Category: Blog

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Send off three boxes to get mailed to mom.

• 08:00 Omelet for breakfast.
• 09:00 Still trying to navigate Daniel 9:4 confessing the sin of our parishiners.
• 10:00 Church services.
• 12:00 build a couple backup cables for mom and box them.
• 14:00 Handed off the boxes to get mailed on Wednesday, Nap time.
• 16:00 93 Degrees outside, Garage was actually cool until I opened the door.
• 17:00 Dinner
• 18:00 Pulled four batteries off the refrigerator UPS and testing them for capacity.
• 19:00 Break down boxes in the Livingroom.
• 20:00 Cleaning
• 21:00 Bed Time

Narrative: I have had 200W of solar panels on my homestead for a couple years. They don’t generate enough consistent power to do much energy saving efforts. With my efforts to build a solar charger for my mom’s golf cart I have gained appreciation for having solar panels that face East and West. It is a reality at this point that these solar panels will not produce the same KWH/Day as the South facing panels. But they do give me a plus-up in power early morning and late afternoon when the chimney casts a shadow on the south facing panels.

Forfeiting some total power these East/West panels has given me more consistent power throughout the day. They also do a good job when it’s overcast with about 60W on a cloudy day. (Much more than I thought.)

Feelings: I am against changing legendary brand named products because they offend someone. We are a nation, it feels dangerous to yield to complaints of the protesting masses that have taken over this country in the name of racism.

Tomorrow: Monday, most of the work on my mother’s solar golf cart is in the mail.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Big Amazon shipment for mom’s solar project today.

• 08:00 Cereal for breakfast and headed out the door for a short walk.
• 09:00 Back from our walk, have to deal with the car we gave away today.
• 10:00 Blogging..
• 11:00 Wasting time on FB.
• 12:00 Nap
• 14:00 Packing tape arrived, boxing up stuff
• 15:00 Figuring out how to ship this stuff.
• 16:00 Gee Wiz, there is so much anger out there…
• 17:00 Mowing lawn
• 18:00 Running Gen#1 and cleaning
• 19:00 Checking Gen, putting things away.
• 20:00 Whites are called to own the sin of systemic racism, ewe!
• 22:00 Bed

Narrative: If the packing tape arrives today (And it is supposed to) I plan on putting all the wiring to charge my mother’s golf cart using solar panels into boxes. Then I need to take them to be shipped.

Feelings: Found an interesting article promoting the idea of “Stop Sanctifying Criminals.” and posed it to my FB page.

Tomorrow: Sunday, not looking forward to it this time.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans:

• 08:00 Up eating cereal for breakfast and a good cup of coffee.
• 09:00 Planning and going for a walk.
• 10:00 Switch computers to solar power and do some research.
• 11:00 Writing in my blog
• 12:00 Updated my planning chart and blogging.
• 13:00 Cleaning and blogging.
• 14:00 Down for a nap
• 16:00 Getting organized writing in my blog.
• 17:00 Dinner, large salad
• 18:00 Watching “That Girl”
• 19:00 Playing scrabble, I lost
• 21:30 Went to bed.

Accomplishments: Looks like my efforts to FB, Bing and the FTC have paid off. The fake power saving products are not being sold on any public platform I looked at today. (Except Amazon LOL)

Narrative: I realized last night there is a shortfall in my design for mom’s solar. If lightning hit nearby it could possibly travel into their home from the surface of the ground. With 400 feet of distance and insulated wiring we need to ground the golf cart if she is running the inverter AND charging with solar. The current plan is to put an inductor on the solar wires and ground the inverter with a power strip that has two plugs.

Repairs: One of my battery banks has a weak battery. The trouble with having four batteries in series is that the strong ones will kill the weak one over a short amount of time by over discharging it. (Below 10V) Especially in high voltage strings where a 2 volt voltage drop in a single battery will not be noticed. Short term I’ve paralleled a very small battery that will plus-up the capacity to protect the remaining life of the weak battery.

Long term I’m going to build a circuit that will notice when any battery in the string is almost two volts different than the adjacent battery. (maybe less.) I was hoping the battery management device would prevent this from happening, especially when the current draw is only 2-4 amps.

Feelings: We are drowning in all the amplified protesting, time for some serious social media distancing.

Tomorrow: Saturday, huge Amazon shipment day.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Get groceries and ship about a hundred pounds of wire to mom.

• 07:00 Up and eating breakfast.
• 08:00 Planning meeting, Instacart Shopping.
• 09:00 Putt’n away the groceries.
• 10:00 Vacuuming the floors.
• 11:00 Finishing up the wiring for the solar charger.
• 12:00 Nap Time.
• 14:00 Package up the wiring to be sent to moms.
• 16:00 Tested solar wiring just to make sure before boxing up the last of it.
• 17:00 Dinner.
• 21:00 nibbling on an ice-cream bar

Narrative: Blog is a bit thin today, I was pretty busy all day.

We spent a great deal of the day talking about limiting the drama that we bring into our relationship. If we get emotional, it’s time to turn off the news. Which is hard since it is everywhere these days.

