Off Grid Solar Powered WiFi Mesh and Camera station, Part 2
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- Опубликовано: 28 мар 2023
- (find part 1 here: • Off Grid Solar Powered... )
Our off-grid homestead moves along with this project for a solar-powered wi-fi mesh and camera station.
In this Part 2 video, I narrate our way through the mechanical prep and physical on-site install of the camera/wifi pole, electronics box, solar array, and connecting conduits/wire.
Not a sponsored video.
If you use my Amazon links, you pay the same, but as an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
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That solar panel will provide some nice shade for any snakes - very thoughtful 🙂 Stay safe out there.
LOL yeah, I thought about that and for now have just started to pile up some rocks around it. Probably should go back and do metal mesh all around the array to try and prevent that unless you have a better idea!
thx for the comment and for watching.
I keep in the moab desert for 3 nights and is the most peaceful beautiful feeling waking up getting a coffee and enjoying the beautiful scenery 🏜️ !
Agreed! Super magical place.
To hold the pole straight by yourself. I used 3 foundation stakes and 3 cheap racket straps and a level. stick pole in hole then tighten each strap that's hooked to stake and to top of pole or connect it to pole anyway that works level as you tighten each strap and there it is held in place and straight up and down. It worked for me.
Put box w/electronics under solar panels with poles on both sides , dig two holes for poles .
SURROUND IT W/ ROCKS and put cement around box between rocks!above ground level!
Now you have a raised box inside a man made rock !( you could even put some kind of natural insulation around and under box .
I would use rocks the size of a block w/ some flat spots and seal the lid w/ a raised vent
Use the panels to shade the electrical use a fan under panels to cool electronics in box, bet it gets plastic melting hot in summer !so id put something over the lid for insulation!
I think ventilation is more important than water protection 😊
You can raise solar panels up a little and anchor it with the poles 😊
W/ 2 poles you could support a tracking system to follow the sun😊
Longer pole better view?
Nice install.
Few things I would have done.
Put the cameras and solar panels on the one pole but higher then a person can reach to prevent theft.
Put the battery into a steel locking box bolted to the pad.
All possible, but with the winds we have (we're in a 120mph wind design area) putting panels that large up in the air on a pole would have necessitated a VERY sturdy pole and steel reinforcements. Just not super practical. If I only needed 1 25 watt panel, for example, makes sense. But all valid depending on what you're optimizing for of course!
Thanks for watching and commenting!
I am enjoying your videos. Just an idea of mounting your equipment inside a small locking jobsite box that could be fixed to a cement pad or not. With mounted solar panel on the lid and attach a mast pole to the side for equipment and cameras. Everything in a neat smaller package that could be moved about or permanently anchored to a specific location. You could also add additional batteries if you wanted. You would be able to make small stations at home and mount around the property at your will for a more permanent solution.
Great idea! I will say mine is very hard to even notice, which is great, but definitely not mobile which is an awesome idea. And your idea is more repeatable for deployment in various spots. Thanks for the comment!
Found your videos and am enjoying them. This project is something I am doing as well. I had it all designed and now am changing all my power ideas. We had the same UniFi layout.
Keep those cameras rolling.
Thx! Good luck on your projects.
This has given me some great ideas for my remote property. Thank you for making both of these videos!
I'm glad it helped! Still working well for me 👍
Very nice project!
Thx! Still working perfectly.
The progress is amazing
Thanks for watching!
A trick on sun damage for the 3D printed parts..... A good coat of exterior paint will do WONDERS for UV protection.
I've heard this! Thanks for the reminder!
I used a cooler for underground install 9 years ago and still as good as the first day!
Yeah, these plastics can last a long time if they have no UV on em!
I like the way you explain!! Good stuff man keep it up💪🏼🫡
Thanks!! 🙌
Love this project!!!
Thx!
most thorough and i thank you
You're welcome!
Nice to see how you game planned this. I like what you did with the plastic tote for electronic component storage.
For my off grid land, I've been using Eufy 4k solar powered cameras which cut the need for the local battery power, but I do still run into the need for wifi mesh to cover more acreage.
Thx for the comment and yeah, a system like eufy with built in solar power is a much easier install! I'm planning ahead to a more robust unifi system across the site so I went with that but your way is smarter for what I was trying to achieve here. 😉
thank you brother this video is gold
Glad you liked it!
That was great, cheers
Shalom, thank you very much for the video. It is greatly appreciated and informative.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Awesome video looking at doing something like this!
Glad you enjoyed it!
See if white roof rocks are available to cement to the lid of the box.
you're a Pro, mann!
🙌
cool project.. Might be a good candidate for a LoRa
I'm also considering using point to point networking to give me a more stable connection and then running the mesh antenna from the "local" ethernet. Lots of ways to skin the cat, though!
