Field Notes

<--2023-09-12 13:30:00 | 2023-09-28 13:25:00-->
Other sites visited today: Bouldin Alfalfa | Vaira | Tonzi
Phenocam link: Searching...

West Pond: 2023-09-19 16:45:00 (DOY 262)
Author: Joe Verfaillie
Others:

Summary: Testing solar batteries, down to two good ones, lots of ants, restart camera after power was down.

West Pond
2023-09-19

I arrived at about 16:45 PDT. This was a quick stop to test the solar batteries that have been losing power in the early mornings for the last week or so. The water level is above the opening of the inlet pipe but it seem to be running.

I opened up the plastic boxes and chased out a bunch of wasps - nothing to be done about all the ants though except try not to get bit. These are bigger probably native black and tan ants that do bite. They have taken over the solar charge controller and there are mounds of debris in the bottom of the box. Ants have shorted out solar charge controllers in the past so might be worth swapping this controller out.

I disconnected the batteries (sn BB-WP) and tested them with the load tester. The first three from the west tested okay but the last one on the east tested weak. These are wired in 24V pairs and the one paired with the weak battery had a bunch of corrosion on it positive terminal. So I disconnected these two and left the system running on a single pair. I also check the water levels and added a little water to a couple of cells that were low.

Even by 4:30pm that solar panels are shaded by the willow to the southwest. I thought about trimming it but it has a bunch of large stems. It would take more work than I had left in me at the end of a long day. But it could be trimmed to increase the solar day.

At the tower I turned the Canon camera on again and collected the flux data. I could see that there were unzipped files each morning meaning power was down.

I left at about 17:20 PDT

0 photos found

8 sets found

Can't check WP_DO
1 WP_DO graphs found