Will your next car be electric?

Randyretired · November 7, 2021

10 hours ago, gjhunter01 said:

I'm curious what the life span is for the batteries and how that cost figures into the long term pay back. The $10k electric company cost might be a better bargain over the life span of the house.

Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries are rated for 3000 to 5000 cycles and that is based on fully charged and discharged. With this size battery bank it should be enough to last 3 maybe 4 days without any input from the solar panels. In reality even during storms the panels put out some power. So realistically this should be enough battery for 4 or 5 days without conserving. This means the batteries will not typically see full discharge and I doubt cycles will be the limiting factor. Age will probably be the limiting factor and there are but few examples of how long that is. 20 years in theory and a few examples for 80% capacity. I am not sure how long these will last but at 80% this battery bank is still useful. The price of these batteries has been going up mostly due to shipping costs that have skyrocketed but I believe I can build this battery bank for around $7,000. I am reasonably confident these will last 15 years and I am hoping for 20 or more. I built a smaller 10kwh battery pack like this for our 5er but have only used this year. So far it has been good. The difference between these and lead acid is very noticeable. The solar panels are used but not very old and are near or at rated output. The panels were $60 a piece.. I have not decided on the inverters and such but I like the all in one packages like growatt. The payback with all things added in should be around 10 years or less at current prices. I believe price increases are likely. My time is not included and I already have the tools needed. There is another incentive to to do this. This is a fairly remote area and the electrical lines have been there for years but not used. If we were to purchase electrical service we will be the only ones on this line and I wonder how reliable that is. I would think a backup would be necessary and since we travel, solar with a backup battery or at least a good generator would make sense.

Ray,IN · November 7, 2021

5 hours ago, noteven said:

How to start your Tesla at -34C in Saskatoon, SK

Link to a video

I was disappointed; he did the warming test while charging the battery. I wanted to see the actual draw on the battery bank and how much capacity was used.

LindaH · November 7, 2021

Probably not. At our ages, our current car will probably be our last. Plus, as long as we're still making the trip south each winter, an electric car would be difficult in terms of daily range and, since we mostly boondock, how would it get recharged?

noteven · November 7, 2021

2 hours ago, Ray,IN said:

I was disappointed; he did the warming test while charging the battery. I wanted to see the actual draw on the battery bank and how much capacity was used.

Hi Ray - he has another video kind of to that effect.

Vladimir · November 8, 2021

On 11/7/2021 at 8:26 AM, Randyretired said:

There is another incentive to to do this. This is a fairly remote area and the electrical lines have been there for years but not used. If we were to purchase electrical service we will be the only ones on this line and I wonder how reliable that is. I would think a backup would be necessary and since we travel, solar with a backup battery or at least a good generator would make sense.

I have owned a off-grid house for 23 years. I would go on-grid ASAP, if the local public utility didn't quote a price of one million dollars for the line 20 years ago!!!

In the Forest Service, we did give up a electrical line to a popular campground and the taxpayers paid dearly for that decision. Your pretty handy, but there are lots of hidden costs to solar off-grid.

It is reliable, in the 23 years my power has gone off...ONCE. But it was hell, to find a electrician that knew how to work on solar.

I would do BOTH. Get the utility hookup and don't use unless totally necessary. I would look at it as a generator and use it to charge the batteries when needed. An existing line should be real cheap to hook up. If you need a new line, well a million bucks!!

Lots of good things come with electrical lines. In our county, fiber follows powerlines. If your on-grid you have fiber or soon will have. Besides, you never know if the next person owning your property will want solar.