Thomas Allen Schmidt's posts

Please forgive my sounding nosey. The reason was to get an idea of the natural resources that may or may not be present for you to utilize. An example might be manure. A pile of manure, with a pipe coiled inside of it, covered with black plastic could heat water. These type of things.
Yeah, electrical fires, I here that a lot. If an electrical fire is caused, it happens because somebody, someperson, didn't adhere to the NEC or lightning struck. I have actually seen where two neutral wires on a 120 vac, 20 amp lighting circuit in a steel box in the ceiling where not made properly and they got hot enough to smoke badly. This scared the people in the house and they called the fire department which in due course, pulled their meter and would not give it back until the electrical was corrected and inspected. All of that could have been prevented simply by someone twisting those two neutral wires together tightly before screwing on a wire nut. It was in a box though and that is what probably kept any wood from catching on fire. An arc fault breaker would have helped also but the house was old enough not to require them according to NEC. Another example is where somebody changed a 15 amp fuse on 14 gauge wire to a 30 amp fuse. There was nothing left of that home. In a sense, this made the 14 gauge wire the "fuse" but instead of blowing harmlessly encased in glass and metal, the wire got hot enough to set wood on fire and burn the house down. I could go on all night with these examples. The reason I am bringing them to your attention should be obvious. In the wrong hands, even small amounts of electricity can be extremely dangerous. Just look at the world today and why there is such a thing as non-polluting renewable energies. Ok, enough said about that.

It is possible to safely heat water with a deep cycle battery bank.
http://www.survivalunlimited.com/diversionloads.htm
But lets think about this for a minute. Take a look at the SJH12600 element. Thats 600 watts at 12 vdc or 50 amps at 12 vdc. It claims to be able to heat 15 gallons from 75F to 120F in 5 hours. 5 times 50 = 250 amphours at 12 vdc nominal. That would mean nothing less than 4 - Trojan T-105's wired in series/parallel for a total of 440 amp hours at 12 vdc nominal. After heating 15 galloans of water it would more than 50% dead. To replace that with PV in your region it would need a PV array of no less than 600 watts at 12 vdc nominal and 5 hours of clear sky's and sunshine to reach 100% for the next 15 gallons. Also there is the need to change the thermal switch because the ones on your water heater are not rated for 50 amps at 12 vdc and the size of the wire would have to be no less than #6 awg cu. and it would need protection with a fused disconnect rated for 12 vdc nominal.
How many thousands of dollars are we looking at here for 15 gallons of hot water per day if lucky?
It would not be environmentally benign as solar power but, but maybe you should look at the cost of having a gas fired water heater and an LP. or Nat. gas service installed. Then as time and money allow, having a proper solar thermal water heater installed to reduce dependence on that gas. Who knows maybe even an air handler or radiant hydronics to heat the home. One thing is for certain, all of this renewable energy stuff is extremely expensive but before there prices come down the established energy infrastructure will raise theirs.

Hey, that looks pretty cool, let me try that.
           
                  Tri- Metric
                       ^
                       ^
 Battery neg.> Shunt < negative of everything dc in or out.

Like this you should be able to see; realtime voltage, then realtime amps ether in or out (display will show a - when amps out), then a realtime percentage of charge from 100%.

Bring up volts display then hold "select" and quickly press "reset" at same time. This number should be the same or a little less (0.2) than the high voltage limit set point of the charge controller.

Do the same procedure in amps mode and select, "off".

Do the same in % of full mode and select, "H94".

This is how I set mine up without a battery temperature monitor. Do you have the "extra data" functions set like you want them?

