GUIDE SETTING UP A SOLAR POWER SYSTEM

[Lucky7Gaming]

I think you are confused a bit. Those batteries are not monster huge.
They are normal Tubular 100AH 12V battery connected in series. 2x means 2 no of batteries.
So in total the battery bank will give 24V 100AH. That battery is connected to a 24V/1500VA Inverter to get backup.
To reduce the power cost I'm looking to implement solar or other possible solutions like genset or so.

In my opinion if Solar is used its better to just plug the psu in inverter and connect the solar panels to battery rather
 than directly connecting 12V to ASIC devices. Then we can avoid the replay and converter. What yo think? Do you
know how efficient the generator thing is?

Okay.  I see.  You're taking the batteries and making ac power with the inverter and then converting it back to dc power with the PC power supply and I assume the batteries are plugged into some ac, to DC chargers? 

So is it          ac wall ->charger -> batteries -> inverter -> computer PSU -> miners
or
                      Ac wall -> PSU -> miners.  When power is up
                     Charger -> batteries -> inverter -> PSU -> miners only when power is out
100amps is pretty large...the largest ones on amazon are like 40amps and $50-60. 

I can think of many options that aren't very efficient.  When I get home tomorrow night I'll make a good diagram of this.  I feel like this'll require either a 24v to 12v step down or a whole overhauled battery charging scheme. 

For a backup inverter like this 100AmpereHour is pretty common and normally used everywhere here in homes.
In youtube, I found a tons of guides and a few good ones. Thanks for wttbs to putting it here.
My current setup is like below, see the image.
Also I'm looking where Generators diesel/petrol/LPG is economic to run for this.

I'm going to ask some professional electrical engineers today and see what's the best for this system.  I feel like diesel generators are costly and inneficient.

I did some research in using fossil fuel ac generator sets. They are no where near to afford as a system for running 24hrs.
Their cost to output ratio is very high and dropped that fossil fuel plan.
Will look more into Solar + Grid Setup. As per my calculations when we combine the solar+grid ROI is 15 months and its very great.
Solar alone is expensive for this purpose due to the need for a large battery bank to get power when Sun is down.
If we are setting up a full solar setup minimum 35 12V 100AH batteries for continues 24hr 1KW/H delivery.

At robotics in my high school I'll talk to them about it, is having a battery bank for backup when there is no power still a viable option?

Overhead cost for 35 12V 100AH batteries is huge. So its not a viable option in my opinion.
One 100Ah 12V battery will cost around 100 to 130 USD. So USD 3500 for the battery bank alone.
And the no of solar panels need to be almost doubled to charge this big battery bank.
So need atleast 15 no of 12V 250W PV Panels. $190 to $200 per PV panel cost another $2850 for 15 panels.
Adding all minimum 8000 to 1000 USD and which is very high for running such a small 1KW miner.

Alright. So I learned a few things.

1.  The efficiency of DC to AC on an inverter is around 70% and if you have a computer psu that's around 80% then your efficiency is really really bad, especially since the whole point of this is to save electricity.
2. The batteries you have cannot be used for backup and solar regulation for the miners.  That would need complex voltage sensing and still wouldn't be perfect.
3.  The diagram above that I edited would work fine.  The best way would be to buy an 24v-12v step down because that would be the steadiest 12v power available. 
4.  If you get 12v solar panels and run that through the solar charge controller with the batteries in parrelel you would be ok.
5. Apparently solar panels only get max output around 4 hours a day.

[kabopar]

This is an interesting thread, however you may consider a more 'conventional' approach:  Instead of having a system dedicated to mining, why not simply use a standard grid-tie PV system. This offsets or covers your mining electricity cost during sunny hours and allows you to mine using the grid during dark hours.  Standard grid-tie systems are common place, relatively low cost and accepted by neighbors/planning authorities/electricity providers.  These may be eligible for some 'green' subsidies in many countries.  Another factor is the WAF (or SAF=Spouse Approval Factor), where it is easier to convince of the merits of such an investment on wider financial/ethical grounds.
I have a PV system of about 2 KW peak capacity that provides partial offset of my mining electricity costs.  The electricity provider pays very little for energy that I feed into the grid, but charges 'like a raging bull' for the KW/h that they provide, so it makes a lot of sense to use internally all that the sun provides.  This of course doesn't help at night, but I don't need to buy and maintain large battery banks.  If some day I stop Crypto-coin mining, the PV system will still provide a useful function in reducing household electricity costs.

