Step 2 is installing aluminum brackets on the roof, to which the solar panels will actually mount.
I was chatting with one of the two installers. He noticed that I was wearing a Linux Foundation t-shirt, and he mentioned that he ran Linux on his older computer. Ubuntu, as it turned out. He said that he found it mostly user-friendly, and was able to do almost everything he could under Windows, except use Real Player to listen to his favorite college radio station, kdvs.org.
So I checked out kdvs.org, and found multiple m3u streams, for both mp3 and ogg formats. Within minutes, we were streaming to the outdoor speakers while they were working on the roof ;-) When he got home, he confirmed that he was able to do the same with Amarok.
For other articles in this series, see:
http://blog.dustinkirkland.com/search/label/Solar
:-Dustin
I hope you past the info onto your fitter :)
ReplyDeleteRegarding those solar panels, how about rain/dust/snow (if any at your place? :)), what are the longevity of these? Do you need to clean them often?
ReplyDeletevytas-
ReplyDeleteHi! The warranty is 20 years on the panels, and 13 years on the inverter. Even at 20 years, the panels are projected to still produce at 85% of what they produced when brand new.
We only get snow out here about once every 5 years, so I'm not too worried about that. Hail is a much bigger concern, as it can do a lot of damage. For that, I just needed to increase my homeowners insurance premiums to cover the value of the system. Dust could potentially be a problem (if it doesn't rain for a very long time). In which case it would help if I climbed on the roof with a hose and washed them off.
:-Dustin
I quite like this concept as well:
ReplyDeletehttp://tinyurl.com/nvxd88
Regarding hail, PV panels are rated to withstand rather large hail. We had a huge hailstorm last year... many people in our neighborhood got new roofs, both our cars were damaged - and our PV panels were just fine.
ReplyDelete