The electrician in me says, "why not get a temporary construction service panel installed?" but the off gridder in me says, "who needs PP&G anyway?"
I agree with you, Ana. Just one 240 vac water heater element can require as much as 4500 watts to operate. It should be printed on the side of the element, Issac. At 12 vdc thats 375 amps. If all things were equal, that car battery would collapse in on itself and create a black hole that would suck in the entire universe. Ok, so I am exaggerating. The point is, you don't have anywhere near enough electrical power from a car battery for a conventional 240 vac water heater. In a conventional house this would be on #10 wire with a 2 pole 30 amp breaker, 7200 watts. Typically, only one 4500 watt element is on at a time. There is no easy or inexpensive way to resolve this. It will mean some sacrifices, Issac.
Couple of questions Issac.
What region do you live in? Southwest, northwest, central? Rural, suburbs, city?
How are you heating your home, if necessary?
How are you moving the water?
If freezing is not a threat and you have a way to circulate water from water heater tank and back again during the day.
Black pipe on the roof in sunshine can make some pretty hot water. Maybe too hot, so use extreme caution. Turn off water coming into water heater tank once it is full and include a "T" in the black pipe at its highest point on the roof with a "vent" pointing upwards. The vent will keep pressure from getting to high. The circulating pump will, hopfully keep the water from getting too hot. There will need to be cutoff valves in the pipe going to the roof as well so that when regular water pressure is restored to use hot water, all of your water doesn't run out onto the roof. If you think about it, there is a way to retrieve the hot water in the black pipe as well. Something rigged up like this should not be left alone or in the care of a child. There are a lot of safety issues involved with rigging something like this as well, for property and person. May I ask, what caused the house fire?

It sounds like an otherwise well insulated building.

" it's after 9pm the sun has been gone for four hours now and it's still 71* in here..current outside temp is 33*."

The climate in each apartment is supposed to be self contained. Here in America, building codes, in general, concerning fire walls and blockage have been in place for a long time. Especially in multi family dwellings. There is a good chance that every apartment is "fire blocked" from the other on all sides top to bottom. As well, there is sometimes sound insulation in adjoining walls. If fire cannot get through then I don't see how heat and ac could either. When your neighbor is cooking, can you smell it in your apartment or would you have to go into the common hallway to smell it? IF! there is anything criminal going on, I would say it lies with the building contractor and inspectors IF! those "fire codes" were not enforced. 

"If your door opens onto a common area where the bill is shared and you were proping the door open to get your heat or cooling, he would have reason to complain."

As for the ice packs. Been there done that. Lived in a retired 1956 Chevrolet school bus while house construction was going on. Saved our empty gallon milk jugs, set them outside with water in them during winter to freeze, changed them out from the indoor icebox when needed, always had a surplus. Had to buy ice in the summer though for essentials. Most of the stuff was kept cool in the creek though. Gas refrigerator/freezer now, with plans to capture waste heat in the future. Right now, back of fridge is sealed to an air chase with outside air flowing up and out. This keeps heat out of house in the summer and works a little to good in the winter, have to block chase off partially.

This brings to mind though how in conventional building practices how much harder an AC system has to work. Every bulb is a heat source, refrigerator/freezers, oven/stoves, water heaters, all interior heat sources that the AC unit has to pull out of the house and deposit outdoors. What made me think of this was when we were re-wiring the chandeliers on the cathedral ceiling in the sanctuary of a church and the treasurer ask me if this would effect his light bill. Six chandelier's, 1500 watts each. I explained to him that its not just the added light that would effect the light bill but the added heat as well that the AC unit would have to pull out in the summer time. I compared it to running six 1500 watt space heaters while running the air conditioning at the sametime. He ask if there was anything that could be done, dimmers maybe? While trying to do my best impersonation of Ponchus Pilot, I pointed to the lights with one hand while holding the other hand out, palm up and said, "its up to you. choose one and sacrifice the other. More light or more money, (while bringing the pointed finger to bare on him) which one do you choose? I think he got the metaphor because he just chuckled as he walked away. Thankfully though, somebody was using their noddle.
http://www.toad.net/~jsmeenen/recovery.html

One doesn't have to be a devout Christian to understand the words of Christ as written in the Gospel of Matthew. With these words Christ speaks to all people and all religions, through all time. For those that don't understand the connection in my last post within this thread.
The occurrence of an additional 4.5 billion people over the past 108 years is "the house built on sand." The "sand" is all of these energies we believe that we cannot live with out. I believe that the human race would survive without those energies, just not all 6.5 billion of us.

