Since installing our shower shack and getting the Joocla Instant hot water tank, our showers have been so much better at the cabin.
The only drawback? carting the battery back and forth between the cabin and the shack, along with a light (when needed).
Recently, I received a 25% off one item, no restrictions at Harbor Freight.
I really had no idea what I wanted to get, and after some discussions with Mrs. TnT, we decided to try to get some more solar for the shower shack.
What to get
After looking online and checking availability, I decided to go with the 100 Watt Amorphous Solar Panel Kit by Thunderbolt Solar.
it came with 4 – 25 Watt solar panels, 1 charge controller, 2 led light bulbs and some wiring and mounting hardware.
Since the pump used a cigarette plug, I bought one off of Amazon.
I already had a small 2.5 Ah 12 volt battery, so for the little bit we were going to use, it, we figured it would (probably) work fine.
Time to prepare the site
When we added our water catchment to the shower shack, I had to cut down a tree to allow more rain to hit the roof of the shack. In so doing, it also let more light in. But as we looked, we weren’t sure it was really going to be enough.
So, Mrs. TnT decided to we needed to cut down some of the cedars that run rampant in the area. She even already knew which ones needed to come out.
So, with chainsaw in hand, it was time to start clearing the area so we’d have enough light to charge that battery.
After several hours of chainsaw work and many water breaks, I finally got most of the trees down.
There were a couple more we talked about taking down on the other side of our walkway, but I decided they could come down later. I was tired, and it was getting late, and we really wanted to panels in this trip.
We moved the table we use to do dishes to the other side of the shack so I’d be able to install the bracing of the panels to the table.
Then it was just a matter of putting it together, finishing the bracing, adding the panels, wiring it all together and powering it up.
When it was all said and done, I spent between 6 and 7 hours working on the this project, but not having to cart the battery to the shower when it was time for a shower was amazing!