[RE-wrenches] Straw bale wi-fi

[William Miller via RE-wrenches]

I have install a gateway in an exterior equipment space outside of a straw
bale envelope once and wi-fi reception was no problem.

I think that every situation needs to be evaluated on it’s own, however.
Checking with a smart phone is a good start.

William
-- 

William Miller
Miller Solar.com
805-438-5600
www.millersolar.com
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Re: [RE-wrenches] [EXTERNAL] IQ Gateway outside straw bale house

[White, Will via RE-wrenches]

Drake,

I can't speak to your specific situation, but I live in a strawbale house and 
have no problem getting a Wi-Fi signal outside within reasonable distance of 
the router.

Thanks,
Will

-Original Message-
From: RE-wrenches  On Behalf Of 
Drake Chamberlin via RE-wrenches
Sent: Wednesday, April 26, 2023 11:39 AM
To: RE-wrenches 
Cc: drake.chamber...@redwoodalliance.org
Subject: [EXTERNAL] [RE-wrenches] IQ Gateway outside straw bale house

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We are planning to combine Enphase circuits in an IQ combiner box, with 
enclosed Gateway, on the outside of a straw bale house.

Will the WiFi signal penetrate a straw bale and the two layers of stucco the 
wall is made of?

Thank you,

Drake

Drake Chamberlin
Athens Electric LLC
Ohio Electrical Contractor’s License 44810 CO Master Electrician’s License 4526 
NABCEP Certified PV Installation Professional


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Re: [RE-wrenches] IQ Gateway outside straw bale house

[James Rudolph via RE-wrenches]

Drake:
Have a wifi extender on hand to help if needed.


James B. Rudolph


Independent Energy

C-39784 ES #10816

NABCEP Certified PV Installer since 2009  #091209-155

C. 808.313.9701













On Wed, Apr 26, 2023 at 5:58 AM Dan Fink via RE-wrenches <
re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org> wrote:

> Drake; How much chicken wire or other metal mesh is in the strawbale walls
> and stucco? Can you measure wifi signal strength ahead of time with a
> smartphone? Is it possible to hardwire Cat5 from the homeowner's
> router/extender/etc to the WAN port of the IQ Gateway? That is always
> preferable to wifi.
>
> Dan Fink
> Owner, Buckville Energy Consulting LLC
> IREC Certified Instructor for PV and Small Wind Installation
> NABCEP Certified PV System Inspector
> NABCEP PV Associate
> d anbo...@gmail.com
> 970-672-4342
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, Apr 26, 2023 at 9:40 AM Drake Chamberlin via RE-wrenches <
> re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org> wrote:
>
>> We are planning to combine Enphase circuits in an IQ combiner box, with
>> enclosed Gateway, on the outside of a straw bale house.
>>
>> Will the WiFi signal penetrate a straw bale and the two layers of stucco
>> the wall is made of?
>>
>> Thank you,
>>
>> Drake
>>
>> Drake Chamberlin
>> Athens Electric LLC
>> Ohio Electrical Contractor’s License 44810
>> CO Master Electrician’s License 4526
>> NABCEP Certified PV Installation Professional
>>
>>
>> --
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Re: [RE-wrenches] IQ Gateway outside straw bale house

[Dan Fink via RE-wrenches]

Drake; How much chicken wire or other metal mesh is in the strawbale walls
and stucco? Can you measure wifi signal strength ahead of time with a
smartphone? Is it possible to hardwire Cat5 from the homeowner's
router/extender/etc to the WAN port of the IQ Gateway? That is always
preferable to wifi.

Dan Fink
Owner, Buckville Energy Consulting LLC
IREC Certified Instructor for PV and Small Wind Installation
NABCEP Certified PV System Inspector
NABCEP PV Associate
d anbo...@gmail.com
970-672-4342




On Wed, Apr 26, 2023 at 9:40 AM Drake Chamberlin via RE-wrenches <
re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org> wrote:

> We are planning to combine Enphase circuits in an IQ combiner box, with
> enclosed Gateway, on the outside of a straw bale house.
>
> Will the WiFi signal penetrate a straw bale and the two layers of stucco
> the wall is made of?
>
> Thank you,
>
> Drake
>
> Drake Chamberlin
> Athens Electric LLC
> Ohio Electrical Contractor’s License 44810
> CO Master Electrician’s License 4526
> NABCEP Certified PV Installation Professional
>
>
> --
> ___
> List sponsored by Redwood Alliance
>
> Pay optional member dues here: http://re-wrenches.org
>
> List Address: RE-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org
>
> Change listserver email address & settings:
> http://lists.re-wrenches.org/options.cgi/re-wrenches-re-wrenches.org
>
> There are two list archives for searching. When one doesn't work, try the
> other:
> https://www.mail-archive.com/re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org/
> http://lists.re-wrenches.org/pipermail/re-wrenches-re-wrenches.org
>
> List rules & etiquette:
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>
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>
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[RE-wrenches] IQ Gateway outside straw bale house

[Drake Chamberlin via RE-wrenches]

We are planning to combine Enphase circuits in an IQ combiner box, with 
enclosed Gateway, on the outside of a straw bale house.


