The progression of Power.

Ten years have passed  since we decided that we would buy our off grid property.
We had no idea what that would really entail. We knew what was already set up there would not  be appropriate for what we  would need power wise in the future,and that we would have to in reality start from scratch.

The only solar panels  on the house were 6 x30 watt old 1970's  solarex  brand. This was combined with 2 x car 12 volt batteries without an inverter or any other safety equipment. On taking possession of the house  Our Uncle ,who was a retired electrician came with us and quickly modified the setup to get us through the first year  so that we could assess what we would need.
We then purchased after time 8 X 200 watt solar panels ,an  inverter and a controller and 12 X 2 volt ,1000 amp hour batteries to give us a reasonably good 12 volt system.These were all chinese produced bought on ebay..

We kept the original 6 small panels and  set up the  older  batteries as a separate small grid to run our back-up12 volt  lighting system that is installed  throughout the house.

As time when on, and we needed to upgrade even more we decided with advice from our local solar place that we would change our system over to  24 volt instead of 12 volt.
 One day,we had arrived up at the farm  to  find our fridge and freezer  shut down and all the contents spoiled  as our wonderful chinese inverter had died. ,Oh what a smell and mess, took ages to be rid of it,e buried the meat in a big  hole and had to spend weeks de-smelling the appliances.

We invested in a good quality 2400 watt xtender brand inverter, and changed things over.
Best move we ever made, everything has been running like a dream ever since.
We have since purchased 6 more of the big blue batteries, but need still another 6  so that we will have two 24 volt battery banks.

The photo above shows my husband and his beautiful Uncle Ernie ,who was such a wonderful help to us, and teaching my husband  how to  work with the solar power.
Sadly  Uncle Ernie passed away last year after a very long battle with prostate cancer. He is greatly missed. RIP Ernie.
While we were on a roll with the solar stuff, we decided to add a solar panel to the roof ,controller inside and batteries under the seat of our caravan so that we can travel and be independent  of caravan parks and electricity.This works brilliantly.

I am sure  there will be many more modifications to the house solar system  as time goes by.
We intend to add a cool room later on,which will probably require  a seperate inverter and battery bank of it's own, so that it is isolated from the house grid .
We find that living off the grid is wonderful, our battery bank allows us to run, fridge ,freezer,tv, dvd,computer,lights,microwave,washing machine  ect.
If we want to run heavier power draw items like irons, toaster, hairdryers,vacumn cleaners and other things like that, we start up our back up generator for these.
Living off grid is wonderful, it is great knowing  that we are producing all our own power are are not reliant on the electricity  grid for anything.
So if you are sitting on the fence trying to decide wether  to try off grid living  or not ,then all I can say is do it !! you will never be sorry.
So folks, until we meet again,
Cheers to everyone,
Jane.

P.S. Just wanted to add an update to this. Since writing this  blog entry we have  added again to our battery bank. We Travelled to Sydney last week and purchased 7 more batteries to add to our grid.(6 plus a spare)

Brian spent the best part of the day rearranging all the batteries and re-connecting  them up to run this as a 1000 amphours.  A huge job as each of these big blue batteries weighs about 75 kilograms.
Every little step we take now will make a huge difference to our lifestyle down the line.
Must move on.
Cheers to everyone once again,
Jane.

A glut of citrus

As Usual at this time of year we have a glut of citrus. I gave  a lot of citrus  away as I just didn't have the time or the need to preserve  it this year as I already had a wonderful supply of marmalade from last year.
So this year I only kept  the tangerines and ruby grapefruit and I only had a few lemons and limes as the trees are only new.
I decided to attempt jelly which I have never made before, My Mum( and after speaking to my cousin this morning,) my Aunty Belle  used to make quince jelly when I was very young, but I barely remember.
I borrowed my sons big Breville  juicer which he has in storage at our house and took it up to the farm with me.This sure saved me a heck of a lot of time.
I had two  shopping bags of tangerines to juice , and i ended up with 9 litres of tangerine juice,and one litre of ruby grapefruit juice,and a cup full of lemon juice and a small amount of lime juice.

I kept four litres aside to make four batches of jelly and decided to attempt to can the remainder of the juice to use at a later date. I have never canned any juice before so this was a real trial for me..will let you know how it goes.We simmered the juice for 10 minutes,then strained through several layers of muslin,placed back into pot,added the pectin and reboiled for 1 minute, then added the sugar and reboiled for another 1 minute.
I made four individual batches as I wanted to try a variety of  additives, in one batch I did I added lemon juice and the 4 1/2 cups of sugar and the pectin another I added no lemon juice and less sugar and pectin and the grapefruit I added lime juice. This was purely all experimental for future use.

