Your channel is totally "Next Level" engineered solutions for Off Grid boon-docking RV-ing. Your solar electrical abilities are off the scale crazy good.

For someone like me, that is not electrically savvy, just by looking all your videos that give me an inspiration to try to be better, I thank you very much for it

The technical data as always was great! The sarcasm…amazing! I’m quite impressed you drug you whole water heater out of your home just to drain it 😆

I love these electric/utility configuration videos, looking forward to the Grafana walk-through.

This was a great video! I can't wait to see the video about the monitoring and display. I will be looking to add it to my own system.

Brilliant! As usual of course. I need to do something like this with my solar panels on the shed for the water well that usually isn't producing unless I am pumping water.. Thanks Jason! Bye Kara!;-)

Best response to “you won’t be able to do” is to do. 👏👏👍👍

I like the way you diss criticism in sarcastic way ;) It is astonishing there are so many pseudo-experts speaking with authority, while they are missing basic knowledge like an actual wattage equation!

Will be great to see the monitoring and display video.

Always impressed with your electrical knowledge Jon!

Love your DIY videos and I am wondering why you are not a millionaire . I am watching some 'specialists' in solar power on KZfaq and in my opinion you are at another level .Good luck and don't make us waiting for videos so long :))

Good video Barba Roja! I’m looking forward to you showing how to set up the power display. Really impressive. What a beautiful view from where you’re parked! Take care you two.

A kindred spirit in project geekiness. Except I come from the days of old school relay logic and building my custom parts out of fiberglass or whatever. You are inspiring me to start digitizing my projects and join the 21st century.

Woohoo. A second video within a week. Awesome

Excellent video series! I look forward to seeing how you monitor and chart everything.

Excellent production, thank you

Dude, thanks for posting. Just looking for tips on diversion, this helped - thanks.

Hey, I see your truck in Nuevo Arenal, Costa Rica. Welcome and enjoy!

That's a beautiful place you are at! I been to Mexico a couple times 20 years ago, I wanted to move there then! Can't wait to see what's next!!

I have no doubts that one day you will build the Flux Capacitor, great channel. Finding your channel is like striking Off Grid gold. Greetings for the Kootenays, Creston, B.C.

A hug from grandma =15w 🤣😂 I love it

Good show! Been toying with this concept myself.

Brilliant stuff guys! Thank you so much! Can’t wait to nerd out with the InfluxDB and Grafana stuff. 😎👍🏻

Great video!!

Incredible electrical knowledge. Thank you!

Wow, Amazing video. Really like these technical information.

Always great videos! 👍👍👍

I'm always impressed with your neat wiring J! Really clean and efficient.

Love it! Super helpful to see how you have got all this set up 🙂👍

Dude! These videos are fricken awesome!

Mega cool automation guys...very impressive to say the least and you make it look so easy too. Can't wait for the next one.

As always, Awesome

Fantastic bit of information! Thanks for sharing your wealth of knowledge!

Absolutely brilliant!

Impressed of your knowledge and handyman work.

Yay a tech video I almost understand

A great video.

Beautiful oughtside over there. I'll checkought your other videos.

Great video, I always enjoy your video’s!

Solid W on the drain system. Earned a sub and like from me.

Excellent! As always...Our Truma has an electric input...might have to look into using it for something like this.

🌎💚So well described thanks very much. I've looked at dozens of similar themed videos and none of them touch yours for clarity.🖖🏻👍🏼✅

good job

great vid. thanks

Brilliant 👍

Looking forward to the grafana vid!

Love the diversion immersion conversion!

That's pretty cool!

great video , can't wait for the 'graphics video'

Another great video...I just wish I bought the DEXT16 when I got the rest of my system. They are all sold out for now, so just gonna have to wait patiently.

Nice! I like that you have so much excess power even with a fridge and AC unit. Next you'll have to install a heat exchanging bitminer.

your videos are very good although I don't understand much about electricity I like to watch them and try to learn something new every day thank you very much for your videos I'm just following you but I find what you do very interesting and that we share the same feeling of traveling the world although you are doing it and I am still in my dream of doing it soon good health and waiting for your new videos a big hug

The best part of the video by far is 4:04.

Grandmas huggs are the best.

🤣😂 Your humor is good ...

Yeah I'm definitely doing something similar for my rig. Can't wait to have hot showers.

Thanks!