Cheers

[NapoleonBonaparte]

Have you check the electricity rate at Iceland? 0.04 USD per kilo watt if I am not mistaken.

Unless solar can beat this rate without subsidy, all huge mining operation and data center will head that way.

[allcoinminer]

This is an interesting thread, however you may consider a more 'conventional' approach:  Instead of having a system dedicated to mining, why not simply use a standard grid-tie PV system. This offsets or covers your mining electricity cost during sunny hours and allows you to mine using the grid during dark hours.  Standard grid-tie systems are common place, relatively low cost and accepted by neighbors/planning authorities/electricity providers.  These may be eligible for some 'green' subsidies in many countries.  Another factor is the WAF (or SAF=Spouse Approval Factor), where it is easier to convince of the merits of such an investment on wider financial/ethical grounds.
I have a PV system of about 2 KW peak capacity that provides partial offset of my mining electricity costs.  The electricity provider pays very little for energy that I feed into the grid, but charges 'like a raging bull' for the KW/h that they provide, so it makes a lot of sense to use internally all that the sun provides.  This of course doesn't help at night, but I don't need to buy and maintain large battery banks.  If some day I stop Crypto-coin mining, the PV system will still provide a useful function in reducing household electricity costs.

Cheers

That's a more conventional and easy approach to the problem.
As you said, building a battery bank is expensive.
How many panels you are using to get the said 2KW? Also let's know the watt ratings of panels.
If possible you are invited to post some images or drawings of the connections if its not conventional.

[Lucky7Gaming]

This is an interesting thread, however you may consider a more 'conventional' approach:  Instead of having a system dedicated to mining, why not simply use a standard grid-tie PV system. This offsets or covers your mining electricity cost during sunny hours and allows you to mine using the grid during dark hours.  Standard grid-tie systems are common place, relatively low cost and accepted by neighbors/planning authorities/electricity providers.  These may be eligible for some 'green' subsidies in many countries.  Another factor is the WAF (or SAF=Spouse Approval Factor), where it is easier to convince of the merits of such an investment on wider financial/ethical grounds.
I have a PV system of about 2 KW peak capacity that provides partial offset of my mining electricity costs.  The electricity provider pays very little for energy that I feed into the grid, but charges 'like a raging bull' for the KW/h that they provide, so it makes a lot of sense to use internally all that the sun provides.  This of course doesn't help at night, but I don't need to buy and maintain large battery banks.  If some day I stop Crypto-coin mining, the PV system will still provide a useful function in reducing household electricity costs.

Cheers

That's a more conventional and easy approach to the problem.
As you said, building a battery bank is expensive.
How many panels you are using to get the said 2KW? Also let's know the watt ratings of panels.
If possible you are invited to post some images or drawings of the connections if its not conventional.

In my state, NJ, the power company said that small grid tie inverters are illegal.  You'd have to check in your state.  I would have to get the grid ties professionally installed.  Grid tie inverters are not very efficient and power companies pay pennies on the dollar for that electricity.  Also, this would mean you need an input outlet of electricity into the miners and an output outlet to the power company, and there might not be enough power outlets in your house.  I still think running the solar panels with a small battery to even out the voltage and then switching to wall power the rest of the night would work cheaper. 

[kabopar]

Using 12 panels of 190W each with a 3KW inverter (originally wanted to have a 3KW system, but on installation we found that it wouldn't fit on the roof). All professionally installed and legally connected to the electricity utility through their meter.  The feed-in tariff is fairly small, so using it to offset the electricity provider's cost makes a lot of sense.  I'm getting 6 AU c/KWh as a feed-in tariff, while my provider charges about 54 AU c/KWh during peak time (there is a time-of-use formula, which I won't go into right now). This system produces more than 7 KWh/day during winter time (now, down under), and about 13 KWh/day during sunnier seasons.  It is a completely conventional installation, so I won't post any photos.  The miners are just connected to standard residential electricity outlets, and do not care if the electrons come from the roof or the utility.  There used to be a subsidized generous feed-in tariff here, which made PV systems very attractive, but the politicians decided that they can't afford the subsidy, so it was terminated.  It doesn't fully supply all the bitcoin mining needs, but helps put a slight dent in the energy bill.

