Chill Out

Yes, it has gotten a little chilly recently, but it is important to keep it all in perspective. After all, we all remember February and how brutally cold it was. 

So, as with all things in life, take it easy (cue The Eagles) and just carry on and make the best of it. 

Things will get cold and things will get warm, things will get good and things will get bad. The one thing that will remain constant is that you must deal with it.

So, I will just bundle up and soldier on, as I certainly can handle a bit of a chill in the air. I simply reserve the right to grumble a bit as I get going. 

Though it will not stop me, as no matter what comes my way, I will . . . 

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!

Satellite Radio Worked Great!

So, as I said, I activated and connected up my Satellite Radio. I didn’t do anything permanent, I just strung it across the place and plugged what wires had to be plugged into what. 

   

The first afternoon, I had the antenna (that little black box thing) sitting on the roof, with its wire running out the window. 

The interesting thing is that I didn’t have to do that, just placing it up high inside the trailer worked fine.

   

That is the top of the slide-out, that stays inside because to slide it out, would put it, and my butt into traffic. 

Now, to power it (for now), I have to plug it into one of those round “12V power sockets.” 

Since I only have one, that is a problem, as most of my appliances plug either directly or indirectly into a 12V power socket. Indirectly, means that I plug my 120VAC stuff into an inverter which plugs into a 12V power socket.

So, I got this.

   

That is a Y-spliter for a 12V socket. Since my Satellite takes almost nothing for power, it is no problem having it and, say my laptop running on the same outlet, at the same time.

This way, I can listen to the Satellite Radio, as I work away on the laptop. It was fun and I was able to do it quite well. 

Despite how well it worked with the antenna inside, I will still get the radio properly installed for two reasons. 

One is that I hate seeing cables strung across the floor, not for something that is going to be a permanent fixture in my home. 

For the other, I want that antenna on the roof, so that it can get the strongest and best signal, no matter where I am. (As in, even if I am in some remote location).

Running the larger system was okay, but I am not sure how often I will run it, due to how much power it takes.

You see, when that all in one desktop is running, it takes 50Watts of power. Compare that with my laptop which, when fully charged takes around 10 Watts or less to run.

It was nice to run it and we shall see what will happen, but it seems like a bit of a power pig, to run. 

You see, this is an issue as if I am drawing more power than the solar panels are providing at any given time, then I am drawing power out of the batteries, even in the middle of the day. 

So, while I have a great deal of power, I still must be mindful and weary of what I am using at any given time. 

It is possible to get to the end of a sunny day with completely dead batteries, even with all that sunshine and all that electricity coming from my solar panels.

The Satellite radio worked great, and that was nice, as I plan to use it daily from now on. 

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!

Resurrecting My Desktop

I bought this PC about a year ago yet have not used it for the main reason that it does not have a battery in it. 

  

That means that it needs constant AC power in order to run. Now, I could use an inverter to run it, and I do, but that means draining Wanda’s batteries.

Yet, now with my solar charging system, I can use this PC as I have the power to spare. 

This one is nicer to use as it is an all-in-one, and is a larger monitor and has the ergonomic keyboard and mouse that I like. 

The laptop is easier to use as it is all contained, I can use it with or without power coming in. 

Yet it has the cramped keyboard that I don’t like, and unless I am only using it for writing or editing, it will drain its battery fast. (So, gaming is best done when plugged in).

I see myself only using this larger one on the weekends, or . . . you know . . . when I do finally get a larger place (without wheels under it).

At any rate, I will see how things go with using this larger PC this weekend. 

FYI, I brought it in to work to run all of the updates that it needs to run, since it has not been turned on in seven months.

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive and keep moving forward!

Another Treat

Okay, so with the advent of the not having to worry about power . . . 

(as long as the sun shines, and if it doesn’t we all have larger problems than my lack of electricity) 

. . . I can allow myself to entertain the possibility of something that I have wanted for a while now . . .

   

. . . Satellite radio in Wanda.

So, for those of you who don’t know, here is a close-up of the stuff, and essentially what I got was the “Vehicle Kit.”

   

In the middle with the display is the radio itself, and it is a small thing. 

The black box below it is the shuttle dock that it slides into. That dock is supposed to be permanently mounted somewhere.

You can probably guess that the cord thing in the lower left is the power cord that plugs into a 12V power outlet (called a car’s cigarette lighter for us old folks).

In the upper left is the antenna itself, with the business end being that little square box that stick to the roof by way of a magnet on its base. 

The audio cord on the right (the 3.5m audio jack to dual male RCA) is what I bought to connect the satellite radio to Wanda’s Stereo.

