Solar
Showcase - Solar Projects From Our Readers
OUR
SOLAR HOME IS FOR SALE

After 28 years of living in our home in
Northern California, we are moving to a new location. We love living here
and wish we could take our home with us, but we can't. If you are
interested in living in an off grid home please click on the picture or
click HERE
to see how you might become the next owner.
Here are some of the projects that our readers have made and submitted.
All are based upon the plans found on this website. As of January 1, 2014,
the solar cooler and tracker plans have been downloaded over 190,000
times.
Ian from Australia


Hi Jim - I have to tidy up the wiring when the fan motor controller arrives. 10 amp inline fuse for the fan and a 3 amp inline fuse for the bilge pump. The unit is small but works a treat. I live in Beechworth in NE Victoria in Australia.
I have to seal around the fan and the front of the unit and make it more pleasing to the eye. Can't wait to try it out
as it gets very hot down here in Summer. - Ian G
Santiago from Liceo di Lugano 2, a school in Switzerland.

As part of a senior project we finished building the tracker about 3 weeks
ago. We managed to use the antenna rotor, controlling it from a homemade circuit.
Then we tested it with the help of a local university, comparing its energy
production to that of a fixed module. The solar tracker produced over 17% more energy than the fixed module
on a sunny day in February.
John from New Jersey
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Thanks for inspiring me to make this.
You can see John's video here.
Crystal and Dave from the Mojave Desert


We live completely off grid on solar
panels, propane and water delivery. My husband Dave used our existing side draft
swamp cooler but wanted to keep all of its existing 110 volt AC motor
and pump intact for those cloudy days when the solar panels are not working that
great. So he took off the front grill where the cold air comes out and built a sheet metal box on the
front. He took a radiator fan and its motor off of a junk car that we had sitting around and attached it inside the sheet metal box he
built and then put the grill back on. He installed a bilge pump (boat pump) that we got from Walmart for about $18. He set it next to the 110 pump and hooked up the water
line (spider) that feeds water to the swamp cooler pads. Then he hooked it up to the solar panel and it works great. When we have to use the 110 motor and pump we disconnect the solar panel and switch the water line back to the 110 pump and plug it in
and fire up the generator. You were wrong about one thing. I believe you said the 12 volt swamp cooler puts out a 10 to 15 degree difference? Well
ours puts out 20 to 25 degree difference. When it's in the upper 90's
outside, the inside of our place it is in the mid to upper 70's and when it's in the triple digits the inside is in the mid 80's. Thanks again - Crystal
Raymond from the Mojave
Desert
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Raymond has a small 480 square feet desert
cabin. To keep it cool, he found a used evaporative cooler and converted it into a DC solar cooler
using the plans from this site. He asked some important questions about
the electronics to make sure and built a really nice unit. He made some
great modifications for his unit which uses a DC motor controller for his
fan.
You can see Raymond's video here.
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