Brillant

So happy a problem solving geek like youself is sharing this online. I'm planning on doing a van conversion (24v or 48v power)soon, and want to have a ryzen itx build computer w/pico dc psu (full dc pc) . I have also been wanting to do somthing similiar to this video of not wasting wattage when batteries are full and the sun is shinning. I was planning on diverting it to a 24v zerobreeze a/c (if i need it) or diverting it to an atmospheric water generator ( haha which is a 300W dehumidifier/ with berkley water filter that feeds back into my water tank) Hope you guys are enjoying your trip so far and hope to see you guys at a meetup in Canada in the future once my van is complete!

I approve this video, especially how you completely went overkill on the power cables to your hot water system if those cables ever melt that means pigs can fly on that day, nice job, also love the fact that welding cables are easy to get. Complete overkill on the soldering of the wires to the termination lugs i am sure you would be able to use that cable to pull out a stump before lug comes off i also Approve of this, nicely heat shrunk as well.

This is great! I run my 10 litre hot water tank off the inverter, it pulls 800 watts and I tend to put it on once a day and that does me. I did look for a 12v water heater but couldn't find one. I might look more into making my own, but I have been put off by those very same mythbusters episiodes on what happens to a water heater and things go wrong!

THESE NUTS!

I guess you could also wire the element in series and run it on 24 volts which is the minimum on home solar systems. Good to know about these elements. Thank You. 73

👍👍👍nice

This is my first time here, and I'm subscribing. I've been in IT for 38 years (mostly programming), but I know very little about electronics. Your videos are amazing. Love the detail, love the editing, love the humor, and love the down-to-earth vibe. Thank you for doing what you do.

Hrmmm… time to find a mini water heater. Didn’t know they made them this small.

Aside from being my hero I love the metal reference 🤚. I feel it only appropriate to ask for a glowing finger for 2.0? Also, if ever in the northeast USA glad to lend garage / welder to a fellow mad scientist :-).

Duh you and your set up is bad ass

Interesting. I have no problem watching your commercials. My Victron components have no secondary take off to do such a diversion to for instance run my absorption fridge on electric a few hours a day. I will say the LifeBlue batteries BMS does have a j45 network plug, 2 each. No documentation how to make use of them. The factory Rep. Said they were for software updates. It may be possible to gather state of charge information from them and then setup a seco dary load takeoff that way. I'm able to do it manually for now plugging my shore power cord into the inverter, then unplugging it when the sun is low, 3 to 6 hours later depending on time of year. With the price of propane now, a few hours on solar daily could save a fair amount of coinage over time. Anxious to hear your plans to cross the isthmus whether by land or sea. Most go by sea but your resourcefulness makes me wonder if you'll be the one wo does it by land. Take care...

These nuts

This is awesome! Are you planning on heating up your shower keg this way too?

You monster! Drowning all those angry pixies that thought they could freeload ;-D

You got criticism after your first video over theer drain plug, honestly. With what you're doing you're clearly not dumb. Why do pele always feel theer need to be negative. I for one think your project is ace :)))))

I added a thermostatic valve to increase the hot water storage, so I can heat it to 165 and inject cold water to bring it back to 110 degrees f

Another great video! Thank you for sharing it. Any chance your soldered ends will relax, or even melt at that heat load? I suppose it would be about the best case scenario, so long as they don't dead short to the other terminal...but either way, you mentioned you left your proper lug crimper in Canada, but why not just beat it with a hammer? (Don't misunderstand, I'm not trying to strike up controversy, just kinda curious...totally being an armchair quarterback here btw.)

One of my first thoughts was "what about heating water when the SOC is not 100%?" I supppse I am fringe as well as a 3%er, LOL. 2:50 Always be sure the rubber sheathing is up to snuff! A failure could change your life! 😎

Another Great video once again, keep them coming 👍 I have a question about solar panels its probably a stupid one but do you have to use 12v panels. I only ask because my son install solar panels for house in the UK. I was wondering if I could use them ?

👏👏👏👏👏👏

Hi, Jason. I am new to your channel, but I am watching all the videos and enjoying each one of them. Could you point me to the video about the InfluxDB and Grafana?

How did I miss this one? Such a great project! I’ve always thought that diversion heating into a sand heat sink would be a good idea…

Id use Romex solid copper. Its what everyone uses. But what you used is of course just fine. At that wattage speaker wire would be ok.

By using this extra power, your solar panels should last longer. When power is extracted from the panel, there is about 20% less power dissipated inside the panel and hence, they run cooler and should last longer.

I was thinking of an idea to solve your overheating wires maybe add some aluminum fins at the terminal kind of like a radiator. S*** you might even be able to put a peltier fan on it lol.