I never did get to mailing the wiring to mom, I’ll have to do it tomorrow….

I checked Bing tonight, none of the OKOWATT Ads are running anymore. (The complaint to the FTC may have worked.) They have also died down a little on FB, I’ve not seen the three “snake oil” power saving products being advertised for several days.

Feelings: I am discouraged by all the violence and destruction of property. I also do not know what subjects are “Safe” to talk about in mixed company anymore.

Tomorrow: Friday, hopefully I can get back on schedule tomorrow.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Finish mom’s solar wiring and get it in the mail back to her.

Narrative: The latest design is to lay two “Gates” side by side and strap the panels to the top using zip ties or fencing wire. We need to support the top of the gates to about a height of 2 feet if we can.

Pretty much spent the whole day putting connectors on wires to charge mom’s golf cart using solar panels.

The sun is more than 200′ from the house so I’ve come up with wiring that allows them to put them up temporarily as they are needed. MC4 connectors are standard but difficult for most and impossible for an elderly person. I’ve changed the connectors out for Anderson SB50 (Standard Battery 50A) connectors with 100Ft sections of wire to run to the house. (can be extended to 400 feet)

This turned out to be quite a project, it took me all day to put connectors on all these wires.

This strike crimper turned out to be a life saver, a couple whacks from a hammer and the crimp is super solid.

Feelings: Atlanta police officer was charged with a long list of wrongdoing for shooting the man at the Wendy’s. It certainly feels like the BLM demonstrations have raised the bar on police use of force these days. We’ll have to see how this plays out in the courts.

Tomorrow: Groceries.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accomplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans:

• 08:00 Juice and French toast, then coffee
• 09:00 Morning planning meeting.
• 10:00 terminate two 100Ft solar cables for mom.
• 13:00 package up the two solar cables and eat lunch.
• 14:00 Time for a nap
• 16:00 quick battery test and clean up.
• 17:00 Dinner
• 18:00 Tried to watch a movie, I am waay too emotional.

Narrative: I cut the ends off a 100Ft 12AWG extension cord and replaced them with Anderson SB50 connectors so that mom could connect/disconnect them easily. The voltage on these connectors is a nominal 34Volts at 5 amps and open circuit voltage of 44 volts. It would benefit her and me if we could run three panels in series, that would have an open circuit voltage of 66V! Little worried she’d get shocked and an continuous arc is more likely when disconnecting the wires.

I am going to color/key code the connectors to their position in the series connections from the panel, solar charge controller to the golf cart.

Feelings: There was a skirmish in New Mexico that tells a tale.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/06/16/albuquerque

Then, a white man in a blue T-shirt appeared to rile the crowd, according to video obtained by KOB4. People erupted in shouts, and the man took a few steps back. A masked protester swung a skateboard and struck him in the shoulder. The man backpedaled out of the crowd, but continued to exchange shouts with protesters.

Someone in the video encouraged people to follow the man and get his license plate number. Several people followed him, and one tackled him to the ground. As he tried to stand back up and three people tried to hit him again, the man in blue pulled a gun and fired four shots, striking one man and scattering the crowd.

In a second video that captured the moments following the shooting, the gunman sat in the middle of a road as the New Mexico Civil Guard ‘militia’ members formed a circle around him. One man carrying a semiautomatic rifle, and wearing camouflage fatigues and a military-style helmet, kicked the handgun away from the man and stood with his foot on top of the weapon.

Police responded to the scene with tear gas and stun grenades to force the crowd back. Officers detained several members of the ‘militia’ group, according to reporters and witnesses at the scene. Video showed officers placing the apparent gunman into a cruiser.

“Notice how calmly they’re all being detained,” former housing secretary Julián Castro tweeted Monday night. “Don’t tell me George Floyd and Rayshard Brooks and Eric Garner — who did not harm anybody — couldn’t be treated differently. What Julián Castro didn’t say was that most of the men recently killed would still be alive if they hadn’t resisted while being arrested.

Tomorrow: Need some more emotional barriers, this world is getting to me.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Spending a tremendous amount of money preparing mom for the next emergency power outage.

• 07:00 Up and sipp’n coffee.
• 08:00 Testing 48V battery banks. (I have at least six batteries that are bad.)
• 12:00 I think I need four new batteries to make this right,
• 13:00 nap time.
• 13:40 Up getting organized.
• 14:00 added small 4.5AH batteries in parallel to balance the 48V string.
• 17:00 Raining
• 18:00 Dinner
• 19:00 Scrabble with the wife.

Narrative: I have two strings of four Duracell batteries in series (48V) from Batteries and bulbs. Both strings are struggling to produce half their capacity and they are only a year old. (Replacement is called for at 50% capacity.) I have a new string from Interstate that does produce the power, but they’re only a week old. To extend the two Duracell strings I’ve paralleled a small 4.5AH battery with the weakest battery in the string. (I have 5 of these small batteries from UPS units.) I am letting the strings reach a full charge tonight and will do another load test on the Duracell strings tomorrow. Three of the batteries seem to be fairly matched and still had power left in them when the weak one reached 10.5 volts.

