hey comms, having watched others in action sure helps in the planning.

tying to the grid is dandy, but one does become dependent on it. besides, wouldn't it be great NOT to have to tie to them and pay monthly bills?

given what you're saying, i might suggest not going to a 12V system. we did that for 15 years, but today's inverters and LED lighting is so efficient that going 12V isn't necessary or even desirable. if you carefully pick your items its possible to run the entire household on a 1000 watt PV array and a few deep cycle batteries. that can easily run lights, laptops, printers, wifi, satellite internet and TV dishes, stereo/radios, flatscreen TV, tools, and even a small A/C, if one is careful and conservative.

we have only a small honda generator for those periods of gray days. don't think we run it more that a couple dozen hours each year. gens are noisy, require lots of attention, wear out and are expensive to run. best to save it for running large powertools or in emergencies. i'd prefer not to use it at all.

our yearly delivery of propane runs the on-demand waterheater, cookstove and frig.

we heat only with wood. water is gravity-feed from a spring 250' above the cabin. the property was partly chosen because of this dependable water supply.

get a Backwoods Solar catalog. i found it to be the best and most comprehensive out there. and their customer service can't be beat because they live with what they sell.

we still have outhouses. fact is, we always will, because they are so simple, pleasant and cheap. there's nothing like watching the sunrise from a well located outhouse :-)

when the snows get deep we use horses to get down the mountain to where we park the vehicles in winter (see pix below). and when the horses can no longer get through, we revert to snowshoes. if one perceive things like this as "living a good life" instead of as a hardship, it isn't half as tough as some folks would imagine.

and don't let your "shortcomings" stop you. as a city boy i didn't know anything when i started either. if i could do it, so can you!

one last point, i guess wasn't as clear as i should have been: you said "Simple would be 100% grid". by simple i really meant keeping the systems simple, doing with less, not what is simpler for you to do. in fact, living this lifestyle isn't easy like a renting an all-utilities-all-furnished apartment in the city, its actually lots & lots of time and hard labor, but it is far more satisfying in the end.


my partner, patti, saddling up to go work when the chained-up pickup can no longer get through