The Forestry Forum
General Forestry => Drying and Processing => Topic started by: sawwood on May 27, 2021, 10:02:02 PM
I have a solar kiln and need to run the fans on solar power and may be a dehumifer to help the drying time. How big of a system would i need
to power two fans and the dehumifer ? I sort of understand the system but need to know how big of a inverter i would need. Thanks for any help.
What type of battery bank will you have? Might be worth looking into window vents.
From what i have read i will just need one battery. The YouTube guy had just a solar panel one
battery. A controller for the solar panel and a inverter. Didn't show how many out lets it had. I
am going to look more into to it. Looks like it may be coast about 800 to 1000 to set it up.
You don't need a battery to run the fans. If you connect the correct size solar panel directly to the fan, the fan will run during the day and shut off at night.
Quote from: Brian_Rhoad on June 05, 2021, 12:12:54 AM
You don't need a battery to run the fans. If you connect the correct size solar panel directly to the fan, the fan will run during the day and shut off at night.
This.
In the standard solar kiln plan you only operate the fans when the kiln is hot (the sun is shining). At night the kiln cools off, the humidity in there goes up and you get a daily "reconditioning" cycle. The wood "rests" and the moisture gradient inside to boards evens out. Ready for another burst of hot air the next day. Although this is slower, it's safer than simply drying as fast as you can. Other kilns can dry faster, but they need more precise control (humidity / temp / airflow) to ensure good results.
If you need more throughput, then build another simple kiln and/or partly air dry the wood first. It might take 4 weeks to dry a load from green, but only 1 week of kiln time if the wood has air dried for a couple of months first. End result is 4X the amount of dry wood coming out of the kiln.