Will the WiFi signal penetrate a straw bale and the two layers of stucco 
the wall is made of?


Thank you,

Drake

Drake Chamberlin
Athens Electric LLC
Ohio Electrical Contractor’s License 44810
CO Master Electrician’s License 4526
NABCEP Certified PV Installation Professional


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Re: [RE-wrenches] Underground fault finder

[Kienan Maxfield via RE-wrenches]

Dave,

The Thumper creates a high current, high voltage discharge. It uses a massive 
capacitor bank that you connect to the conductors on one side. When it works 
correctly, it'll cause a massive arc blast at the location of the fault. 
Assuming the fault is underground, it'll cause a big thumping sound. One 
technician walks as close to where he heard the thump as he can guess, then the 
other tech fires a second thump. The walking tech then readjusts his location 
and so on until it seems that he's right above where the thumping sound is 
coming from. Once that's determined to the best of your ability, you mark that 
spot and dig there. The wires will be all melted at that location. All the 
wires in that conduit will need to be spliced.

The thumper can be used for overhead lines too. You want to make sure that the 
fault isn't in an equipment room... the results might not be pleasant. You also 
want to make sure that all of the wires are isolated on both sides of the run.

I think that the TDR is a cooler tool (time domain reflectometer)... it'll give 
you an estimated distance (in terms of feet of wire) to the fault location. 
These two tools are actually best used together... use the TDR, and if it says 
the fault is 100 feet away, and you have a 200 foot run, then you'd know to 
position your tech as close as you can to the 100 foot mark, then use the 
thumper, and you can more quickly determine the exact location to dig. If the 
TDR says that the fault is at 200', and you only have a 200' run, then you know 
that it might be more risky to use the thumper, and you can go to the far side 
of the run and try to find the fault from that side.

I don't have the hands-on experience with either of these tools, but I've read 
a lot about them. The TDR should be able to detect most faults including a 
complete sheering of the line. It works by sending a pulse and reading the 
capacitive and inductive reflections. Whenever there is a splice, a short 
circuit, or an open circuit, it will send back a reflection and each different 
type of issue has a different type of reflection. The primary fault that it may 
not be able to see is a high resistance short circuit (like insulation 
breakdown or like a high Ω IRT), so it may not help find an intermittent ground 
fault.

Thanks,
Kienan




Green-Go Solar Distribution LLC

Maxfield Solar LLC (installation and consulting company)

maxfieldso...@hotmail.com

(801) 631-5584(Cell)

distribution.solar


From: RE-wrenches  on behalf of 
Drake Chamberlin via RE-wrenches 
Sent: Thursday, April 20, 2023 4:04 PM
To: RE-wrenches 
Cc: drake.chamber...@redwoodalliance.org 
Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Underground fault finder


The thumper sounds like the one to use, but what does it destroy? Does it 
induce a much higher voltage on the line than regular line voltage? We are 
dealing with open circuit problems.

We can return to our original plan of digging up areas and checking for voltage 
on the lines with a voltage sensor.

Thanks,

Drake


Drake Chamberlin

Athens Electric LLC

Ohio Electrical Contractor’s License 44810

CO Master Electrician’s License 4526

NABCEP Certified PV Installation Professional

---



On 2023-04-18 12:04, Brian Mehalic via RE-wrenches wrote:

Not sure about rental sources in your area, but there are two options:

1) An underground cable fault locator, aka a "thumper," which only works on 
direct buried cables. It is a destructive test (at the fault location), and 
should only be performed when there is a known fault in order to locate it. It 
requires "walking" the cable run with a sensing device to hear the "thump" 
generated by the high current/high voltage induced on the line.

2) A time domain reflectometer (TDR), which is sort of like radar in that low 
energy signals are reflected by changes in cable impedance; it is 
non-destructive, but also not as accurate in terms of the location (providing a 
cable length to the fault, rather than a "thump" at the actual fault location) 
and typically cannot see higher resistance (≈>200 MΩ) faults that the thumper 
can.

Brian Mehalic
NABCEP Certified Solar PV Installation Professional™ R031508-59
National Electrical Code® CMP-4 Member
(520) 204-6639

Solar Energy International
http://www.solarenergy.org


On Tue, Apr 18, 2023 at 8:27 AM Matt Sherald via RE-wrenches 
mailto:re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org>> 
wrote:
Hi Drake,

I've rented a set-up from my electrical supply house.  I'd check to see if 
Scott Electric/Advantage Rental serves your part of Ohio.

If memory serves, it is two pieces of equipment that you need.  One to trace 
the line and a second to find the fault.

-Matt

On Tue, Apr 18, 2023 at 11:20 AM Drake Chamberlin via RE-wrenches 
mailto:re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org>> 
wrote:
I understand that there is a tool that locates underground faults in
buried cables. No one in our area has one. There are high tech