Cheers

[Lucky7Gaming]

Using 12 panels of 190W each with a 3KW inverter (originally wanted to have a 3KW system, but on installation we found that it wouldn't fit on the roof). All professionally installed and legally connected to the electricity utility through their meter.  The feed-in tariff is fairly small, so using it to offset the electricity provider's cost makes a lot of sense.  I'm getting 6 AU c/KWh as a feed-in tariff, while my provider charges about 54 AU c/KWh during peak time (there is a time-of-use formula, which I won't go into right now). This system produces more than 7 KWh/day during winter time (now, down under), and about 13 KWh/day during sunnier seasons.  It is a completely conventional installation, so I won't post any photos.  The miners are just connected to standard residential electricity outlets, and do not care if the electrons come from the roof or the utility.  There used to be a subsidized generous feed-in tariff here, which made PV systems very attractive, but the politicians decided that they can't afford the subsidy, so it was terminated.  It doesn't fully supply all the bitcoin mining needs, but helps put a slight dent in the energy bill.

Cheers

Yeah that's pretty cool.  If I make my own solar panels I can save money and not vet it nicely installed and hook them up toy minersx but this is probably the better long term strategy.
T

[kanazawa]

hi.

how much amps it need to power on a normal antminer s1 ?

and for the s2 ?

can someone tell more about current needed to mining...

**Two panels with 250W and 8.5A each one will power a S1 and keep it cool with a corsair cx500m
or
**Five panels to power a S2 with the internal psu?? The amps and watts are right?

thanks.

[Lucky7Gaming]

hi.

how much amps it need to power on a normal antminer s1 ?

and for the s2 ?

can someone tell more about current needed to mining...

**Two panels with 250W and 8.5A each one will power a S1 and keep it cool with a corsair cx500m
or
**Five panels to power a S2 with the internal psu?? The amps and watts are right?

thanks.

For our purposes amps it watts/volts.  Example: 350 watts/12 volts = 29 1/6 amps. 
The panels will depend if its 24v or 12v.  If its 24v it has twice the wattage and also means you need half the amps.  So 250watts and 8.5 amps means its 29 1/6 volts?
An S1 could get away with probably 400 watts of panels $200 if you make it yourself.  The quoted specs on solar panels only run for about 4 hours a day, so a little more would be necessary to get through more of the day.  A cx500  (what I"m using now)  would work as it has about 500 watts on the 12v rail for the miners. 
Five panels?  We need the ratings.  The 12v from the panels would probably need to get around the internal PSU, I'm not familiar with how that works.
If you're using a grid tie system then I guess it doesn't matter how many panels you have.

[allcoinminer]

hi.

how much amps it need to power on a normal antminer s1 ?

and for the s2 ?

can someone tell more about current needed to mining...

**Two panels with 250W and 8.5A each one will power a S1 and keep it cool with a corsair cx500m
or
**Five panels to power a S2 with the internal psu?? The amps and watts are right?

thanks.

For our purposes amps it watts/volts.  Example: 350 watts/12 volts = 29 1/6 amps. 
The panels will depend if its 24v or 12v.  If its 24v it has twice the wattage and also means you need half the amps.  So 250watts and 8.5 amps means its 29 1/6 volts?
An S1 could get away with probably 400 watts of panels $200 if you make it yourself.  The quoted specs on solar panels only run for about 4 hours a day, so a little more would be necessary to get through more of the day.  A cx500  (what I"m using now)  would work as it has about 500 watts on the 12v rail for the miners. 
Five panels?  We need the ratings.  The 12v from the panels would probably need to get around the internal PSU, I'm not familiar with how that works.
If you're using a grid tie system then I guess it doesn't matter how many panels you have.

For an S1 to run with 360W the amp requirement is 360/12= 30A.
But from single 250W/24V PV Panel we will only get 8.5Amp maximum. So need 4 such panels to run one S1
That is 4*8.5 = 34Amps, when losses are calculated may need more.
Lucky7Gaming, what you think of my assumptions? I'm not clear in that point you above said.

[superresistant]

So the most complex part is the battery charge ?

Why not using the miner day-only ?