Nice Job
Thanks! 👍
Some batteries for European cars come with plugs for the vent plug on one side. So you can attach a proper vent tube out the side of the box if you are using a lead acid battery. So the box does not fill with acid vapors
Yep, great point for those using Lead-acid. Thx for the comment.
I'm a little concerned if panels being so close to the ground can withstand an animal walking over them.
Very nice install overall, since you already have a thermometer inside, let us know how hot it gets inside the box, maybe that concrete on the lid has enough termal mass and you don't have to worry about cooling after all.
Are they to catch cactus thieves 🌵🌵🌵🌵bit of an eyesore in such a pristine wilderness
Lol. I'm building a homestead here... Need to keep an eye on things during the build. 😊 In person you barely notice them in the vastness to be honest.
Either get a much longer drill bit or a sds drill bit extension. Bending that far can blow out your back. Having a welding shop cut and extend one drill bit is not as painful as a blown out back.
Paint the post to match the horizon colors to hide it in plain sight.
You're *totally* right about the drill extension and thanks for calling that out.
As for the post, it's a little tricky since the horizon colors are really different based on the direction you're looking and the time of day, but sounds like a good refinement for next time :)
The tweekers will just steel your cameras, batteries and panels. I know they did to my desert cabin setup. I learned and installed tall poles firmly anchored and electronics in a super heavy steel vault. Setup a ftp cloud server and have your cameras sent pictures anytime they trigger.
Oh yeah I already get all of the video and notifications off property in real time. Sorry to hear about your experience though.😞
Looks good! Having some sort of cover over your cameras is a good idea, just to keep the sun off of them to prolong their life. Just a small sheet of metal would work
Something like a solar panel perhaps?
@@MRI27890 yes! Great idea
I like that though for me I calculated I needed 200w of panels which would need a LOT of bracing to survive string wind gusts. If you can get away with like 50w of solar, I agree those panels are nice and small and more easily supported by a pole like the one I used here.
Your setup is very useful for my situation. I got so much knowledge from your videos that i need especially the electronics , i will start using this method in my farm in the middle of no where😅. I just want to know how can i expand it to cover everything in my farm. I will need more solar panels, lights, small water pump for agriculture and lastly a router with 3 cameras.
Glad it's helpful! The best thing about a mesh network is that you can just add more and more and as long as the node can reach at least one other, it will carry the network.
The bad part is that this method tends to really slow down as you add more "hops" AND you don't get nearly as much distance out of it as you would if you just added 2 Ubiquity Nanobeams (or equivalent from another company ) where one link can literally go hundreds of meters or more.
The real decision is whether you actually need usable internet all over (mesh is perhaps worth it) or you just need to get camera signals back to home base, in which case using something like Nanobeams is likely better.
Love your videos. Found you from the well drilling videos. One concern I would have is, how well the cameras will hold up in the middle of summer in direct (desert) sunlight. Perhaps a sun shade over the cameras may be needed?
Thanks and glad you enjoy em!
I have a camera that's survived one summer already but yeah, totally agree the summer UV will be terrible for the plastics.
I did internationally aim all of them so none of them have the sun shining directly in the lens (or sensor) but totally good point.
Wish We could get away with doing everything like this!
But i am in Manitoba Canada... And We get LOTS of Rain and also -40 Temps LOL!
Yeah.... very different circumstances and thanks for acknowledging it! So many people are pretty quick to just say things like "that's wrong" or "you should do it X way" without considering the circumstances that actually make something a good fit. Anyway, thx for watching!
I think you made a potential lightning rod. Perhaps consider adding a grounded lightning rod - not sure if the electronics would survive the proximity to a strike, though.
Yeah, a ground rod driven deep into the earth might serve the whole thing well. Thx for the heads-up!
@@LetsOverthinkThis I use Unifi all the time as a WIFI and security installer. You should have used shielded cables and Unifi cat5 surge protector's and grounded the system. Just lighting strike close by will kill everything from top to bottom. Trust me on this seen it to many times coming and repairing systems that people don't understand EMP it's a killer on net ports. Been doing this since 2005 owned my own WISPA until 2021 when cable and fiber came through my area. I currently run tech support and installs for private homes and installs for RV parks and of commercial use. Been a big fan and user of all UBNT and Mikrotik products for years.
any chance these 3d prints are on any of the 3d printing websites for download?
I'm needing a really God camera system for my off grid property that sits unattended for 3 weeks at a time
Well there are tons of options but they all depend on a bunch of factors only you know (how much ground to cover, do you have internet, do you have line of sight, do you want to just have recordings or also alerts, do you have power on site, how much do you want to spend, how visible or covert do you want it all, what's the weather like there, etc, etc.).
But the good news is there are lots of options and the tech for both cameras and power have improved a ton in the last 5 years or so.
Nice job, Did you considder mouting the electronics and battery above ground in a waterproof box? I've previosly tried hiding things underground but these have inveriably allowed water to seep in.
