Into The Dumpster

Rockport, Texas

Smash it to pieces and THROW it into the dumpster. The Dell computer with Vista has been a piece of garbage from day one about four years ago. Today was its last day to frustrate anyone. Vista was not the trouble. That machine has had lots of trouble and finally enough was enough. The smashing was required since the hard disk would not even clean off properly for non-violent disposal. For the last month the blog and all my personal stuff has been done on an old Dell XP computer that performs flawlessly.

In hopes of an installation of the solar panel, the first chore today was to connect the wire to the panel and shrink wrap it into place. Several folks offered alternate suggestions to purchasing a heat gun. The “stove lighter” did the job very well. To my surprise everything went just like the instructions said it would.

When the sealant for installing the panel on the roof was checked, it had hardened in the tube since the first panel was installed a year ago. There fore a trip to the local camper dealer was needed and accomplished.
It was a very expensive sealant. The cost was a bit over $40 to get out of the store. Now tell the whole story fat man!! OK. While standing in line for my turn at turning over money to the clerk, an item that has been being considered for a few months was noticed. It was priced about $5 lower than the best price on the internet. So it jumped into my loving arms. The gadget is a Wingman for my television antenna.

It gives a small boost to the signal to help when you are at the fringe. Many folks have said they have had great results with it. Maybe it was buyer’s remorse talking that positively. The initial results are not that exciting to me. Of the four channels that were showing random pixilation on my television, three now seem fine. The channel that was really wanted to come in good shows no improvement. RATZZZ.

The installation was very easy with only needing to snap in four buttons. In fact it is easy to install even when you have it upside down. The buttons come out easily and even still work when you turn the device right side up to reinstall it. When it was finished, the roof time had been about five minutes total. Here we have it in all its glory.

The five minutes up on the roof were a serious chilling to my hands. The solar panel needs to be installed when it is warmer so the lap sealant will flow properly into all the crevices to stop moisture from entering the Castle. Tomorrow is supposed to be warmer and still very sunny.

In preparation for installing the fourteen screws into the roof, some self drilling screws were purchased to make the installation easier. The Castle’s roof is 3/8” plywood under the EPDM membrane. When the installation happens, it will be a lot less work to use the self drilling screws than having to drill holes then put the screws in. The panels are so light that if there is any wind the panel wants go flying with the birds. Working by my self means special techniques usually have to be utilized.

It is bad enough having fresh wet sealant all over the place without fighting with a flying solar panel also. Then the wire will be routed to the first panel and the two daisy chained into the current roof connection. The number of panels that can be daisy chained in this style of panel is two. Part of the moving the controller plans includes a different style of feed from the panels to where the controller will be mounted inside the Castle.

With a little luck, tomorrow night will be a report about installing a solar panel as a way to try to have tooooo much fun. TheOFM.