Workshop In An Alternate Homepower Environment

[CW]

Because it wouldn't.

[Ulysses]

I don't see how ANY of them could actually compost anything when you are always adding new material. My composting takes place in the compost heap. That actually works.

Yea. I built a composting toilet and replaced it with a bigger version (30 gallon) of the bucket toilet. I overcame the weight problem by putting a drain at the bottom that goes into a hole (covered, of course) and I used weeds chopped with a lawnmower or peat moss when there are no weeds instead of sawdust. My well is about 300 feet away and down 126 feet. I've given some thought to having it go into a solar still and then only clean water would reach the ground. Haven't figured out yet how to clean the solar still though. Might be ugly and stinky.

[Ulysses]

How is this done, getting 220V from 110? How do you get the two "hot" wires? Are there 2 secondary windings on the transformer? Wouldn't they need to be out of phase with each other?

[CW]

He stated the method in his last sentence. Transformer.

[Anthony Matonak]

As I understand it, composting toilets always have a second compartment where the final composting takes place before the stuff is removed.

You might instead use a solar evaporator so that only vapor escapes. The fellows doing those earthships (tire houses) did a bit of work on these things. I found a page of theirs...

they prefer to use a solar heated septic tank that drains into a large outdoor lined planter. Plants do seem to do a good job at both removing pollutants and evaporating water.

Anthony

[Scott Willing]

I don't see a problem with that. I add fresh material to the top of our working pile once a week until the bin is full and we let 'er rest. The most active thermophilic zone *is* right near the top where the new material is added. Our working bin is toasting along at 120 degrees F right at the moment.

We learned a lot from Joe Jenkin's "Humanure Handbook" e.g. that we don't need to do a lot of work turning the pile, and that doing so can actually kill the thermophilic action. That's exactly what we've found in practice. Haven't flipped a pile since.

Yep.

I'm fortunate enough to have two small smallmills run by neighbors within a few miles. We tried leaves and stuff but kept bringing in too many bugs with 'em.

Excellent.

One reason I like the bucket thing is 'cos the pee just goes into the pile where it contributes nitrogen and helps to keep it at the right moisture level.

One of our problems with the commercial unit was that no matter what we did we would eventually end up with flies, e.g. fungus gnats, living in there. The buckets don't sit around long enough for anything to breed in 'em.

I thought when we build the new house I might like to try a vault, but the fly thing really worries me. Plus, we're trying to keep to a single-story design with no stairs which kinda precludes that anyway. Best site we have is on a hill though, so there's still the possibility for ground-level access to a lower-level vault. Dunno.

I'll keep the commercial toilet around just to install it (temporarily) for getting approvals... something prior residents here haven't had to concern themselves with.

-=s

[John P Bengi]

LOL....good one!

[John P Bengi]

That is because the contract didn't spell their name correctly like you did.

[Robert Bonomi]

The magic is "the right transformer'.

a 2:1 step-up tranformer.

120V primary 240V center-tapped secondary.

No magic. just good engineering.

[Cliff]

Yep. Not that any of the wingers would know that. Or the revisionists, working way at history in the US. The Communists were the reformers. They'd had enough of the corruption. The US may have pushed them towards Stalin by supporting the corrupt Nationalists.

Where's Hamei when you need him?

[Ulysses]

Yes, and so did mine. The problem I had was I built one that should have had enough capacity for 5 people but I had to empty it somewhat every 2 or 3 days with 4 people using it. The stuff would sit in the drawer for only 2 days then have to be emptied into a compost heap. With my extra-large bucket toilet I need to empty it every 7-10 days. Less work for me and a lot less complicated. No moving parts.

I think in order for a composting toilet to work for a family of 4 it would have to have a capacity of at least 200 gallons, probably more. It would be huge and, if a drum type, would probably require an engine to turn it.

Probably wouldn't work for me because so little liquid leaves the toilet. This methods seems to work well for flushing toilets though.

[Ulysses]

Well yes, it seems like it SHOULD work. But you said you retired your commercial toilets. There must be a reason why.

Quite possibly one of the most useful books ever written. Most of what I know about composting, pathogens, coli bacteria etc. came from that book. I just make a hile in the top of my pile, add the new stuff, and cover it with stuff from the sides of the pile.