"What will replace oil wells?"
Taken out of context it appears as a simple and honest question but in review of this thread, I feel that it was a baited question used to draw us into a debate about harvesting the natural energy of geothermal and turning it into electricity. There is no guilt to be laid here for "baiting." If there was then I would be as guilty because I have done the same in the past.

Even though it may not be what the majority of us would like to see in the future, I still think that in the near future, the powers that be will proclaim that they have found a way to "safely" harvest methane hydrates from the oceans floor and derive a "natural" gas from it for use as a means to "free us from dwindling supplies of crude oil and coal." I am not saying that renewables will not have a place in the future. There is no doubt about that but there is a doubt about how affordable renewables will be when compared to methane hydrates as an energy source for 6.5 billion, or more, people in the future. After all, the "powers that be" have to maintain there monopoly, don't they? Without it they cannot control the world. Who is "they," you ask?
http://www.asis.com/users/stag/thewar.html
Believe or not!

Nor am I in favor of culling the human race. I only made the assumption as to what would happen if the human race were to abandon its desires for all these energies we seem to not be able to live without but can live without.
You must be a trouble shooter and like to come up with the easiest and fastest results to amend the trouble. Culling the human race is strictly your imagination working, not mine. I actually think more along the lines of abstinence in regards to world wide human population.
In case you have missed some of my other postings.
From the beginning of the human race on the planet Earth up to the 1900's, (10,000 years?) world human population reached an estimated 2 billion people. From the 1900's up to present 2008 world wide human population has been estimated at 6.5 billion. That is an increase of 4.5 billion in 108 years, give or take a decade. This population increase corresponds with the increasing use of those energies that we believe we cannot live without but can live without. The prime mover, but not limited to, in this case would be electricity. Fossil fuels another.
Matthew 7:24-27

Why not turn it all off?
What law is there that states; If we have a thing, then we must utilize it.
Chances are you may have access to a knife, does that mean you are suppose to cut everything in site?
That would appear as adolescent mischief, teenage angst, wouldn't it?
How is what we are doing with man made energy any different?
Just because we know how to utilize it doesn't automatically mean we have to utilize it.
I think that what scares people the most about turning it all off (man made energy in general) and putting it away, is that, without having to see the facts and figures we all just seem to know that this action would start a process of about 4.5 billion people dieing over a period of about 100 years and quite frankly, what to do with all those dead bodies. Especially if it where done "cold turkey" and not a long drawn out process over the 100 years. Think about the impact all those dead bodies would have on the environment. Think about the impact on the environment they are having, living. We all know what the problem is. We all know what the solution is. Coming up with new types of energy to to replace the old is like sharpening that knife.

Going with 1' = 0.433 lbs. psi.
18 lbs. psi. would be 41.5'
I know thats not right. Must be the gauge. I think I paid $2 for it. At most with a full 1,000 gal. tank, top of water is 36' to Earth. Then there is a 4' difference in ground elevation to where the gauge is located but its 3.5' from the ground. So at most I have 15.8 lbs. psi. I didn't include what is beneath ground because thats 2' at both ends and cancels itself out anyway.
One thing I did to compensate for low pressure was to increase volume by keeping pipe size large all the way up to the cutoff valve for each water outlet. It starts out as 3" down pipe then goes to 2" underground where it comes up to a manifold and reduces to 1.25" and then .75" all the way to the sinks and shower and so on. Of course I had to remove any flow reducers like the water saver device in the conversion valve. Everything works as if it were at a higher pressure unless several outlets are open at once then it slows down considerably but this hasn't been a problem for us. If it every does, its a simple mater to install a booster pump, tank, and pressure switch.
I was expecting to have a water hammer problem but to my surprise it didn't.

I stand corrected. Thank you Ken. I was basing this on my system which is 30 foot high and the water pressure gauge I use reads 18 lbs. psi. but I divided 30 by 18 instead of 18 by 30 which is still high but that could be in the gauge or the difference in elevation from actual water top height and pressure gauge. My apologies Aslan.