Feelings: We’ve got to lower the tempo on these BLM demonstrations, burning buildings is not a lawful protest. Apparently they are looking for a woman that torched the building with a molotov cocktail who was not part of the protest.

Tomorrow:

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies. We are still higher than the peak when the Governor gave the sheltering in place order.

Plans:

• 08:00 Up, eating breakfast and making plans for church.
• 12:00 Nap time.
• 14:00 Up getting organized.

Narrative: Testing the first of two 35AH batteries removed from the 48V string yesterday using about 40W load. I started out with 7W and increased it looking for the battery to falter. When I got to an hour at 28W I plucked a 40W light bulb out of the closet and used that instead of the four candle lights. I also have a 60W light if I get that far with the battery.

The first of the two only got 7AH out of it before the inverter called it at 10V. The second was 11AH and running at 11V when I pulled it. The charge has been 3.5A (1C) and it is still charging this morning at 7Ah+. I expect the internal resistance to increase as the battery is discharged, however the resistance is a little high to me for a 35AH battery. (I think the 18AH batteries I have were much lower.) The voltage of this second battery discharged below 70% jumped to 14.2V at 3.5 A charge, which I thought was not very good. These batteries seem way too “Mushy” to me for a UPS, meaning the internal resistance is pretty high. (Maybe a couple of ohms.)

Thinking of doing a test at 1C which is 3.5 Amps on all three strings. 3.5x50V is 175W, these UPS units are good for 1200W which is 24Amps. (Almost 7C) Maybe a better test in my case would be 350W or 2C, the batteries should last about 4 hours at that rate.

I have started to build the cables to connect mom’s solar panels to the golf cart. Normally waterproof MC4 connectors would be used but since this would be a temporary setup and mom would have a hard time connecting / disconnecting them I am transitioning to red Anderson SB50 connectors.

Feelings: Police are on such difficult ground, their jobs are impossible and there is a camera everywhere to find fault in their decisions made at gunpoint.

Tomorrow:

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place even though the Governor has lifted that restriction.

Plans:

• 07:00 Breakfast and planning meeting.
• 08:00 Blogging, moving cars, pulling network and cameras from Pam’s house.
• 09:00 Cleaning.
• 10:00 replaced 2x 35AH batteries in the UPS battery bank.
  • All of the batteries that were being individually charged at 14.2V were warm.
  • The 1A fuse to the battery tender was melted, it may have been loose since the other half of the fuse was fine. I had to use a new fuse.
• 11:00 Florida is having an outbreak, mom cancelled her hair appointment.
• 12:00 checking batteries, ordered Generator Wagon.
• 13:00 Ordered blue and red SB-50 connectors for Nancy.
• 13:30 Nap
• 15:00 Getting Organized
• 16:00 Dinner
• 17:00 Scanned document from Nancy
  • Turned on water and A/C for Pam.
• 18:00 Watching movie
• 20:00 Checking about church tomorrow.

Narrative: Pulled two batteries from Secondary 24V UPS and replaced two batteries in the Primary 48V UPS. Disconnected half of the battery bank to do a load/run test on the new string of four batteries. The old TWO batteries were slightly higher voltage on the onset of the test than the newer TWO batteries. I also connected two banks of solar panels across the battery bank to extend the run time.

Feelings: Demonstrations and riots are not diminishing…. Now they have a list of 10 demands! An officer shot a suspect that shined a tazer at him today in Atlanta. It is reasonable to use deadly force against the suspect if the officer is solo to prevent the loss of his weapon. It is not so clear when there are more than one officer in which the second officer can protect the downed officers weapon. A tazer shot at the officer’s face could render the officer blind which to me is significant harm. In any case the suspect was not clearly an “Unarmed civilian” running away as the paper described. Certainly not a reason for a police chief to resign her post. (my opinion.)

Tomorrow:

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

Status: Sheltering in place even though the Governor of Georgia released seniors to go about their business as long as they wear masks and social distance.

There have been 755 people that went in the hospital in Gwinnett County Georgia so far. (Cobb=747, Dekalb=725 and Fulton=940.)

Plans:

• 07:00 Up and having breakfast
• 08:00 Vacuumed floors
• 09:00 Running Gen#2 with 10/40 oil.
• 10:00 Gen#2 inverter failed, the gas saver feature is broken.
• 11:00 Writing in my Blog.
• 12:00 Creating drawings, bag that… I’m taking a nap.

Narrative: Fought with the batteries today. I have three 35AH 48V strings and one of them has been giving me fits ever since I tied them together. Today I found one of the batteries in the string at 8 volts. (Meaning two cells were ZERO) I’ll not be able to trust that battery again. I put four power supplies on the string to charge each battery individually and disconnected the string from the UPS. It’s $500 to purchase a new string, I am scoffing at that for the time being.

Feelings: Seattle has lost a city block to the BLM protests.

Tomorrow: Saturday.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To