Catching Up...

Just returned from a great visit to Iowa City and finished phase 2 of Solar Labyrinth. This project started over a year ago with a phone conversation and collaboratively evolved into what you see here.Allan Berger is the super-hero adventurous instigator of this project since it was his desire to compliment the 40kW solar installation on the roof of his building that lead to Solar Labyrinth being built. This project was unique for me since it was such a long distance translation of idea to form and much of this sculpture was fabricated there in Iowa City while I was sending drawings from Florida. Overall this is a stand-alone, non-grid-tied 1400W pv system, though it has the unique challenge of collecting solar power with solar panels facing all 4 cardinal directions. This was addressed by using 4 Morningstar SunSaver charge controllers wired in parallel to manage the charge. Special thanks to Nate Frees at Newport Fab & Machine for being a steady head and reliable problem solver and fabricator of all the aluminum seen here. It was great to be in Iowa City for a week as well, spent some time at the Coralville Dam, but mostly put in long hours to see this through!