[MickGhee]

GO SOLAR WITH BTCITCOIN

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=671778.msg7607842#msg7607842

we are taking orders

[allcoinminer]

GO SOLAR WITH BTCITCOIN

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=671778.msg7607842#msg7607842

we are taking orders

Then you will be the best one to answer here.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=655325.msg7713937#msg7713937

[MickGhee]

GO SOLAR WITH BTCITCOIN

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=671778.msg7607842#msg7607842

we are taking orders

Then you will be the best one to answer here.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=655325.msg7713937#msg7713937

it looks like you would need at most 2 of our panels per s1 to run it for 5 hrs a day (depending on where you are located ) plus an inverter and any battery storage u might want. now factor in that it runs 24 hrs you would need 10-12 panels per s1 to run it 24/7  plus battery backup to be "OFF GRID"  if you want to be grid tied (recommended)  you could forego the battery backup and a bunch of headache our 7.5 kwh system could run 3-5 of these miners 24/7 (depending on time of year and location)  for $13,555  COMPLETE

[allcoinminer]

GO SOLAR WITH BTCITCOIN

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=671778.msg7607842#msg7607842

we are taking orders

Then you will be the best one to answer here.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=655325.msg7713937#msg7713937

it looks like you would need at most 2 of our panels per s1 to run it for 5 hrs a day (depending on where you are located ) plus an inverter and any battery storage u might want. now factor in that it runs 24 hrs you would need 10-12 panels per s1 to run it 24/7  plus battery backup to be "OFF GRID"  if you want to be grid tied (recommended)  you could forego the battery backup and a bunch of headache our 7.5 kwh system could run 3-5 of these miners 24/7 (depending on time of year and location)  for $13,555  COMPLETE

How many panels(???W/24V) and the ChargeController(ratings including charge current) required to charge a battery bank of 200AH/24V in 7hrs from solar.

[MickGhee]

GO SOLAR WITH BTCITCOIN

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=671778.msg7607842#msg7607842

we are taking orders

Then you will be the best one to answer here.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=655325.msg7713937#msg7713937

it looks like you would need at most 2 of our panels per s1 to run it for 5 hrs a day (depending on where you are located ) plus an inverter and any battery storage u might want. now factor in that it runs 24 hrs you would need 10-12 panels per s1 to run it 24/7  plus battery backup to be "OFF GRID"  if you want to be grid tied (recommended)  you could forego the battery backup and a bunch of headache our 7.5 kwh system could run 3-5 of these miners 24/7 (depending on time of year and location)  for $13,555  COMPLETE

 

How many panels(???W/24V) and the ChargeController(ratings including charge current) required to charge a battery bank of 200AH/24V in 7hrs from solar.

just to be clear the entire bank = 200ah/24v ?

if this is so you would need at max 4 305 watt panels running 5 hrs a day  this would give you 4.8 kwh per day the charge controller i would use is Morningstar’s TriStar MPPT TS-45 solar controller  which allows for peak of 3 kwh  this would run a little less than 1800 usd

this is just an example and your mileage may vary

[allcoinminer]

You above post is not clear to me.
I will show you an image below to get a clear picture. Click on the image to get make it bigger.
The invertors and controllers connected there are for sample only and are free to change.
Also alternate configurations are welcome from all.
If you know a good configuration than this for "Working 400W for 7hr backup" and "400W for 8hrs during daytime. Assume the remaining 9hrs the miner is switched off.

[MickGhee]

You above post is not clear to me.
I will show you an image below to get a clear picture. Click on the image to get make it bigger.
The invertors and controllers connected there are for sample only and are free to change.
Also alternate configurations are welcome from all.
If you know a good configuration than this for "Working 400W for 7hr backup" and "400W for 8hrs during daytime. Assume the remaining 9hrs the miner is switched off.

im having our electrician look at this i will get back to you within 48 hrs

[allcoinminer]

You above post is not clear to me.
I will show you an image below to get a clear picture. Click on the image to get make it bigger.
The invertors and controllers connected there are for sample only and are free to change.
Also alternate configurations are welcome from all.
If you know a good configuration than this for "Working 400W for 7hr backup" and "400W for 8hrs during daytime. Assume the remaining 9hrs the miner is switched off.

im having our electrician look at this i will get back to you within 48 hrs

Hope this will be a more helpful, a more simplified image than the above.
See below image.

[superresistant]

What do you guys think about watercooling cells ?
I heard it increase about 15% the efficiency.