Im Very interested in this , the grafics , the solar.. I have a off-grid house, set up like an RV or camper, nearly 1k ah 24v batt, and a smaller 12v system, that does 12v lights, and accessories, I don't trust my well to drink the water, I'm going to add a 12v pump for the kitchen, and use a heater like yours, or another instant/tankless gas heater. I have alot of work to do, I have plans to add a 1200-2kw 12v inverter as a backup, because in an emergency I could connect a car to it and charge it to keep the fridge going, and maybe a microwave, I'm thinking about going 48v on the main system, so I will not need so many charge controllers, and get a 6kw Genetry solar inverter, being I could probably pull 8kw from it for a while, I can cool it with the cool basement air, although I can probably stay below 2500watts, I plan to use my generator to wash clothes, I'm planning to build a diesel generator , that doubles as a DC generator to directly charge batteries, as well as a 7kw ac split phase generator, and do about 300amps at 30v, not sure what it could be capable of at 60v+/-, I would need to build a regulator for the alternators for 48v, maybe run them in series, and burn waste veg.oil , I also been thinking about converting my wood stove to a boiler, and build a steam engine. To generate DC to charge batteries, and use radiators in the house as heat and to condense the steam, for a closed system, maybe use a heat exchanger, to get hot water. I also been thinking about building a thermal storage, like build a small room big enough for a few hundred gallons of water, set it on a few inches of foam and wood, with about 12"-18" of insulation in the walls, and about 2' for the roof, use the wood stove to heat it, as well as solar thermal collectors, with a steam engine, generator doing about 600-1500watts+/-, for about 12hours more less. It would definitely be worth the effort, it would also heat the house, I'm in the foothills of NC,. So heat is needed about 3months a year, and only half that needs serious heat, I'd like to add heat to the floor, before insulate it, use a tiny pump, that can circulate about 5 gallons per hour, but definitely keep the radiators for the really cold nights, may e the thermal storage can keep heating for a day or so after the fire is out. Part of it is a crazy dream, but I definitely need backups but definitely interested in what you got going on, I plan to build a couple thermal solar panels, with 1/2" aluminum tubing, and plumb that into he thermal storage , the hard part is figuring out how to control the mess! Haha, maybe I can learn Arduino or something, but definitely need it to be safe and energy efficient,. Sorry to ramble!! But I'm very into this stuff, alternative power, fuel, life, everything!

Have you considered using a home automation platform, specifically Home Assistant, to tie all your equipment together?

New subscriber here.. Love all the videos you've made. I seen most of them so far. So I've got a 300v heating element like that.. it also came with a little thermostat.. I don't know how to connect it..? Are there any good forums on this subject..? or just a wiring diagram..?

Thank you for these excellent vids. Is the only downside to using the heater’s original 120v AC element with the original plug and run through an inverter a loss of efficiency? I have extra solar power in my 12v system and have been planning to invest in a decent inverter anyway. Any suggestions or cautions for keeping my instal simpler (more reasonable for my skill-set), and doing it that way?

The Electrodacus forum suggested fusing each panel if you connect/combine diversion from multiple dssr's . I'm asking if you did, because I wish to do the same as you have in the video. I'm considering buying a dual voltage 12/230v element

4:05 😆

Great video. Thanks 👍. My project will use 300W heating element and I'd love to use a cheap temperature controller but can't find anything above 20 A. Your solution is too complex for my skills. Have you seen anywhere a controller with a relay above 25A? All the best!

Is that scale buildup on the old heating element normal? Must be a lot of hard water down that way. Thanks for another great video!

Which voltage do the DSSR switch? The straight output from your solar panels, or the output of the solar controller?

I’m looking at doing a similar setup. Did you wire it in such a way you can also override and heat water from the battery bank when there isn’t enough solar?

Did you ever make the video about the display. Or still plan to?

Hey Jon! Which video shows your grafana and pi monitoring system? I'm only finding the automation videos.

Do you have fail safe if tank water level goes low?

What's the difference between the 12v element and the 120? Just the resistive materials used in the manufacture?

how many amps does it draw after installing the 12 volt element?

I’ve been looking into this type of technology for awhile now and also about matching the amount of solar panels resistance with the resistance of the heating element regardless of homepage or wattage what are your views on that

I plan on doing something like this to heat my greenhouse I plan on using direct current from like a 2 or 300 watt solar panel I bought the 20 mm thread water heating element that I plan on screwing into a empty propane tank the only problem is I don't want it to steam out build pressure and explode so I'm thinking of some kind of way to make a pressure relief valve I was kind of thinking maybe drill a hole and put some kind of weight in the hole kind of like pressure cookers have or maybe even a thermostat from a vehicle any input would be appreciated.