New consulting relationship with GreenTecAuto begins
What actually goes wrong with the batteries????
A look at todays Hybrid and EV battery packs
Battery packs exposed
Keeping Warm In New England
Plugging into the SUN
50A 600VAC transfer relay
AC source transfer relay is finished
Adding some new batteries
All weather dish movers
Almost ready to wire things up
Assembling the parts for the load manager
Beating on the system/ use it or loose it
Better solar absorber plate
Better Specific gravity instrument
bringing in the batteries
Burgers are better
California or bust! Solar modified mobility scooter
Canning pot
canning season is here again
Concentrate the heat test #4
Connecting battery bank #2
Cooking some hotdogs
Crappy luck with the weather
Designing a simpler and lower cost solar tracking amplifier
Equilizing the batteries
Everything is working again.
Finally installed
Finally nearing completion of the battery enclosure
multytracker 1
First test
Getting a BIG solar plug
Getting some experience with DC
Getting started on the final wiring
Getting too old to be slinging 120 lb batterys into the rack
Giving the batteries a workout
Hot water tank as energy storage component test 1
Hot water test 2
Identifing the wires, and mounting the Inverter panel
Insulated hibachi reaches baking temperatures
keeping the head cool
keeping warm.
Sue Dabrowski (my better half) makes some solar eggs
Lightning the super fast EV minibike
Looking the data
Main structure of battery rack is finished
Making some stewed tomatoes
making the connection to the existing wiring
making the DC pos buss bars
More improvements to the dish
Multy purpose tracker 1
New tracking amplifier
No more throw away batteries please
Not very encouraging test # 3
Old Rear projection TV lens makes solar furnace
power distribution box fabrication
preparing to connect the big loads
Reading Specific Gravity accurately
running off grid all day
Running on batteries
Second test
Snow melt prep for test 2
Snow melt test one A close look at the process
solar cell adhesion test #1
Solar cells on my Insight ????
Solar cooker gets some wheels
Solar cookout in 20 degree weather
Solarfest 2013
Solarfest is next weekend so it is time to tweak the tools
Solar powered wood burner X-Y stage
Solar powered wood burner focus and lens assembly
Solar teaching toys
Solar tracking with no electronics" Solar Puppet"
Starting the rewiring
The 7 foot circle of sunlight moves to rear deck.
the final high current connections
the finished load center and charge controller connections
the heavy lifters arrive
The new batteries are finally installed and working
The snow is returning???
The snow keeps on coming, need to figure out a good way to keep the panels clear
The sun is dropping 1KW/SQ meter
The transfer relay is wired in and working.
Tracking the sun Big Time
Mikey's solar panel snow sweeper
Vertical and horizontal trackers installed, drive wheel controls
Very interesting heating element
Who pulled the plug?
Wood burning art ?
Yuck, more snow
Making a small solar concentrator
Building MIMA and the plug in adapters
Converting a telephone truck to electric
DIY dual pulse Capacitor Discharge Spotwelder
Chevy Bolt EV joins the family
Getting in shape while making electricity
Retirement
Replacing gasoline with solar electric lawn equipment
What is Genesis One?
How to stop the aging process DIY
MIMA Install Day 2005 a Big Success!
Building a hybrid car grid charger
Tapping into the Wind
Expanding MIMA with the Distribution board ( users projects )

Mikey's solar panel snow sweeper

Mikey's solar panel snow sweeper
Mikeys snow sweeper

Time to go back to a more mechanical way to clear the snow.
After beating on some snow drifts with various things, I came up with a pretty simple to make,low cost and potentially useful way to get snow to slide off the panels.The same system could also clear roofs.
In all the test i have did to date trying to melt the snow,I found that all that is required to fully clear a panel is to give the snow a nudge, and then the snow just slides off with gravity's help.
A bar, pipe, dowel is supported above the panels.This needs to be rigidly attached so you can pull as hard as necessary to get the snow moving. A 3/4" diameter poly rope is attached loosely with a loop. The loop can be pulled left or right with a smaller diameter rope, which would pass through pulleys on the left and right ends. By pulling on the small ropes, you can slide the loop anywhere along the bar, and hold it there if the ropes are tied down.
To clear snow, you would pull on the big poly rope end on the ground, far enough from the building to put the rope parallel to the panels surface. Then you just pull and sweep the rope across the surface to clear the snow.
This means I would have to snow blow a path at the right distance from the house to get the angle right, but that is not as difficult or dangerous as getting on the roof.
The top can be moved left or right to sweep multiple times, all far from the house, away from falling snow.A small cleat to tie down the two small ropes would lock the top loop in position.
Would work best the morning after the storm, when the snow is fresh. Leave the ropes set up all winter, and put a top slide across all of the house peaks to allow clearing either side of the roof with the same bar and separate ropes. Sounds good on paper, the real test will come when it snows again.
The same rope can be used to support the end of a very long snow rake.Imagine a pulley that the rope runs through right above the rake. The rope is held in one hand, the snow rake handle in the other. Lift the rope to get the snow rake end over the snow, push the rake up to get another bite of snow, pull down the snow. I hope that the rake would only be required if the snow is too much for the rope alone. I also rigged up another poly rope tied to the base of my chimney over the panels and to the ground, so I can test clearing a limited sweep of the real panels to see how it works. Now all I need to try it out is another snow storm.