of sunshine between winter and summer is like 10-to-1.

I installed my system in the springtime and started designing my usage based on that type of constant availability of sunshine. As I've blogged before, the end of October was a disaster for me: the rainy season startd, and my electricity usage suddenly way outstripped availability. I recovered by buying a small, low-power netbook. But still, that cost me a lot of money.

Now that spring has come, I can relax a bit more and be somewhat more lavish with electricity. But I've learned just how seasonal this type of thing is.

If anyone is designing a solar electrical system for their van (or for anything), my advice would be: design your system so that it provides enough power for all your uses, in the dead of winter with next to no sunlight. That will be expensive, but not as expensive as having to purchase new, more energy-efficient gear to cope with the lack of sunlight in wintertime.

Lockers!

I went down to the junkyard and bought myself a set of 18 small lockers, 18"x12"x18" each. This is wonderful. They look awful (I need to paint them!) but they are much sturdier and roomy than that awful cheap Costco plastic shelving I was using.

I couldn't get them into the van standing up, so I laid them down on their side. makes a nice shelf, but this position is temporary. I want to mount two of them on the wall, at head-height, one on either side of the van, and one standing up in the corner. That'll free up a lot of space.

For now, though, I'm just happy to have them and all my stuff a lot more organized.

Mobile broadband is the awesome

I just signed up for mobile broadband service. $60/month, and I can get high-speed internet ANYWHERE. It is perfect. I am no longer so limited in terms of parking spots. I can pick spots which have no open WiFi access points. I can even (and will, probably, soon) get out into the woods a bit, and still get internet connectivity.

This is a great amenity.

Links to photos

A few weeks ago was the 1-year anniversary since I moved into the van.

I recently reviewed my picture album on the Vandwellers list

Wow, what a journey this last year has been! It was a brutal, difficult struggle for a long time. Looking back, it took me until around August before I finally got settled in-- 7 months.

I do have a big project still to do: the wall and the ceiling. And also a better bed (a proper futon). And I have to get the front end ball joints done soon too. But, you know, it's home, and it has been home for a year now.

Three more to go before it all pays off.

House sittin'

Got an opportunity this week to house-sit.

Man, running water is a good thing. A bathroom. A sink... and being able to leave dishes in them for a couple days. Refrigeration. As much electricity as I could want, with no worries about sunshine (or lack thereof). Not having to put stuff away all the time. Insulation in cold weather!

It took a day to adjust to being in the van again. I immediately noticed how much WORK everyday living is now. Stick houses are cushy by comparison.

I still can't afford rents though, so I'm staying a vandweller. But I might do some more housesitting again every once in a while. It sure is nice.

A year in vandwelling

Well in a few days it will have been one year exactly since I bought this van and started living in it.

So much has changed that I find it hard to sum it all up and analyze it in any meaningful or insightful way-- sorry--, so I'm just putting up this placeholder post instead.

I haven't added up what I've spent, but I almost certainly have spent as much or possibly more than I would have spent on rent and utilities, if I'd instead decided to go that route. However, I would have had to have had roommates, and done a lot more driving and/or public-transportation-ing around. Maybe I will try to add it up, since tax season is coming up anyway. I did this kind of on the deluxe program, and I also got royally screwed when I bought the van. I know I could have done it a lot cheaper, but I was in a hurry, had a particular set of goals in mind. Which, by the way, I still haven't fully achieved.

My van conversion is still only about 50% done. Completed projects: floor, vital deferred maintenance, ceiling exhaust vent, makeshift furniture, solar electricity, beginnings of insulation, and some security stuff. Still to complete: more deferred maintenance, wall, ceiling, floor intake vent, extra seats, futon, cabinets, and sink. Things which I'm still not sure about: some kind of under-bed box, and some kind of toilet.

I've learned a lot about survival and what is and isn't important. I've figured out where to park safely, how to stay cool and warm, how to blend in, and how to fix a lot of stuff. I have become a great deal tougher in many ways, and a great deal softer-- more compassionate-- in others. My driving skills still suck, but I have learned how to park a house while only occasionally destroying other people's vehicles in the process.

My divorce became final last week; I am now officially single. I have been fairly successful so far in getting steady work, but not yet in getting paid for it. Luckily-- thanks to alimony--, I may still have a few years ahead to figure that part out.

I'm a lot happier in general, and there's no way I'd ever go back to the way it was, say, in 2007. 2008 was a very tough transition year though. Luckily the price of biodiesel has gone down dramatically. That is a huge help for me. Although, I spent the entire last week parked in one spot. I got around a lot on the Muni-- $1.50 a trip to go anywhere in the city-- and didn't start the engine once. That was fantastic and a hint of the life I want: to find a safe, cheap-or-free, semi-permanent place to park this van, and live by walking and public transportation, as a city dweller.

The future is still scary, but every now and then I realize, "Hey, this is MY life now and I get to decide what I do with it!" This thought alone can get me out of bed, any time day or night, no matter how cold it is, whatever I might be worried about or terrified of, or whatever else might have been getting me down.

This is MY life. I own it. I get to decide what I do with it, to the degree that I can. To the degree that I can't, I get to decide what it means, and what I do about it. This is a huge change from last year or any previous year in my life, and it's this urban vandweller's happy place.

Happy New Year to all.

Where'd that yellow thing go?

It turns out I screwed up big time in designing and using my solar electricity system.

First of all, I have the wrong controller. My Concord 4G AGM batteries want 14.4 to charge and 13.2 to float (similar to a wet-cell), and no equalize phase. My Morningstar ProStar 30 controller provides only 14.0 in GEL mode and 14.15 in SEALED mode, which is too little to actually charge up the batts. It'll equalize in SEALED mode once a month a 14.35v, almost up to spec, but only once a month. Worse, the Morningstar float charges at 13.7, which is too high. I had the thing set to GEL for nearly a year, which is wrong-- my batteries haven't been a full charge since I bought them. That's a sure way to destroy batteries-- they get sulfated if they're not quickly charged back up. Another problem with PWM controllers in general is that they aren't very efficient when winter comes. MPPT controllers are better for this; they get up to 40% more efficiency on cloudy days or short winter days.

Second problem is that winter is definitely here. The rains have come, and we went weeks with no sunshine at all!

Third problem is that my lifestyle had become accustomed to having nearly limitless electricity. I'm on the computer for 4-8 hours in a night, and in the summer the batteries would recharge enough that I never noticed any problem. I continued that pattern during the week when we had no sun, because I had to. And now my batteries are fried. I have been over-discharging them, every day, and under-charging them.

When I bought these batts they'd show 13.1v after sundown, and I'd hardly ever get them below 12.9v. I deep-discharged them in May (parked next to a tall building in the partial-shade all Memorial Day weekend, but kept hacking away anyway), but they'd start the night at 12.9v and hardly get below 12.7v by morning. Now they won't charge past 12.7v, and I can get it down to 12.5v in a typical night, and into the danger zone (12.2v) really easily.

So I'm doing a couple things. First off, I've changed the setting on the ProStar to SEALED to get it closer to spec, and maybe even equalize it. Secondly, I'm buying a MPPT controller. Thirdly, I may buy a plug-in electric charger (that'll handle high amps-- I have 440Ah of batteries which would require a 60A-80A charger), to hopefully bring these batteries back to life quickly, and serve as a backup in winter. Finally, I've ordered a low-power-consumption Asus EEE laptop to use for websurfing and 90% tasks for which I don't need the full power of my 2.33Ghz Dual-Core Intel laptop.

We'll see. But my biggest fear is that I've destroyed $1000 worth of batteries. I hope that I can get out of this mess without that kind of expense.