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EXCERPTS FROM 'NO CHAINS'

"One thing nice about the NO CHAINS system is the scalability. It starts very small, but can be scaled as quickly and easily as funds or trades acquire what is needed to become more efficient. Another bonus is that it provides the ability to easily retrofit existing structures, and this gives you a greater number of choices when looking for a property. Many people have overlooked properties well suited to power production from hydro, solar and wind in the future, because of the fear that retrofitting the structure on the land for immediate power usage, will be far too daunting."

ON FINDING AND FUNDING A REMOTE PROPERTY FOR OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING

"When I found my property, I had only $1200 to my name, having saved all year. I bought the property on what is known as a land sale contract. I went to an area with a reputation for an association that files covenant law suits on their members a lot, because I knew it would have the prices depressed. I was willing to bet that there were at least a few land-owners who bought for investment purposes, who had become caught in the legal crossfire. Often, people in this position are willing to work out some "creative" financing in order to recoup their investment before their losses become great."

OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING THROUGH FREE AND RECYCLED MATERIALS

"In fact, you can even affect your taxes. Since the NO CHAINS philosophy strives to recycle as much free building materials in your construction as possible, your property tax assessments can be lower. I had my taxable value dropped by almost half, which translated to only paying a third of what I was originally assessed to pay. I took in photos that proved my construction was not done by contractors. By proving I had used what they term as 'inferior grade' materials, and not doing 'contractor grade' work, they agreed it was only fair to lower my assessments. In the end, my taxes were 1/3rd what they were originally going to charge me."

HAULING OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING MATERIALS TO THE SITE

"Having a good trailer is a lifesaver. Those SIPs, windows, lumber, shingles and such take space and often special handling to get to the site, especially the long items. So the longer the better, up to say 20'. Of course, don't get one that when loaded may be so long or heavy that it is too much for your vehicle, or that 'tail' may 'wag the dog'."

ON SELECTING THE VOLTAGE OF YOUR OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING SYSTEM "

For 48 volts, twice as many batteries than 24 volts must be wired in series, again before you can string several such series blocks together in parallel, to form a greater pool of Amp Hours. As you can see, this gets expensive fast. It also uses huge amounts of space, requires much more cabling and is contrary to our theme. So to have an 'instant on' affordable and scaleable system, a 12 volt bank is our basis."

ON BATTERY BANK INTERCONNECTION FOR OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING DESIGN

"The novice often wires the parallel so that all positive terminals are connected, and all negative terminals, then taps off of one end or the other of the bank, thinking it will give him the amp hours we have indicated. I have even seen this type of connection diagrammed on solar sites that should know better. It will give the added amp hours, but it does so in the direction of the tap. The first battery goes down to 0% faster, then the next battery and so on. This causes the closest batteries to cycle and stay unused causing faster sulfation, wearing them out faster than the farthest. All of them will wear many times faster than they should, because it will be breaking the 50% rule."

BUS BARS ARE KEY TO EFFICIENT RENEWABLE SYSTEMS FOR OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING

"There are two types of standard bus bar in the world of electric connectivity. The common conductor and the grounding bar. There are several types of materials too. Full copper, full aluminum and zinc/nickle or steel coated copper. Some are insulated from the material you bolt them into, and some are not. They are rated according to the type of wire they can accommodate. Either AL for aluminum, CU for copper, or AL/CU for dual use. "

SELECTING THE MOST COST EFFECTIVE INVERTER FOR OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING

"A last minute note on this issue. Using computers and HAM equipment as I do, I have a few devices that required a true sine wave to run. I could have easily lived without them, but I was curious. I found that if I plugged in a $40 UPS battery backup and line conditioner from Staples, designed to protect computers, those devices requiring a True Sine wave would run on it. I don't know if it would work for every device, but at $70 for my inverter, and $40 for that battery backup unit, it was a great savings over the $700 True Sine version of the same inverter."

HOT WATER HEATING FOR OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING

"Since it has regular fittings you can use standard pipe threaded hoses to connect it to an outdoor shower with a curtain ring on a tree and a "Y" connector can pipe it off to a sink on saw horses to start. Later when your home is enclosed, you can pipe it with pvc and transfer the hoses to your indoor water system in the house in about 2 minutes. If you put a reflectix or standard insulation jacket on the unit it can stay warm for several days between firings. In heavy snow areas, an insulated outdoor structure is best to house any water heater."

WOOD STOVES AND CHIMNEYS CHOICES ARE KEY TO OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING

"As noted earlier, then slip joint does just what it says. It slips into the lower stack. The cathedral box provides the horizontal support, so must be fastened to a rafter on one side at the very least, and I like to add cross supports to the next rafter for those sides, and one that crosses them on the far side as well. The exit cone flashing provides the vertical support against the wind. Good cone will have small arms with rollers inside to give greater support and not put it all on the cone lip. This creates a gap, so a rain shield ring is added to cover the gap, and then silicone is used to seal the edge of that ring around the triple wall pipe." "Newer stoves also have much closer setbacks than older ones, simply because they don't heat up to the same temperatures in the same way. Still a good rule of thumb is: Use a base and wall protector. For the base the 8/18 rule is recommended. The noncombustible floor protection, whether stone, brick, cement board (two brands are Wonderboard or Durarock) or a UL approved shield, must measure 8 inches beyond the sides or rear of the stove, and 18 inches beyond any doors you load the stove from. Also, all single wall stove pipe is recommended to be 18 inches away from combustibles. This can be cut in half or even a quarter with wall shields."

SOLAR GENERATION THE RENEWABLE FOUNDATION FOR OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING

"I chose these panels for many reasons. I needed 300 watts to run all of my gear. Though the panels were considered 24 volts, they were actually 35. In order to charge a 24 volt battery system you need the excess power in case of loss through the charge controller. The charge controller I bought was a new type. It could take this higher wattage and convert it to 12 volt for me, more efficiently than stringing a bunch of 12 volt panels together. I actually got more amperage at 12 volts than it was supposed to provide, and the charge controller could accommodate at least one more of these high watt panels."

AMERICAN MADE GENERATOR TRAITS IN OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING

"We Americans are the ultimate consumers, living in a society where inexpensive is king, and disposable is expected. Noise means little as long as power is massive and on demand for the job. Our designs in generators are a reflection of that." "They are always larger. They will also be 50% to 100% percent louder than the foreign models discussed earlier. They will not have a throttle idle adjustment and will run at full speed. The great majority will not have a battery charger."

THE MINIGEN BATTERY BANK CHARGER - CITY LEVEL POWER CHARGING FOR YOUR OFF-GRID SELF SUFFICIENT LIVING

"The Intek on the MiniGen is throttled, so you can reduce the idle once the motor warms up, and when idled down the 1 gallon tank will run it about 6-8 hours, providing up to 1500 watts of power from a 40 amp alternator for the duration. My usage showed that this was enough to run my standard off the shelf inefficient refrigerator, plus provide lights and use two computers and a DirecWay satellite internet system during the entire period." "Have you ever been heading out to work in the morning during a snow storm, only to find your car battery dead? In such cold weather even those portable emergency starter packs often do not have enough cold cranking amps to get you started. With the MiniGen you just roll it over, and quick charge the battery at 40 to 200 amps, even in the most remote location and worst weather."