u/HawkfishCa

Plug in solar is expected to become legal in IL this year. 391 watts max.

I’m currently planning to take my house off grid with eg4 1200xp. Don’t wanna deal with permitting so was going to use a chargeverter to keep batteries topped off with low solar input…. Was not planning on using grid bypass. Backfeeding of grid in any capacity was not a risk I wanted to take. I’ve read several tales of utility companies sensing minuscule backfeeding from the inverter using the grid bypass feature and pulling meters. Whether that’s true or not.. who knows.

With the incoming passage of plug in solar, would this all alleviate my risk of consequences from minuscule backfeeding? I’d love to use the grid bypass feature on the 12000xp.

I’m working on getting house set up with solar. Problem is I’m broke, so trying to do it on a budget while also not buying crap that will break or useless should I expand.

Current plan is to do an off grid setup for about 75% of consumption on most days… 24kwh. This equates to everything in my home less the stove/oven/AC. I plan on moving those three circuits to a separate panel and connecting that to existing grid connection. The existing main panel with heavy loads removed will be fed by the inverter. Battery should cover non solar hours. A battery charger hooked up to grid will act as backup in order to rule out no power situations.

Solar set up planned includes
EG4 12000xp - $1,900
Yixiang 16 kWh battery - $2,140
16 - 385 watt panels (6,160 watts) - $1725
EG4 chargeverter - $650

What equipment can I substitute in order to save money. The ultimate goal would be to go fully off grid so expandable would be ideal. I feel like it can’t get much cheaper without making sacrifices in either capacity or quality.

I have a 1cuft Aio iron remover. Smallest size they offered. It works fantastic. Not a lick of iron. Issue is that we aren’t fish and use maybe 50-60 gallons a day. The gallons between refer is 800 and the time between regen is 3 days. Using 80 gallons of water to regen in order to remove the ton from the 150 gallons we actually use is crazy. I adjusted the time between regen to 5 days…

What are the downsides to this? I read the air bubble can become depleted? What am I missing.

I have a small 5 acre farmette. I grow hay on the property. Haven’t sold any so at this point nothing commercial. When I bought the place and started building I didn’t really explore my options just told him my intent to do hay and build a house. Got a AmFam farm policy with builders risk.

Fast forward, house is done. Still not farming. There are fields that have hay in them. I stand to make 700-1300 if I let a neighbor bale the hate and sell it, I won’t be farming this year don’t have time. insurance is 3300 for the year and a homeowners policy is 1200 per the quote I got from usaa. So obviously I’d like to drop the farm policy.

I call AmFam office and agent is out so I’m dealing with one of staff. But she seems to be implying that dropping to a homeowners policy may not be an option as it is a farm and I intend to let neighbor cut and bale fields… commercial activity I guess. But spending an extra $2100 on insurance to make $7-1300 doesn’t make sense to me. So if I don’t let neighbor cut fields then I would qualify for a homeowners policy and have a net savings?

Am I missing something? My original goal was to just drop to homeowners insurance as I it’s expensive and I’m not a farmer… any sort of farming is an excuse to buy a tractor… not about the money.