Groups > rec.crafts.metalworking > #543593

Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator?

From	Bob La Londe <none@none.com99>
Newsgroups	rec.crafts.metalworking
Subject	Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator?
Date	2026-08-01 11:18 -0700
Organization	A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID	<114ld8t$3kfuv$1@dont-email.me> (permalink)
References	<m18q6s8yow.fsf@void.com> <114ipdu$2vnba$1@dont-email.me> <114ius4$31knp$1@dont-email.me> <114jb72$3jgba$1@dont-email.me> <114jmk6$38nvl$1@dont-email.me>

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On 7/31/2026 7:46 PM, Jim Wilkins wrote:
> "Bob La Londe"  wrote in message news:114jb72$3jgba$1@dont-email.me...
> 
> I have never done this, nor have I ever seen it first hand, but I heard
> described a very simple tracking system once.  Panels are mounted on a
> swivel axis.  A box with a slit is placed on either side of the panel.
> A small photovoltaic cell is used to trigger a circuit which moves the
> panel with an actuator depending on condition.  Sound complicated and
> fiddly, but the idea seems pretty simple.  Elevation is adjust every so
> often through out the year.  I don't recall hearing how it was rest to
> the sunrise horizon at the end of travel.  Maybe a timer.  No signal
> from either trigger for so many minutes and it trips a circuit that
> powers the panels back to a limit switch using something like a
> 6060/6062 board.
> 
> Given today's abundance of advanced flexible processors it might be
> easier to program a small computer system with a 365 day timer, to just
> move the panel/s by dead reckoning every few minutes, and then swing
> back to the sunrise horizon at sunset.  Not at sunrise obviously because
> if all backup power is consumed overnight there would be no energy to
> restart the system when the sun rises.
> Bob La Londe
> 
> ------------------------------------
> I started to make the 200W panel pole mount track by machining a 
> stainless steel thrust ball bearing to fit its water pipe supports and 
> buying a small DC geared motor. The sun sensors can be LEDs on either 
> side of a baffle, they also output current when illuminated, though not 
> much.
> https://www.instructables.com/LEDs-as-light-sensors/
> Comparators with a central dead band sensing the result of the opposing 
> LED outputs would drive an H bridge that can turn the motor either way, 
> usually toward the more lit "sunwise" LED until they are nearly equal. 
> In the morning the other "widdershins" LED would rotate it back toward 
> the sun if properly positioned and the panel output to the H bridge is 
> sufficient. Those are the direction terms from before clock dials.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-bridge
> 
> Then I decided to make it manually raise and lower, to catch early sun 
> over the roof, especially when the trees are bare.  The wind loading on 
> the raised pole and tied-down large rotator pulley discouraged me from 
> continuing the tracker project, it's guyed in place and in summer it 
> permanently faces a gap between trees. There are other panels on the 
> ground nearby that I have to move around to dodge house and tree shadows 
> every few hours so I'm back there anyway and can rotate it by the guy 
> lines. Wood heat has accustomed me to managing my energy sources.
> 
> I played with an Arduino a little, didn't have a good use for its 
> limited capabilities, then went back to programming on an old laptop 
> running DOS and QBasic which has a nicer interpret or compile IDE, the 
> structured programming syntax of Pascal minus its restrictions and all 
> the legacy computer hardware free to use (unlike in Windows), KBD, LCD 
> and HDD for files plus COM and LPT whose registers are addressable in 
> the I/O space. LPT is the digital interface to custom external hardware, 
> I've wired it to a DAC chip and comparator as a successive approximation 
> voltmeter. A mouse can be added through a Call Absolute to a pointer to 
> INT33 code stored as a String.
> https://mirror.math.princeton.edu/pub/oldlinux/Linux.old/docs/ 
> interrupts/int-html/int-33.htm
> 
> 
> 
> 

The very last actual computer program I ever wrote was a Quick Basic 
(4.5) executable running under PCDOS 7.0.  Due to a partial Y2K bug and 
dead cmos battery I called it in my autoexec to bring up a menu to set 
time and date upon boot up.  I used that computer until the end of 2016 
for remote programming some older lines of alarm panels.  In 2017 I gave 
it to the company that purchased my alarm accounts.


-- 
Bob La Londe
CNC Molds N Stuff

Thread

off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Richard Smith <null@void.com> - 2026-07-30 13:11 +0100
  Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Carl <carl.ijamesXX@YYverizon.net> - 2026-07-30 10:25 -0400
    Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-07-30 14:37 -0400
      Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Carl <carl.ijamesXX@YYverizon.net> - 2026-07-30 16:17 -0400
        Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Richard Smith <null@void.com> - 2026-07-30 21:33 +0100
          Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-07-30 19:12 -0400
    Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-07-30 15:22 -0400
  Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? bp@www.zefox.net - 2026-07-30 15:45 +0000
  Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-07-30 13:56 -0400
    Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Richard Smith <null@void.com> - 2026-07-30 21:49 +0100
      Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-07-31 08:23 -0400
    Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-07-30 22:47 -0400
  Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Bob La Londe <none@none.com99> - 2026-07-31 11:27 -0700
    Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-07-31 16:00 -0400
      Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Bob La Londe <none@none.com99> - 2026-07-31 16:30 -0700
        Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Clare Snyder <clare@snyder.on.ca> - 2026-07-31 22:23 -0400
        Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-07-31 22:46 -0400
          Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-01 09:14 -0400
          Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Bob La Londe <none@none.com99> - 2026-08-01 11:18 -0700
            Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-01 16:07 -0400
            Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-02 21:45 -0400
            Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Richard Smith <null@void.com> - 2026-08-03 21:13 +0100
              Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Bob La Londe <none@none.com99> - 2026-08-03 14:03 -0700
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Richard Smith <null@void.com> - 2026-08-04 13:10 +0100
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-04 10:04 -0400
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Bob La Londe <none@none.com99> - 2026-08-04 13:08 -0700
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-04 18:24 -0400
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Bob La Londe <none@none.com99> - 2026-08-04 15:47 -0700
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Bob La Londe <none@none.com99> - 2026-08-04 16:16 -0700
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Bob La Londe <none@none.com99> - 2026-08-04 16:30 -0700
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? David Billington <djb@invalid.com> - 2026-08-05 00:35 +0100
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-04 23:02 -0400
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Richard Smith <null@void.com> - 2026-08-05 09:13 +0100
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-05 09:32 -0400
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-05 10:06 -0400
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-05 21:33 -0400
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Richard Smith <null@void.com> - 2026-08-06 05:34 +0100
                Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-06 09:39 -0400
              Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-03 18:23 -0400
    Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? Richard Smith <null@void.com> - 2026-08-03 19:47 +0100
      Re: off-grid - battery & winter 12V-generator? "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> - 2026-08-03 16:10 -0400

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