Great news , Ive been able to secure my foot on the property ladder finally ,
A modest workmans terraced cottage in a great location , everything I need is within 5 -10mins walk ,hardware ,grocery ,transport ,river ,woods and coast are only a stones throw away
You could either tear the place back down to the dirt and start again or renovate what exists already ,
Im gonna take option B , do most of the work myself over time , save a packet and end up with a really nice cosy place at the end of it .
There a machine invented by the Germans back in the 30's , its known as the Webasto , often truck or boat owners use them as a diesel powered heat source ,
Upto around 5kW in heat output ,either hot air or hot water output ,
Supps around 350ml of diesel an hour at full throttle , it can also be made to run on various used oils , biodiesel or other renewable sources .
Big jeeps tend to have them , the hot water kind , it acts as a preheater for the engine coolant when things start to freeze up ,
The basic unit consists of a combustion chamber , a fuel pump ,a glow plug, a fan and a microcontroller .
Its incredibly simple and reliable , the other thing is now theres a China made version for around 100 euros ,
Its not quite as refined as its German counterpart , a little more noisey and with a few well worth doing modifications to improve the fueling system etc .
It of course requires an exhaust flue ,air intake and a 12v battery to run the fan and micro . Its programable ,with a 7day timer , it only consumes around 40w of electricity to run the fan and electronics . A guy on youtube was able to produce heat for around 7p per Kw hour on a mix of kerosene and used cooking oil , that compares with around 35p per unit from his mains electricity utillity co.
The other thing that caught me eye recently is a portable power system called Ecoflow ,
It consists of a battery pack with charge controller , solar panels , a really cool 80cc petrol/propane powered generator with electric start , that automatically senses your battery charge level and power requirements and kicks in as required , it combines to make an off grid power system with around 3-10kw output depending on battery configuration .
My idea is to diversify my options regarding fuel source ,
So I'll have a traditional wood stove in the centre of the house, I can get as much windfall timber as I need not far away , I'll incorporate a kettle into the exhaust flue to make the cups of tea ,
I'll put up a few panels to gather the suns light and help top up my batteries during the day ,
There whats known as a night saver circuit in the property ,this basically is switched in by a timed set of contacts from 11pm at night until 7am in the morning and get you your electricity at a saving of around 30% on the normal cost of unit during peak hours .
Maybe boost things with the generator during times of high demand ,
Sell any excess power back to the grid , one utillity company here now pay you around 15 cent per kwh which means I can more or less always be in credit with the utillity company . The real beauty is during times of vacancy the amount of power you export goes up and offsets the standing charges .
Finally the Webasto can run in the depths of winter and provide hot water to radiators in upstair rooms and back kitchen .
The exhaust system needs thinking about , obviously you dont want to be sucking fumes back into your home or causing an issue for neighbours etc .
Ive decided to give a maritime theme to the place , so lots of wood and metal , head height is quite restricted especially upstairs and it very much has that cabin feel to it , The stairs looks like it was reclaimed from a ship , its all metal , at the moment its clad in timber which looks horrible , I was able to open up a few of the steps yesterday and get the old carpet off it , low and behold it now has the familiar clank of a metal staircase when you use it , a rub of a grinder and wire brush will bring the rusty hulk back to bare metal , I'll hit it with cans of clear laquer after that and it will look amazing .
Ive a milion and one jobs to get done , hard to know where to start ....
A modest workmans terraced cottage in a great location , everything I need is within 5 -10mins walk ,hardware ,grocery ,transport ,river ,woods and coast are only a stones throw away
You could either tear the place back down to the dirt and start again or renovate what exists already ,
Im gonna take option B , do most of the work myself over time , save a packet and end up with a really nice cosy place at the end of it .
There a machine invented by the Germans back in the 30's , its known as the Webasto , often truck or boat owners use them as a diesel powered heat source ,
Upto around 5kW in heat output ,either hot air or hot water output ,
Supps around 350ml of diesel an hour at full throttle , it can also be made to run on various used oils , biodiesel or other renewable sources .
Big jeeps tend to have them , the hot water kind , it acts as a preheater for the engine coolant when things start to freeze up ,
The basic unit consists of a combustion chamber , a fuel pump ,a glow plug, a fan and a microcontroller .
Its incredibly simple and reliable , the other thing is now theres a China made version for around 100 euros ,
Its not quite as refined as its German counterpart , a little more noisey and with a few well worth doing modifications to improve the fueling system etc .
It of course requires an exhaust flue ,air intake and a 12v battery to run the fan and micro . Its programable ,with a 7day timer , it only consumes around 40w of electricity to run the fan and electronics . A guy on youtube was able to produce heat for around 7p per Kw hour on a mix of kerosene and used cooking oil , that compares with around 35p per unit from his mains electricity utillity co.
The other thing that caught me eye recently is a portable power system called Ecoflow ,
It consists of a battery pack with charge controller , solar panels , a really cool 80cc petrol/propane powered generator with electric start , that automatically senses your battery charge level and power requirements and kicks in as required , it combines to make an off grid power system with around 3-10kw output depending on battery configuration .
My idea is to diversify my options regarding fuel source ,
So I'll have a traditional wood stove in the centre of the house, I can get as much windfall timber as I need not far away , I'll incorporate a kettle into the exhaust flue to make the cups of tea ,
I'll put up a few panels to gather the suns light and help top up my batteries during the day ,
There whats known as a night saver circuit in the property ,this basically is switched in by a timed set of contacts from 11pm at night until 7am in the morning and get you your electricity at a saving of around 30% on the normal cost of unit during peak hours .
Maybe boost things with the generator during times of high demand ,
Sell any excess power back to the grid , one utillity company here now pay you around 15 cent per kwh which means I can more or less always be in credit with the utillity company . The real beauty is during times of vacancy the amount of power you export goes up and offsets the standing charges .
Finally the Webasto can run in the depths of winter and provide hot water to radiators in upstair rooms and back kitchen .
The exhaust system needs thinking about , obviously you dont want to be sucking fumes back into your home or causing an issue for neighbours etc .
Ive decided to give a maritime theme to the place , so lots of wood and metal , head height is quite restricted especially upstairs and it very much has that cabin feel to it , The stairs looks like it was reclaimed from a ship , its all metal , at the moment its clad in timber which looks horrible , I was able to open up a few of the steps yesterday and get the old carpet off it , low and behold it now has the familiar clank of a metal staircase when you use it , a rub of a grinder and wire brush will bring the rusty hulk back to bare metal , I'll hit it with cans of clear laquer after that and it will look amazing .
Ive a milion and one jobs to get done , hard to know where to start ....