Its good to know that you have an otherwise safer system running now. I remember the first homemade solar water heater I built. I started the project thinking it would be marginal at best...
I had completed soldering all the copper pipe and I wanted to run a test on it before painting it black and closing it all up in its insulated, glass front box. The next morning I filled it with cold water and let it sit, flat on the saw horses in open air, not even painted black yet. It was summer time and a relatively cloudless day. By 1:30 pm the pressure had gone from 0 to 120 psi the temperature had changed from 58 degrees F to 140 degrees F. At the time I didn't know how I was going to regulate this and I new that once it was painted black, all boxed up, and on the roof aimed at the Sun, the temperature and pressure would be even higher. I had not anticipated that. I would need more storage. I would need more uses for hot water. I leanred from that; the necessity for, and how and why temperature differential controllers are used and why automatic T/P release valves are required equipment on water heater tanks. Most of all, I gained a greater respect for the power of our Sun.

Hope I'm not to late.
Ellen, have you been able to correct the problem with that contractor?
Here is a site that explains the system you describe on your home. Note the remark about overheat protection. The system drains anytime the pump is not running, so it sounds like what might have happen with your system was, a high limit thermostat should have turned the motor off, causing a drainback, but didn't. Ask your contractor why this didn't happen in your system.
http://www.kingsolar.com/catalog/mfg/package/ksdb-drainback.htm

Here is the list by numbers identifying the components.http://kingsolar.net/ecommerce/product?product%5fid=44249
I really wish the would put these on the same page. Take notice also that they got 9 and 10 wrong.
9 - is the 4500 watt heating elements
10 - is the differential controller.
Also notice the size of and how many collectors there are, the storage tank size, and how many people this system can serve.

Aslan, it would be wiser to construct a water tower and use a smaller pump that would run all during the daytime straight from a smaller PV array.
In a 24 hour period, one day and night, worst case, how many liters of water are required?
Would it be pumping water from a deep well?
How deep?
What is the terrain like at this location, foothills, flat lands, bottom land?
Is there a full, clear view of sunrise and sunset and allthroughout the day, summer and winter?
No trees or buildings or mountains that block the Sun for even part of the day?
Whats the weather like year around?
All of these things make a huge difference in the size and therefore cost, of the PV array.

If the terrain would allow it, there is the possibilty of just setting a tank on high ground and so the need to construct a water tower would not be nescessary. Something to keep in mind is, (every foot of elevation is about 1.5 lbs.psi. 80 foot of elevation will provide about 50 psi.This is wrong.) Correction! 1 foot of eleavation is equal to 0.433 lbs. psi.
Not sure what that would be exactly in metric.

If you think about the basic electric motor design, the shaft is in motion while the windings are stationary. The trick with light kits below the paddles of a ceiling fan motor is to pass the wire through the shaft but if its spinning it will wear down the wire insalation and short out. Apparently the more conventional VAC ceiling fans with light kits below the paddles have motors where, the windings are stationary on the shaft while, in effect, the case becomes the spinning "shaft."
I don't know which type RCH incorperates into their VDC ceiling fans.

http://whileiwork.wordpress.com/
This is a place with a lot of inovative stuff, just don't limit your curiousity to the home page.

Hope you haven't given up on this.
It would appear that there is only one company in the world manufacturing VDC ceiling mount paddle fans and they do not offer light kits. They, he, is offering something else...http://www.fanworks.com/
Take a look. Who knows, a smart investor/inventor with venture capital may come up with a way to include light kits.

Salutations Robert Landau.
Quite simply put, the answer to your questions is, yes.
Think about a house on the grid. Here there are megawatts available but when you pull the trigger on your Skil saw to cut a piece of wood it doesn't take off at warp 9 or anything. As long as the voltage from the PV source doesn't exceed the voltage ratings of the pump motor it will be ok. Like the Skil saw, it will draw only the amps it needs to run. Just check those voltages.

Just a couple of fun facts about the year 1893.




