What Made You Feel Good Today

[masda74]

can I come and help?

[Rab]

This made me feel good.

 

Paintjob made me puke, but when he lifts the bonnet my faith and hope for the future of humanity is restored.

 

Love the redesigned badges

[Puffwagon]

Wmmfg today?

 

I just did my first "winter" electricity read since installing a couple of reverse cycle aircons and it's about $270 for the month. I budget $450 a month for the whole year and the summer bills came in a tad under that, so I'm pleasantly surprised that the winter ones are under $300.

 

It's a hell of a lot cheaper than buying wood which I have done for the past few years.

[OZYWALKER]

Worked a long week last week (63hrs). Came home today to find a set of those drl headlights and led tail lights at the door.
Dont remember ordering them but car parts are always good.
Apparently too much work and not much beer = eBay nonsense.

[tazzanz]

Brought a new laptop, Lenovo Ideapad. i7 8550U, 16GB, GTX1050 bit over kill for browsing but thought fark it

[masda74]

not bad for a gaming laptop. Time for you to try out pubg??

long weekend for me. 4 days off to get stuff done around the place.

 

Electricity..... well I haven't paid a bill since april 2011. I hav been paid by WP and Synergy every 2 months since then.

32 solar panels on the roof will do that for you. :D

[.Stripes.]

^ I really want solar on my place, especially given I'm home during the day a lot when I'm on break. If I knew it's likely I'll stay in my house for the next few years then I'd just pony up and do it, 6.5kw system I reckon.

[masda74]

 back in the day with the rebates, it was worth getting a system that big.

Now a days it is not worth getting the biggest you can get.

If you really want to work out how big a system you need. 

 

Taking readings from your meter at 6am and then at 6pm for a week or two.

Then you can gauge how much power you chew up during the day.

Based on that you can get an appropriate system.

 

it might even be worth while getting a battery bank as part of the deal.

This way you can live off the grid. hehehe

[.Stripes.]

Given my roster though, I end up using a lot of power during the day, especially in summer, as I'm home during the day running the aircon, tv, hifi gear, washing machine etc.

 

Issue I have with batteries currently is that I just don't see them as being viable yet. You're looking at like $10-11k for a Powerwall 2, with a payback period of around 10years (when factoring a new solar system also), at which point the warranty has run out and it no doubt doesn't hold the nearly the same amount of charge. That's great if you're at a stage in life where you're in your dream home and plan to be there for many years to come...but I'm not and so I feel it could just be sunk money. A solar setup without battery, however, would have a payback period of 3-4 years.

 

Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of having a battery setup with it...I'm just hesitant as to whether it's worth it yet. The idea of negligible electricity bills is pretty great though...from an ongoing monthly expenditure that is.

[masda74]

fair point there about being there for a short period of time. even more reason for you to get it right.

Check you meter readings while you are home. check in the morning and then in the evening.

This way you can gauge what size system you need to get.

 

My old man has retired at the end of last year. Being that he was an A grade sparky at one of the big players in lenster, he had cash flow to spend.

He went out and bought the biggest system he could get. funny thing is that their power bill didn't go down by much.

Know why?