Hi All,

Anybody heard of solar shingles? They are shingles that generate electricity from the sun. The nice thing about it is, when you need to get your roof redone- you get a tax credit. Its no batteries, and you can sell excess power back to the grid. How cool is that?

If you back it up with windpower, youre set for night –time also. When my roof has to get redone, its solar shingles for me! Im putting in wind power first (relatively cheap), will augment with solar when the roof needs redone. Im looking at drilling a well also.

Lenny drops off the grid.

As a cool sidenote Ive got a pair of huge white cranes wintering  in my lil pond! I looked at em closely, they don’t look like sandhill cranes, OMG they might be whooping cranes.

I could die today a happy guy , it just keeps getting better and better!

Country Boy Lenny

Lenny... do you have the Cowboy hat yet?

Lenny, sounds like you missed the good ole US of A.

 

So it sounds like your new home is in TX

Lenny:

To answer your question, no, I had never heard of solar shingles until now. It looks like how much sunshine you get and how much local electricity costs are the variables for calculating the payback time.

Thanks,

Joe

I worked on a habitat for humanity house about 4 years ago here in KC and the National Renewable Energy Lab was one of the sponsors. They had just developed the solar shingles and were using this as the first opportunity to put them into use in a residential application. The house was built using a lot of energy efficient features and if I remember right, after the first year, the house had only used $200 dollars in electricity. Sign me up!

Hi All,

Kelsey, no I don’t have the cowboy hat yet, although I did buy a Stetson for my daughter at a yard sale. I told her, we got a Chevy truck, you got a black cowgirl hat, you know how to shoot and all you need now is some cowgirl boots to be a little Chinese Cowgirl.

Norm, I did miss the good old USA. For anyone who wants a crash course in American appreciation, work overseas!

Karl, I’m quite at home here in south Texas, who would have ever thought?

Joe, south Texas has plenty of sun; my back roof is generally oriented south. I’m figuring payback time is 7-8 years. It also depends upon the slope of your roof. Efficiency is highest when the panel is oriented 90 degrees to the sun. Solar panels are more efficient and have the advantage of being oriented to the sun.

Solar shingles look typical, so some thief won’t rip em off while you are on vacation or asleep. During Hurricane Ike gas stations rented portable solar panel units to power the pumps during the outage. Also a lot of railroad crossings down here are solar powered. You wouldn’t believe the number of thieving idiots who were apprehended stealing these things. What idiot would take a solar panel from a railroad crossing, endangering the public at large?

I figured having inconspicuous solar power (solar shingles) would save me the trouble of shooting some solar panel thief off the roof, and having to explain to the local police how this bullet ridden, Swiss cheese looking body came to lie upon my lawn. Also these solar shingles weld into one big mass after getting hot from producing power, so they are unwieldy to remove for a thief.

Adam, I hear ya, Anyway, my advice is to wait until roof needs replaced, so part of the cost is covered. There’s a decent tax credit for these things too. They aren’t cheap- typical installation is $25,000.00- so if your electric bill averages 300 bucks a month- 25000/300 = 83.3 months or payout is about 7 years (neglecting tax credit).

This sounds too good to be true. Lets think this out. The government can't tax this energy, the utility companies can't charge you for it, yep.. somehow this will be outlawed. We will have "community" soloar panels. which you will pay MORE for cause its "good for the earth" and the government can operate this system and charge management fees plus taxes. Anything worth while the government will kill. All ya gotta do is follow the money. Its always about the money with politicians.

What happens if it snows?

Whats snow ?

Lenny
Look what oregon is contemplating. Because people are using less gas (because of cost and better mileage) they want to put a GPS in your car and charge you for the miles you drive. On first look that may sound "fair". but, why do they need a GPS? Why do they need to know where I drove ? Why not just a device that would give miles? I love this country but I don't trust our government. And where does "the government" which is nothing but a few of our neighbors get the rights to do most of what they do? Why do we accept their intrusion into our lives? Are we really sheep ?

So while they can't tax the sun, they will tax each home based on Sq ft or some other basis to make up for the lost tax. The people we send to washington honestly belive they know better how to spend MY money than I do. Somehow they feel its theirs, not mine. Why do we allow this? Show me in the constituition where the federal goverment has the right to tell me I have to wear a seat belt? ( I do because I choose to) or why I have to buy a car with great mileage ( I do cause im cheap). What gives them the right to tell me how to live my life ? We have a government that is totally out of control. Where did I put that pitch fork.??

Wags,  I can best discribe myself in song.  I would like to revisit the song by Country Joe and The Fish"     Hit it boys!  bump dum da dum da dum

"Blow up your TV,   throw away the paper ,  move to the country,  build  you a ho  ho home,  plant a little garden, eat a lot of peaches,  try to find Jesues on your own."                 I came to this from the pitch fork thing,  I was thinkin about spring, every fresh and new, turnin over the soil,  ok,  enough metaphors for now        Thank you,  i'll be here till I get banned 