In the year 1893, Edna Parker was born in the state of Indiana. Edna lived to be 115 years old. Edna has just recently passed away. May God, rest her soul.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-ap-in-oldestpersondies,0,5431712.story

Also in the year 1893, Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse brought alternating current or AC electricity and the motors and transformers powered by it, to the world.

http://www.buffaloah.com/h/tesla/tesla.html

Some more fun facts;
In just a little more than 100 years, the human race has gone from being able to live on Earth without electricity, to not being able to live without it. The same is basically true of the automobile by a decade or so. Major breakthroughs in medicines and health care. Also, about 100 years ago marks a time when a change in human population on Earth began. It took thousands of years for world wide human population to reach an estimated 2 billion people, but in only the last 100 years, we have seen and increase of 4.5 billion more people.

Still reading? Here's another.
Prior to the development of a livestock industry, vast areas of Australia were once without drinking water for a majority of the time. Scientists believe kangaroo numbers went through cycles; during the wetter years that usually followed an El Ni-o event, roo numbers increased dramatically. When the El Ni-o returned, they quickly died of thirst with just a few survivors at isolated billabongs. Today, thanks to bores and dams, most areas of Australia are less than 8 km from water - an easy hop for a kangaroo. Where there is drinking water, kangaroos thrive until they starve. Death through starvation is a slow and painful affair.

It would seem that, for humans, electricity can do more than just power a light bulb.

Is that snow? Oh, hey Michael, you know, one of the terms I haven't seen in this thread is,
"The number of Hours of Equivalent Full Rated output (Power) of a PV module per Day."
Phew! Somebody needs to come up with an acronym or something for that phrase.
As I am sure you are aware PV modules don't make full rated power as soon as sunlight hits them. Power output starts out low in the morning rises to a peak at noon (even at noon a PV module may not produce full rated power) and dwindles off into the afternoon and evening. Basic stuff, right? For New England, this ranges from a minimun in December of 2 hours to a maximum of 7 hours in June. An annual average would be 4 HEFRPD's. (Needs work I think.)
So if we go with that and dream up an example of a 1000 watt PV array or, 1 kW PV array, an annual average might produce 4 kWh per day or 1460 kWh per year. What do you pay for grid power $0.0912 per kWh? If so that would sum up to $133.15 per year. Even at $4 per watt, the PV modules alone for that 1000 watt array would cost $4,000.00 divided by $133.15 I come up with 30 years.
Nope, must not be snow. Just wishful thinking.
http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/old_data/nsrdb/redbook/atlas/
Don't let this discourage you though. Sometimes, taking a leap of faith has rewards of its own. Just so you know, I took a leap of faith when I made the chouce to live without any electricity at home for over 25 years. It wasn't easy but it is possible. As hard as some of those early years were, I cherish the memories of it all. It gave me an insight as to how life must have been for early American settlers. Some of them where refered to as New Englanders.

I understand now Joe. Even with a smooth steady flow of wind across the propeller of your wind genny and the steady load of battery charging the amps are eratic. As if a relay is not fully sealing in, its chattering?
 It will be interesting to know just what the problem is if indeed there is one.

Methane Hydrates
http://fossil.energy.gov/programs/oilgas/hydrates/
The biggest problem with this is still pollution.
Then of course there is mining it from the oceans bottom.

I suppose you have already tried defeating the idle mode by turning the adjuster nub all the way counter clockwise?

I must have been out of school sick that day when they taught the other kids that the word "share" is synonymous with "sell" and or "purchase."

RE is, quite simply, enabling an addiction. All be it a more environmentally acceptable form, but an addiction all the same.

If we are to be independent of the natural resources that produce energy from other nations, then we need to be independent of the addiction to energy.