We prepared our jars, rings lids ect according to instruction filled to within a quarter inch, removed any bubbles and sealed. We then processed them in a double layer in my trusty old Fowlers Vacola water bath preserver for 20 minutes. We decided to set it up outside this time  so that we could run a lead to the generator to run it.
As our property is off grid,  we only have limited amounts of electricity, and on a fine sunny day we would have been ok to run it off our batteries, but we had had several overcast days and so we didn't want to add the extra drain onto the batteries on top of regular household use.

We removed the jars after processing and left on the towel covered table overnight to cool completely and seal which they did.
I then removed the rings, and washed the jars. I had already pre-labeled the jars  as they had been different things and needed to know which was which.

The colour was quite good, though  the jelly not quite as clear as I had thought it would be, maybe the straining process needs to be more thorough. The taste of the tangerine jelly was good, although quite tart, but that suits me. the ruby grapefruit jelly was quite bitter, we think because the lime juice we added was from Kafir limes and not the sweeter  tahitian limes, and I think that may have affected it.I would use the ruby grapefruit again  but omit the limes...the colour of it was beautiful.
So my next attempt at jelly making  will be with a sweeter fruit, either pomegranates or grapes or mulberries,or what ever I happen to come across. I have been contemplating purchasing a steam juicer for this purpose.
The canned juice colour seemed to keep good, although the juice has appeared to have separated slightly.Whether this  all comes together again on re-opening the jars remains to be seen. Will  keep you informed when the time comes.
While we were up at the farm this time I went around and took a few house photos for record keeping and history purposes as we are planning quite a few changes over the next year or so as we make more serious  progress towards living on the farm full time.
So I thought below I would pop in a couple of pictures of my old workhorse of a kitchen. Nothing glamorous but it has been fairly practical.

We arn't sure what we will do exactly but that big brick chimney that leaks water everywhere every time it rains will go and be replaced with big glass sliding doors out to our later to be covered entertaining area,It has created a huge chain of events, each relying on another job to be done before it can be...I am sure we will be living in chaos for a while but it will eventually all be worth it.
So until next time,
Regards to everyone,
Jane.

The luxury of electricity.

When we bought our place all it had to run our off grid house  were two car batteries hooked to a few 20 year old 30 watt solar panels which only ran the lights on a 12 volt system.. All other power usage was via a small generator.
Since then we have added  8x 200 watt panels,new batteries and a big new power inverter and some other bits and bobs. We now  run the house  on a 24 volt system and rarely have to back up with a generator.The cost of having mains power was ridiculous so we opted to stay with the solar off grid stand alone and are very happy with our decision. We cannot run air conditioning but that's not a major problem. I have two stoves, one  gas and the other wood. We also heat with a wood fire in the lounge.The photos below  show the existing system  with a few changes before it was relocated and upgraded,the battery bank and the new inverter,. Also a pic of the new panels.

We are in constant upgrade mode, there is always something we choose to add or improve and that will probably always be the case.
The current system seems to be working well, and if i can give any advice on this it is to buy the best(or better) than you can afford, it will save replacements down the track and wasting money.(Especially when it comes to inverters and batteries)
So until next time, everyone take care,
Cheers,
Jane.

Welcome to "Our Aussie off Grid Heaven"- My first ever Blog !!!

Hi,
My name is Jane and this is a total first for me. I am a blog novice and have no idea what I am doing so will just muddle along.
My husband   and I  currently live in Newcastle NSW Australia (which is on the east coast) but will be retiring soon to our little property that we purchased about 10 years ago with the idea of retiring there.It is near the small country town of Coonabarabran  in central west NSW.
It is a 25 acre property with an totally off grid home on it, we have been slowly doing work over the last 10 years to get it a little more comfortable and economical to live in.
We have set up the off grid solar,added a evacuated tube solar hot water service and starting to set up gardens,fruit trees ect.There has been lots of fencing and repairs also.
We love to grow our own vegies, already have a small flock of Dorper sheep and I am a mad canner.I love the convienence of ready made meals in jars and  having various meats on hand to just whip up quick meals.(I am lazy by nature)
I will put up some photos of the farm and canning along the way(when I work out how to) which will probably bore everyone to bits but I just want to share our story.Some photos will be brand new, and some will be ones I have taken as we have progressed over the last 10 years. I will update after each time  we get out west and the others will be when I am reminissing while stuck here on the coast.
We will eventually have chooks,and other poultry, but until we live there full time it isn't possible.
Hopefully I can work this out and get to meet a whole new lot of like minded friends,
Cheers,
Jane from Aus.