Here is where I plan to install it . . .

   

Essentially I plan to install the satellite radio itself on the wall, above the TV. I will run the antenna wire inside that wall, up to the roof. 

The audio and power cables will run down that wall to the back of the stereo, which is in the bottom of the pic. I will hardwire the Satellite radio to steal power from Wanda’s radio (cutting off the power plug at the end of the power cable). 

I am not going to do this myself, the guy who installed the solar panels is going to come back (second weekend of May most likely) to install it for me.

I just don’t want to screw up putting holes in my roof. I may be brave, but I’m not stupid (at least not that stupid).

Until then, I will setup and use the radio by plugging it in from the front and running the antenna out the window. 

It will do, but not how I want it installed, as in permanently in the trailer.

I will connect it up and get it activated tomorrow after work, and so I will let you know how it went on Monday.

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!

Cold Weather Test This Weekend

So, it will get cold this weekend. Again, it is nothing that I haven’t seen before, and nothing too drastic, but enough to remind me that summer has not arrived.

As with all things, I will take it in stride and deal with what comes as it comes.

It is looking to get down to (rumoured) 0C as a high for Saturday, with overnight lows below freezing for the next while with daytime highs in single digits. 

Again, all this is things that I have seen before, but not with my solar panels. So, it will be interesting to see how much of a difference that makes.

The one thing I do know is that I will be dumping Wanda’s tanks on Friday afternoon. 

As always: Keep your head up, keep your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!

Grand Savings Update

Okay, so it is that time again, when I update how my progress is going on my “Grand Savings Plan!” 

Okay, so let’s see how I did . . . 

   

For review, here is how things looked from last payday . . .

   

That is 21.4% (of my Savings Target).

And this is how things look like, after the dust settled on this payday’s budget . . . 

   

 

That’s right things jumped up to 22.6% of my savings target. 

That means I put away 1.2% of my total Savings Target this payday. Yep . . . you read that right . . . 1.2% . . . despite buying the solar charging system this budget cycle.

How could this be you ask?

The answer is simple, a random stranger out there was sooo impressed with all that I’ve accomplished that they paid for the solar charging system for me . . . yep.

Really . . . 

Honestly . . . 

Hey . . . it could happen!

Okay, no, the answer is that I decided to simply carry a balance on my low interest credit card for 6 to 8 months as I continue to build my savings.

The interest shouldn’t be all that much and quite frankly I expect that to be paid by the fuel savings per month by not running a generator. 

I can work this into my current expenses without much pain, and I will pay it off before long. 

On a side note, I have gotten rid of my generator, mainly because I saw that I was not going to use it, or only rarely use it, and so it was literally dead weight that I was carrying around.

When I get to the property I can buy one again, or rig up a larger renewable energy system to provide my electricity needs. 

Who knows, but until then a generator, particularly of the size and weight that I had was literally dead weight.

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!

Electricity To Spare!

Okay, so I was worried about how things would go with me using power as my solar panels were charging Wanda’s New Batteries.

I was amazed at how things worked out and in fact it was and is a huge stress relief.

Here is what happened on Saturday Morning:

• 6:23 AM : 71% (Twilight)

• 8:00 AM : 90%

• 8:30 AM : 95%

• 9:00 AM : 100%

After that, my batteries remained charged even though I was listening to the radio, using my laptop  . . . even while plugged in. (Something I never do, as it is a waste of power.)

On a side note, I have long since learned that laptops charge faster while powered off, than they do while plugged in.

Anyways, I was able to just use power and not worry about it, all day my batteries remained fully charged, no matter what I did. It was great! 

What’s more is that I have noticed that one statistic on my charge controller keeps creeping up: the battery capacity rating (I think.) It is now at 2.6 KWH (Killowatt Hours).

All I know is that so far, I can just use electricity and the sun will charge them up the next day. 

This also bodes well for winter, as it doesn’t take all that long to charge them back to a full charge. 

The thing to remember about winter is two-fold. One is that the storage capacity of my batteries will drop in winter (so they will store less energy). 

The other thing is that there are more hours of darkness and less hours of light. 

This is well known, but in regards to a solar charging system, it means that there are more hours when I will be drawing power out of those batteries and less hours when I will be putting power into those batteries. 

Again, with all things, I will deal with problems as they arise and most likely I will just run to a campground to give the batteries a good charging up. 

I will try to resist the urge of buying another generator, as it seems like a waste to do at this time of the year, as clearly I don’t need it. 

That, my friends is a great thing to say and know, for as it stands, I have electricity to spare . . . and I don’t have to do a thing to get it. (And it’s free.)

As always: keep your head up, your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!