In a time when there was nothing else to compare it with,  taking a week walking to, or riding a horse to, a place that would only take us a couple hours today, was perfectly acceptable. Of course we look at that today as being totally unacceptable now. Whats it for, this need for speed? Speed. Now there is a word that is synonymous with another. Its even spelled the same. Speed junkies.
Ok, I admit, what would our highways look like with millions of horseback riders and people walking on them?
One things for sure, there would no need for chemical fertilizers and it create lots of jobs.
http://www.ourfirsthorse.com/2006/12/stall-fork-preferences/

Homepower #63

I am no expert and I may not fully understand what it is your having a problem with but, it seems to me, if the blades are turning faster you should get more amperage than if the blades are turning slower. In other words if the wind is erratic the amps will be erratic.

Is there something about the AIR Breeze 200W/24V that is suppose to "level out" amperage in spite of erratic wind speeds?

My PV modules do this same thing on days when clouds are moving by at a fast pace. Amperage goes down with a cloud and back up after the cloud.
 
I realize what I have written could be mistaken for cynicism, but its not intended as such. I to would like to be educated on this.

You know how these product manuals are always saying; "Be sure to carefully read and understand this manual before attempting to..." well its doubly true of some manuals. A lot of these product manuals take, I think, a certain amount of deductive reasoning skills. Certain areas of these manuals are like camouflaged, you have to look for whats not there to see what is there. You get a sense of subterfuge. Some manuals, I wonder if the person who wrote the manual and drew the diagrams, every actually had to follow the manual and preform the tasks.

I have a Tri-Metric 2020. Have had two actually. First was taken out by a surge, long story. Whats frustrating is once you have it all figured out and programed, in the end, you'll never need to know that stuff again. Unless of course you have need of another one or replacing one, but by then it could all be forgotten.

Even after all of that I have to say, the Bogart, Tri-Metric 2020 is a damn good monitor! Mine has worked flawlessly for years. It would be my recommendation to anybody starting up a PV system. You made a good choice.

It depends, where the shunt goes I mean, on what you want to know about your system. If you want know the total amphours in and out of your battery bank then the shunt is the "last link" between ALL negative leads and the only negative lead to the battery bank.
If you want to know just PV input to the battery, go across shunt to battery with PV negative only. After charge controll, not before.
Its the same with anything else you may want to know about individually. Use only that line or loads negative.
Only those negatives that go across the shunt to battery negative will the monitor read in and/or out.
Personally, I want to know all amps in and out of my battery bank, so I went across the shunt with all negative leads.
If there are a lot of negatives in your system, it helps to use a splice block.
!!WARNING!! If you have multiple negative leads in your system going to shunt, you must use the correct wire size to continue negative from the shunt to the battery negative post. Example: you may have a total of; 3 - #4  and 1 - #2/0 negative leads going to shunt but you want to use one wire from shunt to battery negative post. You will need to know the sum of the amperage ratings of the pre-shunt wires, to properly size the one post-shunt wire.

I confused myself on that one. I am starting gain some respect for those people that write the manuals, what with liabilities being a major concern and all. Does the above warning make sense to anyone else? Can anyone write this in a better way? Of course diagrams would help.


As for the set points.
1 -  14.4 sounds high for sealed AGM's. Thats sounds more like a high limit for flooded cell lead acid. I would set that the same as the high limit on your charge controller for those sealed AGM's. Thats 13 something right? Go with battery manufatures suggestions. To high a setting on the charge controller could "boil away" the electrolytes.
2 - Yes. You would only use this if you wanted to judge amp hours in/out as a full charge criteria. Voltage criteria will do nicely though in most cases.
3 - Yes.

I can't tell you a name brand or model off the top of my head. I would need more information about it and time to research, but, I can tell that like hydro, it would need a way to "burn off" surplus power if, power output was not being utilized 100% by the grid or battery charging or air/water pumping, air/water heating, etc. etc..
Even though its advertised at 200 watts or 12 amps at 12 volts nominal, it may go higher before it "cuts out." It may be like the AIR's and have integral heat sink, don't know.
I would need to know more about that particular wind genny.

