We cover all aspects of renewable energy - wind power, solar power, solar water heating, hydro, biofuels, wave power and much more. http://www.reuk.co.uk In our articles Timer Circuits with 4060B, Repeat Timer Circuit we looked at how simple timers can be made which will control an output - e.g. something small like an LED, or a relay which can in turn switch absolutely anything. For all but the very simplest of short time interval timers, a microc... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Make-a-PICAXE-Repeating-Timer.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Make-a-PICAXE-Repeating-Timer.htm Sat, 04 Feb 2012 12:42:46 GMT Pictured below is the new (December 2011) SCC-20 wind turbine charge controller with integrated dump load controller from Karasouli. This is a new low cost, highly efficient, and easy to use charge controller designed for domestic and small commercial micro-generators. What is a Wind Turbine C... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Karasouli-SCC-20-Wind-Turbine-Charge-Controller.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Karasouli-SCC-20-Wind-Turbine-Charge-Controller.htm Sat, 04 Feb 2012 12:42:46 GMT The UK Government will announce on Monday (31st October 2011) their intention to slash the feed in tariff paid to owners of domestic solar photovoltaic installations which qualify after December 8th 2011 by over 50%. NEW (January 30th 2012) - Following protracted legal wrangling, the government ap... http://www.reuk.co.uk/UK-Feed-in-Tariff-to-be-Cut-by-50-Percent.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/UK-Feed-in-Tariff-to-be-Cut-by-50-Percent.htm Sat, 04 Feb 2012 12:42:45 GMT In our article titled PIR Sensors we introduced passive infrared (PIR) sensors and summarised their uses. Of particular interest to us are 12 Volt DC powered PIR sensors and associated circuits since these can be powered directly from a 12 Volt battery which is in turn charged by wind, solar, or oth... http://www.reuk.co.uk/PIR-Sensor-Circuits.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/PIR-Sensor-Circuits.htm Sat, 04 Feb 2012 12:42:29 GMT Using solar photoelectric (solar PV) panels to heat water is very inefficient. It is far better to use dedicated solar water heating panels. However, if you have an array of solar PV which is exporting electricity to the grid for which you are being paid only a few pence per unit, it makes financial... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Water-Heating-with-Surplus-Solar-PV.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Water-Heating-with-Surplus-Solar-PV.htm Sat, 04 Feb 2012 10:58:24 GMT PIR motion sensors can be quite expensive, and require additional electronic circuitry if they are to be put to use in anything other than typical domestic security systems. Options include this KC7783R PIR module designed to be used with microcontrollers or other additional electronics, or domestic... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Hacked-PIR-Sensor.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Hacked-PIR-Sensor.htm Sat, 04 Feb 2012 10:44:37 GMT If you would like to distill your own ethanol you need a still into which your fermented brew is heated and the alcohol separated. In the UK it is legal to own a still, but it is illegal to use it to make alcohol. NEW (February 2012) Now available in the UK is the above pictured machine know as... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Make-a-Still.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Make-a-Still.htm Tue, 31 Jan 2012 13:49:58 GMT Across our website we have plans for many electronic circuits, from solar water heating pump controllers to light detectors, and from shunt regulators to battery status monitors. As the requirements of a circuit get more complicated, the number of components and complexity of the connections between... http://www.reuk.co.uk/PICAXE-Microcontrollers.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/PICAXE-Microcontrollers.htm Mon, 30 Jan 2012 13:12:25 GMT Australian company Rainbow Power offer a great 300 Watt hydro power generator system for small scale Pico-hydro projects. This unit can be used to charge a 12 or 24 Volt battery bank. The HYD-200 is a low maintenance long service life micro hydro generator available in 12V and 24V models. The... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Rainbow-Power-300W-Hydro-Generator.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Rainbow-Power-300W-Hydro-Generator.htm Fri, 27 Jan 2012 12:44:08 GMT Most photovoltaic (PV) solar panels are fitted in a fixed location - for example on the sloping roof of a house, or on framework fixed to the ground. Since the sun moves across the sky through the day, this is far from an ideal solution. Solar panels are usually set up to be in full direct sunshin... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Solar-Tracker.