I understand David.. and I ride my bike for that same reason...Ive seen this country continue the downword spiral for years. We have no leadership in either party, there is no honor among politicians (most). Greed in so many areas has run amuck, doing what is right is now looked down on. We make heros out of an overpaid child playing kids games and treat our real heros with distain. Our politicans are more interested in lining their own pockets and gaining power, they really belive when they pass a law on a piece of paper, that something is solved. Free healthcare for everyone.. but hell no we won't visit the legal system that is choking the medical industry. We have Edwards that made 10's of millions on what, later, was proven to be false science. He put Drs out of business and caused woman to die and yet, he feels good about what he did. We have a legal system that is more about wining then justice. We have a mother that very well may of killed her child and lawyers and other "experts" are coming out of the woodwork to defend her. A person who was "lonely" has 14 kids and some "news" operations will pay her millions to tell her story, and sick people will watch this sicko tell her story. And the kids will pay the ultimate price. We have drugs pouring over the boarder and yet, we put the guards in jail and give a free pass to the drug smugllers.
We have and administration that is quickly taking over parts of our private enterprises, even when they don't want help and then have a congress that can't run their own barber shop telling business how they should operate. A Guy steals 50 billion and gets "home detention" in his penthouse, while the guy that steals a loaf of bread to feed his family gets thrown in jail.
Our new head of the Treasury and IRS is an admitted tax cheat. And when he got caught he paid back two years, not the 4 he owed cause the statue of limitations expired.. hell with doing whats right... he should be in jail not in office.
Our new Attorney general advocated for the pardon of terriorsts, and gun runners cause they gave a donation to a library.. His second in command advocated for pronoghry in public libraries.

Where are the honorable people? Many say the constitution should be a living document, changing with the times. its out of touch with the 21st century. Sorry I don't agree.

Tell me were not screwed.. gonna go for a ride, to chill

I think that happens "up north" somewhere. Just as I like cold beverages, I don't want or need to live IN the refrigerator to enjoy them..

What was the name of that movie where the anchor yells "Im mad as hell and im not going to take it anymore" ? Network? Thats how I feel about our government..

Well now that ya all derailed my thead (thanx guys)

Hi Wags,

Hmmm, My apologies, I didn’t know about the Oregon thing. I see where you are coming from. That’s interesting. As rebuttal not everything that gets proposed gets passed. For example….we had this politician guy down here in Texas, propose cutting off drug dealers fingers. It was all grandstanding, but caught my attention. The interesting thing was he (the politician) was black. Definitely not in the Al Sharpton, or Jessee Jackson camp. While I agreed completely with his position, I had to smile at the absolute snowballs chance in Hades of that passing.

As for seat belts, I know what you mean, next step is the harness in the tub, so you don’t slip and fall, with tub police monitoring. Its all driven by insurance companies. I ditched em years ago. I have no life insurance, or health insurance. I think insurance is like betting against yourself. As an old Vegas guy, I refuse to do that. I have homeowners insurance because it was required by the mortgage company as well as auto insurance for the same reason. Im hoping AIG chokes and dies on that big wad of bailout money.

As for the sad state of our political affairs and court system, I totally agree, and the comments were TNTR (too numerous to respond). My advice is to Leave the pitchfork for the haystack,

I suggest better tools, an AK wannabe (A WASR..dont purchase the Romanian models they are crap..the Yugoslavian ones are much better, chromed action, forgo the chrome lined barrel , you don’t need it if you clean it after shooting, available in 75 round drum magazine or 30 round clip. I suggest the clip, its affordable, get several, if you cant do it in 30 shots, then 75 wont matter. Get , some pistols, 1 revolver, I suggest a .44 mag S&W 8 & 3/8 inch barrel, it shoots like a rifle, and my favorite old standby a .45 model 1911), and a shotgun, short barreled pump. With that combo of firearms -its excellent home defense on a shoestring budget. You can stand off the National guard  with that combo ( if you have enough ammo and people) in the event they ever want to forgo the constitution, and illegal martial law is declared.

My motto, is, on my street, I am the Law!

David, Country Joe and the Fish? A blast from the past!

Give me an F…

Give me a U….

Give me a C….

OK Im gonna stop before deletion

Good Ole Country Joe.... and.. I already have my Mossburg 8 + 1, love my glock (and Concealed carry), was always partial to the S&W 357, and, as much as I wanted an M-14 had to settle for mini 14.

Problem is, they float these "wacko ideas" and in a few years it happens, always "for our own good". That tiny thread in our money ( so we can track drug dealers) also allows someone to tell from a distance who's carring cash and how much. Obama when he was running said we need to tax our carbon footprint. In the UK they have a device they are testing, that you wear and it trackes how large a carbon footprint you have, it also tracks everyplace you have been . Talk about big brother.

Just when did we give our freedom and rights to a handful of corrup pols? When was the contitution changed and put the Federal government in charge of our lives? Didnt we fight a war over states rights, and isn't it about time for another one?

If you are considering  solar shingles,  Just remember to allow enough room for walk ways (rat walks)  on the roof when you find yourself up there loaded for bear and havin to bust some caps at whomever,   wouldn't want to damage the new shingles by carelessness.
                                                                                                                           My feeble attempt to weave this thread back together      cuz............

(Tim Obrien )     "daddys on the roof again"

David,

you always make me smile. I will do the catwalk , but augment it with a sniper tower and spotlight, Heh heh...just kidding...sort of.
 
Back to topic, Im researching now .....how to wire solar shingles to a battery and 4 way rectifyer so you can ditch the power companies completely. Id rather go off the grid completely.

Add some razor wire around the perimeter of the property...some landmines for those pesky stray cats that squeeze between the hogwire...

Kaboom....followed by me saying...Honey, I think that cat just used up all nine lives at once! We can use that big ole hole in the lawn for compost! Saves me from digging.