I feel like  the  best investment I made when I decided to jump on the RE wagon, but was a newbe, was HomePower Magazine.
http://www.homepower.com/home/

It can and has been done. HomePower. Not sure which issue. Some time during the 90's. Can' be sure, but I think it was students at ASU in Boone, NC. who built it. If I get time this morning I'll try to narrow it down but if not... Here's a couple a road signs.
http://www.homepower.com/home/
http://www.appstate.edu/

Only the manufacturer would know these things with, any, certainty about its own product. Only, from what I have been able to find so far or in this case not find (manufactures spec. sheet) the manufacture doesn't want anybody to know details about its product or they don't know because they haven't extensively tested there own product.

Here's another one to throw into the mash.
http://www.partsonsale.com/universalub121100.pdf
 If you look at this sheet, they say it takes their battery 3 months to self discharge to only 91% in storage. Something just doesn't feel right about that to me. Letting a battery just sit there for 3 months without charge. I know that this must happen to a minor extent where manufacturing facilities are concerned. I guess its just me. Maybe I am too spartanistic. I could never let myself spend $3000 on a "yard ornament." No offense intended. It would have to serve some sort of worth while duties. On that note though, I can see where having those batteries in storage, ready to use at moments notice would be a great advantage but then, uhh, never mind.
There is a battery that I have heard off that can sit dead for the most part, and be revived after years in this state. How true it is I don't know. Its the Nickle Iron battery invented by Thomas Edison (or more likely, by one of his think tank minions). I wouldn't know where to get any though without researching it. So... What the heck. I have fun searching for hard to find items.

I'll be a monkeys uncle. That was just toooo easy.
http://www.beutilityfree.com/content/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=44&Itemid=129

When determining ratios there is a need for a comparison value.
http://www.aaastudy.com/rat62bx2.htm

All we have to start with is the PV modules ratings at the STC or Standard Test Conditions which are only possible in a lab under strict guidelines, but this should do.
The other thing we need is ratings based on real world conditions averaged out over a specific period of time. Say, longest day to longest day. June 21 in my region. Then you formulate the ratio of panel efficiency as compared to STC ratings. Luckily someone has been recording solar radiation for nearly 30 years at various places of the North American continent.
http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/old_data/nsrdb/redbook/atlas/
Once there, chose: average, annual, flat plate tilted south at latitude then view map. Find your regions color, compared it to the legend. What this will give you is an approximation of the number of hours of equivalent full rated power of a PV module. Notice over the legend it shows kWh/m2/day. Thats an equivalent of 1000 watts per hour over a 1 meter square area per day. Obviously there are a lot of other factors involved here but this should give an approximation. Try other scenarios. Get to know whats going on with this. Try one similar to your PV array for this month and see how it compares to the number of hours of equivalent full rated power you are actually getting from your array.

Lets say for example you have a 1000 watt PV array facing south tilted at latitude plus 15 degrees in December and you live in central Nebraska. Go to the above site, click average, December, flat plate South tilted latitude� +15 degrees then view map. Look at the legend for central Nebraska and you see 3 to 4 kW hrs per day of potential energy from our Sun averaged out over the month. You have recorded the amount of actual power from your PV array and it equates to 2.5 kW hrs. per day averaged out for the month as well. Divided 2.5 by 3.5 = an efficiency of 71%, roughly speaking. That would make a ratio of what? 5:7 this tell us that you would need two more modules to reach 100% Or a 1:1 ratio. Is this right? Check my math please. I don't get the chance to play with ratios much.

Ok. I could not find anything out about your Eliminator  12 v 100 Ah AGM's. You'd think I was trying to find NASA' top secret space shuttle files or something.
Anyway, I did find this:
http://www.eastpenn-deka.com/assets/base/0139.pdf
Something that might be very similar. If you scroll down the file to page 10 of 16, at the bottom right side you will see a chart. Read this. You can see that at a 10% depth of discharge one may get 3100 cycles. At that rate, figuring one cycle per day, that comes to 8.5 years. Of course "your mileage may vary" as they say. Keep in mind I could not find this kind of spec. sheet for the Eliminator brand your using. These are Deka AGM's. Eliminator brand should have spec. sheet like this though were they are hiding it on the internet, is anybodies guess.