The second half of solar panels are installed and producing.

The first set of 30 solar panels have been up on the battery house and battery house extension for several months now.  They max out at about 7.5kW right now even though the rated output is 10.5kW and the reason is that they are not installed at the optimal angle.  It was deemed more important to be able to withstand storms which frequent the Bahamas than to squeeze every watt out of the solar panels.

In order to install the remaining 10.5 kW of solar panels that I have on hand, I had to extend the boat house roof.  This took effort advantage of concrete poured during the great backyard pour as I used Simpson strong tie 4x4 bases that were sprayed with black paint and then coated several times with LPS-3 for long term corrosion control.  

We had to extend these pine logs in order to achieve this goal.  Each pine log was sandwiched between two 2x4 planks which also sandwiched a 4x4 roof support. 

Here the basic structure was beginning to take shape with 4x4 roof supports sitting on top of a heavy 4x4 outer framework.

Adding the plywood created a large new sheltered area in back of the boat house where the bait freezer can now stay without being rained on all the time.  Dive tanks and other stuff will also take advantage of this new covered work and storage area.

After installing the 5/8" plywood roof, the 30 lb fiberglass infused underlayment went down which is a protective barrier for the heat that will be used as part of the installation process of the called "torch on" or "torch down" roofing material that was use on the project.  We were able to get this base sheet to go up under the exiting corrugated metal far enough to create a leak-free transition between metal and torch down.

It was then time to install the Unirac lightrail racking.  Since the original cabin was made of natural pine, the roof was significantly uneven and we spent several days adjusting the L-feet of the racking system to obtain a reasonably flat installation for the solar panels.

As you can see, we often worked into the evening because my fishing trip to Walker's was approaching and I wanted this to be ready when the guys got here.  This is Frankie out there working in the cool winter evening under what he calls "the DaveStar" which is just a commercial grade LED street light that I had installed as part of the back yard upgrade.

Throughout the process, my partner for this installation was Frankie from AF Solutions, who have I have been working with for the past 2 years now to get Coquina Compound (as we like to call it) ready for Becky and I to retire here.  It was a very rewarding experience to have completed this solar install quickly and professionally with Frankie's help!!

After weeks of long hours, often extending into the evenings, the second 10.5 kW of the Coquina Compound solar installation was finally complete.

Here is the tessellation plan.  There are 6 strings of solar panels, 5 strings per panel, 30 panels in total of 350 W panels for a 10.5 kW nominal generation ability. However, these panels are actually tilted 5 degrees the wrong way because I did not want to completely reconfigure the boat house roof.  So during winter when the sun stays relatively low on the horizon they might max out at only 6.5kW but we will get that for about 6 hours per day.  During the summer when the sun is directly overhead it is going to be much better, perhaps 9kW peak generation.  We just happened to luck out that the starlink orientation was within 7 degrees of optimal.  The starlink antenna with its stupid kickstand was bolted to a piece of heavily painted 3/4" plywood and then solar panel clamps hold that wood to the unirac lightrail for a clean install.

Because of this new solar generation, Coquina Cove is now officially off grid.  We will continue to use the power company as a backup for the monthly connection fee of $50 but the average monthly power bill of more than $600 (more in the summer, less in the winter) should be a think of the past.  IF they do not raise the price of power (which of course they will) then payoff for this will be about 10 years.  But that is a bit misleading since the $600 number was taken when we were being very careful with power consumption, turning on the air conditioner for half the house during the day and the other half of the house at night.  But now we run the entire house at 72-74f AND I have the battery house extension AC running all the time in dehumidification mode which was not the case before.   I think at our current quality of service, the power bill would have been more like $1000 per month and so the payoff for the system is probably more like 7 years given the stupidly high cost of electricity here in the Bahamas.