In the dark...

[Duchess]

And thankfully I have the iPad and iPhone still!!

Well, for a little while at least...as the iPad is down to 7 percent of battery and the phone is not much better...how typical!

So it was a big storm and some lightning hit pretty close to home, causing this blackout we have had for several hours now. What ****s me is that the people across the road have power! I don't quite get how that works.

Anyway, if this is going to become the norm for us, as power companies become about making money and not fixing infrastructure, then i reckon it is time to think about hardwiring the house for 12 volt.

Seeing as I have started on the trailer and I need to develop my burgeoning soldering skills, I thought it would be a great project for me!! All I really would need to do is set up lighting in the kitchen, bathroom and possibly the lounge and definitely some lighting for the front stairs would be good to. A couple of charging points and I reckon I would be all set!

Just have to then think about the charging and powering side...

I'd use the candles still for the bedrooms and even the lounge...in summer they're a pain as they do seem to put out a lot of heat! (funny that!)

Well...just some thoughts I had whilst sitting in the dark!!

*Edit: for stupid ipad auto correct!*

[singo-26]

Some friends of mine have no 240 volt feed to their house due to location. Everything is 12 volt running from 20 100ah batteries in a shed fed by a large solar array.

It looked like a good storm that went over you guys out there, I got the warnings and came inside for a look at what was coming.

Have you got a car charger for either device?

[Duchess]

I am thinking smaller scale as my situation would be for emergency lighting as is the case right now!

Though, i want to run a fridge, then I might need to think of single battery for it and separate batteries for charging from and lights.

I daresay your mates setup was a tad costly with 20 batteries!! And they would have really good power too. Do they run inverters at all, do you know?

[NewcastleKnight]

We had no power tonight for several hours...thought about all the 12v lights I have but could not use them.... Need to sort something out...lol

[Kit_e_kat9]

Some friends of mine have no 240 volt feed to their house due to location. Everything is 12 volt running from 20 100ah batteries in a shed fed by a large solar array.

My dad looked into this as well.  Quite expensive compared to a gennie and some fuel, but I guess it's what you can afford at the time. 

Everytime we lose power here I whip out all the camping equipment ... 2 burner gas stove, camp lights ... and "camp out" for dinner.  Last time it happened, I was eating a steak and veg dinner when the neighbour knocked on the door.  They got a bit jealous that I wasn't sulking about it like they were.  At least in suburbia, our hot water still flows without assistance, so I had a shower when required as well.

And yes ... over the road ... lights & tele going ... head over and ask if you can watch the news with them.  Apparently, they will be on a different pole configuration to you (or something equally as technical) ... sucks I know.  Mostly it's for an hour or 4, but sometimes it comes back on after I've gone to work the next day.  Hasn't happened for awhile though, so I guess we are due soon.

Kit_e

[singo-26]

only when needed, most of what they had was 12 volt. It was an interesting house, Built for a tv show. as you walked around you could see all the common camera angles, They looked good the rest of the house was very rough.

[noel_w]

Reminds me of when I grew up on a wheat farm not too far from where Duchess lives. The only power we had was a 32V lighting plant with huge 2V batteries in a bank. Cooling was done by Kerosene, made the contents of the fridge stink of of it.

News today that the BOM are thinking Brisvegas & SEQ will suffer again this summer almost as bad as last summer. We have already had a few good storms through here.

[briann532]

Duchess,

I have set up some systems operating off a 7.0 amphour, 12 volt alarm battery (around $22 at battery world)
I run some 500mm strip leds which I bulk buy at around $8.50 a piece.
They are brighter than a standard 60 watt globe, not that horrible hospital colour either.
Placed neatly in a polished alloy reflector they do wonders.
A 5 watt solar panel ($30 odd dollars for a good one on evil bay) and lighting all sorted.

A good quality well wired setup for around $200 with all wiring and switches etc (all labour DIY)
Can provide lights throughout the house all night.

PM me if you want some details.
Cheers and best wishes
Brian

[sandman]

We are currently getting a house built and have had the sparkie fit an inlet for a genny into the power box. We will be living out of town so rely on power for lighting and water. If the power goes I can wheel the generator around and fire it up!

[Duchess]

....and I'm back! Though they had to have two goes at getting us up and running again...I heard something go bang the first time, followed by a lot of yelling...so I sure hope that the guys over on the substation are all ok. Nasty stuff this electricity!

Brian, that sounds just the ticket for these situations. Considering those LED strips draw next to nothing and have a huge output, I reckon that is the way to go. Are you using that system every night? At the way the price of electricity is going...could be a pretty cheap answer that would have you reaping the benefits pretty quick!

Noel...that's what I have been hearing too...the latest is that we're going into a weaker La Nina pattern and the long term forecast for here has been consistent with its prediction of higher than average rainfall for this area. Not all good news that really but the country is crying out for rain again.

Sandman...I think that is a great solution too and was one I was thinking of if there are going to be long periods of power outages due to storm damage. Its the fridge and its contents that I worry about as in our hot summer they won't be cool or frozen for long!

[Duchess]

It looked like a good storm that went over you guys out there, I got the warnings and came inside for a look at what was coming.

Have you got a car charger for either device?

It sure was brewing up and watching the radar, I could see it was a big line of storms that headed off towards the coast. So you guys didn't get anything much down there?

Yep, have a charger that does both I things and gave the phone a bit of a boost when I had a drive around town earlier sussing things out...like who had power and who didn't! So, hence the 12 volt set up in the house idea...as I could also still charge up technology if needed too! If it had gone on too much longer, I would have gone down and plugged my stuff into the camper battery and charged it up that way.

I think that we're on a different circuit in town to say the main street and hospital. I think it comes down so far in our street as there used to be a guy who had to be on a kidney machine and so if he needed power I guess he and the hospital (along with the aged care facility) were the first to get back on. Makes sense there. We seem to be on the same circuit as the high school down the road and several other homes at the end of the street.

One year, I remember waking up to the cooler on the roof making a hugely weird noise and when I turned the lights on they were real dim. Turns out we were experiencing a phase out and they had to fix a fuse. Interestingly enough, I knew the company guy who had to climb up the ladder at 2am and when he had finished fixing it, he came back to tell me that the fuse had been jury rigged about 5 years before during a flood when they couldn't get parts to fix it. It seems a classic example of how infrastructure out here is looked after and is only fixed when completely broken! Seems real unfair when we pay the same, if not more (actually, pretty sure its more) for power than the rest of the state!

[bullfrog]

I'm used to being in the dark, I'm married 

[Duchess]

Dog house still not had lights installed yet? 

[Symon]

Just get an electrician to wire up a changeover switch and inlet, you can then just run the house off a generator.  Would only cost a couple if hundred at best.

Did that with my house as the infrastructure here is old and crappy, blackouts are common.

[Duchess]

Plus the cost of the gennie, I'm guessing, Symon.

What size are you using to supply power and do you only run certain things on it when you have to?