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Solar-Tracker.htm Fri, 27 Jan 2012 10:46:05 GMT We have for many years been selling our high current light dark sensor circuit and low current light dark sensor circuit which are based around the simple LM741 Light Dark Sensor Circuit for which we provide the circuit design on our website. During that time we have received many requests for a ra... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Light-Dark-Dawn-Dusk-Relay-Controller.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Light-Dark-Dawn-Dusk-Relay-Controller.htm Tue, 24 Jan 2012 16:48:37 GMT As the importance of renewable energy has increased over recent years, more renewable energy degree courses have been added by UK university physics, engineering and other departments. Now it is possible to do a dedicated undergraduate and post graduate renewable energy degree made up of IT, electro... http://www.reuk.co.uk/UK-Renewable-Energy-Degree-Courses.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/UK-Renewable-Energy-Degree-Courses.htm Mon, 02 Jan 2012 14:14:26 GMT PIR (passive infrared) sensors are used in many applications for motion sensing. In our article PIR Sensor Circuits we looked at how a typical 12VDC PIR sensor can be used in common applications. Such PIR sensors are typically used in home security systems to be connected directly to burglar alarms... http://www.reuk.co.uk/KC7783R-PIR-Module.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/KC7783R-PIR-Module.htm Wed, 30 Nov 2011 15:40:57 GMT A large proportion of the heat output by a central heating radiator goes into heating the wall on which the radiator is mounted. In the case of internal walls this is not a great problem since the heat in the wall will be slowly released back into the room, but where radiators are mounted on a party... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Radiator-Insulation-Products.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Radiator-Insulation-Products.htm Fri, 14 Oct 2011 13:17:41 GMT With the recent fashion for tearing up carpets and exposing stripped wooden floorboards an old problem has reared its ugly head - cold draughty floors. Up to 15% of the heat in a home can be lost through the floor which at current electricity and gas prices is expensive, it is very wasteful, and col... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Floorboard-Gap-Insulation-Seal.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Floorboard-Gap-Insulation-Seal.htm Fri, 14 Oct 2011 10:32:58 GMT Over the years since the original Electrisave went on sale we have tested and reviewed many wireless electricity monitors designed to help people to keep track of the amount of electricity (and therefore money) they are wasting. Now it seems that new electricity monitors are being released to market... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Wireless-Electricity-Monitors.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Wireless-Electricity-Monitors.htm Fri, 14 Oct 2011 09:45:33 GMT Until 2007/2008 the wireless home electricity monitors on sale were all functional, but pretty ugly - not the sort of thing you necessarily wanted looking at you from your mantel piece or coffee table (and I'd know because I've had over thirty of them pass through my living room over the years,... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Wattson-SilverLining.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Wattson-SilverLining.htm Fri, 14 Oct 2011 09:31:16 GMT Before spending a lot of money installing a PV solar or wind turbine generating system, it is vital to survey the planned site to ensure that the prevailing weather conditions are suitable. In our article Survey Wind Speed at Turbine Site we looked at how an anemometer with a data logger can be u... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Power-Predictor-from-Better-Generation.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Power-Predictor-from-Better-Generation.htm Fri, 14 Oct 2011 09:28:20 GMT It is possible to test the state of charge of a lead acid battery (or battery bank) with a multimeter simply by measuring the voltage however this is not always an accurate indicator. More accuracy is provided by measuring the specific gravity of the electrolyte in the battery (assuming that the bat... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Battery-Specific-Gravity.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Battery-Specific-Gravity.htm Sun, 18 Sep 2011 20:02:57 GMT The ecolectric toaster from Morphy Richards is one of the first toasters in the world to be designed to be energy efficient and made from materials which can be recycled. Even the packaging is 100% recycled and 100% recylable. Ecolectric Toaster Although this two-slice toaster is designed with e... http://www.reuk.co.uk/Energy-Efficient-Ecolectric-Toaster-Review.htm http://www.reuk.co.uk/Energy-Efficient-Ecolectric-Toaster-Review.htm Fri, 16 Sep 2011 14:49:51 GMT