[Me]

That question isn't real relative to the discussion as you don't specify the type of battery your talking about. Some batteries are very efficent at recharging and some are not. Some batteries have very large capacities and some do not. Air tools have their place, but it takes a very large airtank to keep one running for a few hours, without adding more air. You can't run a soldering iorn off air, but you can off batteries. Lets see you lug around a portable airtank to run your Impact Tool, and have it still run after 30 minutes of use. Apple and oranges, dude......

Me

[Me]

Now here is a fellow that asks an inteligent question. If you take a dual winding secondary with 120 Vac on each winding, feeding it with a 120 Vac Primary, and connect the dual 120Vac windings in series you get 240Vac. The phase is determined on how you connect the two series windings. and they will either be inphase or 180 out of phase, depending on the connection.

Me

[Ulysses]

Thank you :-)

[wmbjk]

Perhaps one foreman cracking the whip on a dozen guys toiling with air-powered sanders, drills, nailers and sprayers? It should be relatively easy to calculate the daily compressed-air demands of that, and multiply it by the desired number of days autonomy. I'm guessing that a surplus 747 pumped up to 1000 psi might cover it. Add one man to the crew to take care of all the windmills. :-)

My wife reminds me when 4 months is up, but I've usually already checked the water at about 3 months. It's a big help that we have wind power and tracking for the PV. So we have a much lower proportion of our energy making a trip through the batteries than we would with fixed PV alone. Less charging and discharging equals less maintenance and longer battery life.

Our wind generator (a typical type) for example makes 3 phase AC, and has a rectifier/controller indoors. There's no "charger", and no waste unless the batteries are full. Even then, discretionary loads can make use of the surplus.

I'll give you this, you sure are determined. ;-)

On home power setups, a transformer is often used to double the voltage of a single 110V inverter to run standard submersible well pumps. One model here

haven't heard of a VFD being used with an inverter, but it should be feasible barring weird compatibility issues. I once set up a VFD to run a 2hp well pump from a really crummy single phase 4500W engine-driven generator. The idea was to use a 230V three phase motor, in order to reduce wire size, lessen startup load on the generator, and eliminate potential thrashing of the pump against an uncased bore.

I got into this thread to rebut the position that generators on their own are a good way to do off-grid power. But lots of people do use generators alone. Compared to that, a generator/inverter-charger/battery combo is a huge improvement, and if properly sized can be a practical solution used indefinitely, even if no other sources are ever brought online. Some inverters can even add their output to the generator output, which provides a way to power loads too big for either unit on its own. For explanation and theory, start at page 57 of the 2mb manual at this site

In case anyone reads ahead and freaks at the blizzard of optional settings on that unit, I'll point out that most users change very few of the defaults. The manual is a good read for anyone who'd like to check out the capabilities of whole-house inverters.

Excellent idea, here's a link you might find useful

[wmbjk]

[wmbjk]

Yup, that looks like gymmy bob/bengi alright.

's been complaining about top posters since 2001? Yikes! I sure wish his social worker would give him a scroll-wheel mouse already. Anyway, alt.support.tinnitus? Ringing in the ears, probably due to cranial defect... that explains a lot.

Wayne

[lionslair at consolidated dot]

Either 240V give or take a few due to coupling differences or Zero give or take a few due to coupling differences.

When it is zero the phasing is wrong and must be reversed on one winding. Many electronic transformers have black dots on the 'true' winding lead to make phasing easier. Power is just the same simply a single frequency.

Martin

[Dave Mundt]

Yea, I have held for QUITE some time that the biggest problem with America's businesses is that the MOMENT they suck up to that investor money tit, they lose sight of the ORIGINAL purpose of the business (to produce a goods or service, sell it, and, make a decent profit off it) and become focused completely on the idea of sucking as much money out of the customer's pockets as possible, and producing the bare minimum product to get this to happen.

This is true, too...folks have a long history of making bad decisions. The best we can do is try to make better ones...and hopefully, learn from our mistakes before the crisis gets so bad that we cannot survive. Keep your powerder dry. Dave Mundt