Neil Jackson

Neil Jackson

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@NeilJackson

From Greater London. Learning about garden office.

Greater London Joined Oct 2024
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Overview Reviews (0) Posts (20)
Building off grid solar with Google Ai.
Used ChatGPT and Claude for bits of my garden office build and found them useful for the rough calculations — battery sizing, cable gauge, that sort of thing.
in General Chat 2 weeks ago
Anyone know if a Victron MPPT 100/30 will work with 24v panels on a 12v battery bank?
@WelshCamper worth double-checking your Voc in cold conditions — panels can spike notably above their rated open-circuit voltage when temperatures drop, and in Wales that's not a trivial...
in Q&A 1 month ago
Bluetooth Connect/mppt 75/10 - not talking
@WillReid worth checking whether the Bluetooth is actually paired to another device somewhere — phone, tablet, old laptop.
in Batteries & BMS 1 month ago
Anyone else using a Raspberry Pi to log their Victron data locally?
Similar setup here but on a Pi 3B+ — been pulling data from my Cerbo via MQTT rather than VE.Direct direct.
in Monitoring & System Design 1 month ago
BlueSolar Duo 12/24v 20a SCC010020000 manual and lithium
@PartnerProject the SCC010020000 is one of the older non-programmable units — that's the real issue here.
in Batteries & BMS 2 months ago
Multiplus 12/1200 12v and 230 vac are good but no power
@ExSquaddie49 is on the right track. Worth checking the DC cable sizing and connections too — I had a similar ghost fault on my garden office install where everything looked fine but the lugs on...
in Inverters & Chargers 2 months ago
Converted an old shepherd's hut into a cabin – what's the simplest solar setup for occasional weekend use?
@MarineOllie good shout on keeping it simple for weekend use. One thing I'd add from running my garden office off-grid — don't undersize the battery thinking you'll always have sun.
in Off-Grid Cabins 3 months ago
Alternator charging killing my leisure batteries — worth fitting a B2B charger on the boat?
Finally getting round to sorting the charging setup on my narrowboat properly. At the moment the alternator just dumps straight into the leisure bank (3x 110Ah AGMs wired in parallel) via a basic...
in Marine & Boat 4 months ago thumb_up 5
Mixing panel wattages on the same MPPT — actually fine or am I asking for trouble?
Finally got round to expanding my garden office array. Started with 2x 200W Renogy panels last year, and I've now picked up a couple of second-hand 175W panels (different brand, slightly different...
in Solar Panels & Controllers 4 months ago thumb_up 6
Anyone else running a small MPPT just for emergency backup — worth it or overkill?
Got a similar setup running in my garden office — Victron 100/20 feeding a single Fogstar LiFePO4 battery.
in Solar Panels & Controllers 4 months ago thumb_up 5
Anyone managed a decent solar setup for under £300 total? What did you actually buy?
@Paul1975 Done similar on a tight budget for my garden office. The Fogstar 100Ah LiFePO4 sometimes dips under £150 on sale — worth watching their site.
in On a Budget 5 months ago thumb_up 9
Anyone else using a Raspberry Pi to monitor their off-grid setup? Sharing what I've cobbled together
Running a very similar setup on both my garden office and the boat — Pi Zero 2 W works a treat for this kind of monitoring without drawing much power itself (important when you're being careful...
in Monitoring & System Design 5 months ago
Anyone else running a separate small solar setup just for their garden office?
My main home system handles the house and boat batteries, but I ended up putting a dedicated 200W panel and a Victron SmartSolar 75/15 on the garden office rather than trying to tie it all...
in General Chat 5 months ago thumb_up 4
Anyone else finding their MPPT controller wildly overestimates battery SOC in cold weather?
Same issue on my boat last winter. The Victron was showing 85% SOC when the battery was clearly struggling — lights dimming, inverter cutting out under load. Turned out the main culprit was the...
in Q&A 5 months ago thumb_up 7
Anyone else gone the Fogstar Drift route for budget lithium? Worth it vs Renogy?
Been running a Fogstar Drift 200Ah in the garden office for about eight months now — zero complaints.
in On a Budget 5 months ago thumb_up 8