I did and that's definitely a valid solution! In my case I wanted to try buried first since the electronics stay cooler and since we get so little rain here anyway (and this is on the top of a small hill so drainage is working in my favor). But in many places an above ground approach is probably easier to execute well.
Thanks for watching and commenting!
excellent just One observation though how about putting some 1/4" critter wire around your solar panels to protect the underside from critters believe me when I say it will happen if you don't put something around bend it so that you have an area around the panels out approx. 8-12" from the edges of panels and bury it about 1-2 " under dirt and if you really want to keep scorpions and other varmints out a thin layer DM earth on the ground as well better yet wix it with the dirt that you scrape away. I promise you will not get a critter surprise when you are checking them in the future - Dave Blunt in Northeastern Nevada
Absolutely spot-on suggestion, David. It's come up before and especially because of the snakes, this is a thing I have to get done. Much appreciate the comment and thanks for watching!
This is awesome. I like it. I would love to do something like this, but my backyard is small enough that I could just run an outdoor cat6 cable, but it wouldn't be nearly as cool, haha.
Just wondering, and maybe you addressed it earlier, but did you really need 2x 100-watt panels? I was thinking that it would look pretty dope if you have smaller, 20-watt panels mounted over the camera that acted like a hat.
Might not be as cool, but any time using wired ethernet is feasible, it's the best bet! Most reliable, fastest, and takes care of PoE as well! I technically could have gotten away with wiring it, distance-wise, but the ground is so hard to trench and a bunch of it will be graded soon, ripping up anything I bury there.
What amount of solar you need is a hard thing to answer since it depends on power draw (which actually varies) and how much cloudy weather you expect, etc, etc. 20 watts *definitely* wouldn't have done it, though. The 2 cameras + the internet switch + the mesh antenna + the losses in the PoE injectors all add up to something like 25 watts continuous, so you need quite a bit more to make up for night time, plus the fact that most of the day isn't full sun. Agreed, using a panel as a sun-shade would have been a nice dual-purpose, though!
Thanks for watching!
Greetings from the Atengkalengkaleng channel
hi!
personally I prefer to hit printed parts with a bit of spray paint to protect against UV
Definitely a safer bet. What paint do you use that actually sticks to it? Fusion?
why not considered taking star link wifi
This does use starlink for the Internet. Their wifi solution isn't robust enough for my needs though.
Only thing i dont understand is why you want it? Cameras rarely help with thefts after the fact. It wont do anything real for security unless you have some very fancy set up to automatically alert you. And a fake camera and a trespassers will get shot sign would be more effective as deterrence. I guess the WiFi in itself is nice. But it all just seems excessive to me.
I hear you but I have my reasons 😊
And yes I do get immediate alerts, assuming I'm not already on the property..,
Repeat after me: quarter twenty.
It isn't "quarter by twenty".
Saying it wrong will get you laughed at in the hardware store. Well, as long as the people there aren't wearing pronoun pins.
I'm aware the usual way to say it is "quarter twenty"... not sure if you do voice-overs but it's not a natural way of talking and you're more focused on the tone than the words. Either way, nobody has a chance to laugh at the hardware store since i'm definitely don't need to ask them where the hex bolts are ;) Also if you're in a store where the staff is laughing at their customers, that's a sorry place for both parties. Pins or no pins.
@LetsOverthinkThis I hear ya. In northern nevada, we I've only seen the weirdos in the big box hardware stores. They really aren't there to help. Since the only things they know have no relationship to a hardware store anyway. Comic book store maybe.
Anyway, unrelated but I'm jealous. You got a smoking deal on that tractor man. Congratulations.
@@highlandermachineworks5795 Oh the big box ones are the worst. Though I've been in plenty of local ACE stores that had a great selection of unique hardware in those little drawers that really put to shame what HD or Lowes usually has. And McMaster is really my go-to if I have a crazy project going on :) Anyway, thanks for watching. More coming your way....
@@LetsOverthinkThis msc has a warehouse near me. Buy McMaster just has better stuff. And yes, ACE is the place!
Please make more vids, watched all and subbed. Thank you
Glad you like em and thanks!! 🙏
Nice install.
Few things I would have done.
Put the cameras and solar panels on the one pole but higher then a person can reach to prevent theft.
Put the battery into a steel locking box bolted to the pad.
Definitely valid options but I didn't make those design decisions because of a few factors. It gets VERY windy up here and fixing a pole that was rigid enough to tolerate a large solar panel that high up would have been a real pain for me. Also, it would have been a huge eye-sore, whereas my slim and shorter camera-only pole isn't as easy to spot at all. A locked battery box is a good idea but I don't have pad to lock it to, and again, I didn't want to expend that effort this go-round. But you're absolutely right that those decisions would have led to a more secure set-up. Thanks for watching!