Setting up my first bitcoin mine in garage

[mforno]

Hi all,

I am looking for advice on setting up a home solar garage mining farm.
I live in Queensland Australia where it can get very hot at times but great for solar energy year round except for the season.

- My garage is hot most of the time of the year, will I need to get it insulated and make it temperature controlled?
- I already have solar on my roof producing 6.17KWh today with a power of 1903W.
- I am willing to cover my roof with more solar if it means saving electricity.
- My solar currently does not have batteries to be stored in for nighttime use, it is just on-grid.
- I primarily just want to mine bitcoin, would recommend just bitcoin or move into altcoin mining using an FPGA miner?
- Should I turn my system off during the rainy season when there will be less sunlight and no profit?
- I have all the funds to start this venture but know that it could be a gamble if the market crashes or unexpected events happen.
- how many miners should I setup to start with?
- what is the best brand miner to go with?
- would it be smarter to buy old used miners and even some damaged ones and fix them cheaply to use for miners too?

Could this be a good new years resolution project to get started? I know the halvening is coming up this May 2020 meaning it will be even more difficult to mine but could it still be worth my while?

Thanks for all the opinions and thoughts you may have.

[philipma1957]

So many questions to answer here.

Okay you are on grid.

so what is your deal with the power company?

[Artemis3]

With that solar capacity you should be able to power a single S9, they are very cheap now that they are obsolete, from 100 to 200 USD used.

IMO you should thermal insulate the roof, just to reduce the heat as much as you can. Ambient temperature does not need to be controlled, as along as it remains under 40°C the S9s work just fine.

Consider each S9 needs about 250cfm of fresh air, it is far more important to move that much air in/out than trying to change its temperature. If you have too much humidity (or too little) you should also consider mitigation. From 20% to 70% is fine.

Keep adding panels and when you achieve an extra 2k W, add another miner. Or if you go with the newer, more efficient miners check what they consume. Don't worry about never getting big, that time is ending. Soon only the small miners with free power such as those with solar will remain; let the big ones die one by one.

I assume you are using a grid tie inverter. Do not use batteries. At worst, shutdown the miners at night, its still better than stressing the batteries, leave those for your home only.

[philipma1957]

never use ac to cool it is too costly.

you can buy a cheap unit like the s9 and only daylight mine.

just hold the coins.  think long term two or three years of mining and holding the coins.

at a minimum.

you can silver bubble wrap the garage ceiling.

Reflictrix  is one product.
usa amazon has it.  not sure if it is available in australia 🇦🇺

[mforno]

Thanks for getting  back to me guys.
What do you all think of the Dragonmint 16T?

Would it be worth investing in a few of these instead of antminers?

[Steamtyme]

Thanks for getting  back to me guys.
What do you all think of the Dragonmint 16T?

Avoid like the plague they are. They were a terrible product and have no support available for them at all. You are much better off finding used S9's. Apart from that I always reference a new miner here - First time/Small miner reference for getting started.

Biggest thing for you will be just making sure you are exhausting the air directly outside of your mining space. Here is a thread of my garage this past summer, not a large mine by any means and your average temp is proabably closer to my highest. I used the concrete slab of my garage for the added heat dispersal, and aimed the tunnel directly outside. Dust is also a concern but cheap filters are more than enough generally.  Summer Mining - Home miner

Best of luck. I do suggest however weighing your options of what you are going to spend on gear against outright purchasing coins. Not to discourage you, but I continue to push forward because I move almost all of my hardware inside for the winter to heat my house. Canada problems lol.

[philipma1957]

Thanks for getting  back to me guys.
What do you all think of the Dragonmint 16T?

Would it be worth investing in a few of these instead of antminers?

no parts or support
they break.

old s9s are better