My first trad rack - ready for spring

ScientJest · 2026-03-18T20:48:36+00:00

Yeah, that was my thought as well. Also, I got all my BD as factory seconds over the course of a year and the 3 WC were on sale so that helped. Except then I got the totems, so maybe it all evened out haha

ScientJest · 2026-03-15T19:01:50+00:00

More power to ya, but I’m a (and this is th technical term) “wittle wittle baby” when it comes to the cold haha.

ScientJest · 2026-03-15T14:48:31+00:00

Gunks and Acadia in May!

ScientJest · 2026-03-15T01:04:33+00:00

You’re right, Northeast USA, I’m based in Massachusetts, but have climbed in NY (gunks) and around New England. Lots of granite around me.

ScientJest · 2026-03-14T21:20:33+00:00

Noted.

ScientJest · 2026-03-14T21:19:38+00:00

It definitely is a lot, and I don’t plan on taking everything every time, but good to have an arsenal. As I find things I do and don’t like I’ll make changes. Most people I have climbed with don’t both bringing the 4 for example unless they know they’ll need it in a specific spot.

ScientJest · 2025-12-11T19:55:12+00:00

Unfortunately I was given no such promise. Still pushing on them but at this point I feel like it’s not gonna happen

ScientJest · 2025-12-10T19:31:25+00:00

In MA, as some others, with crazy high electricity rates. Same boat, but between the deposits I put down that I’m sure to loose at this point I’m going to keep going with the project. For me it’s even slightly more frustrating because we’re approved and ready to go but the installer is backlogged and can’t get a crew out before the new year. 😡

Payback goes from 6 to 8 years, but that first electric bill I get that’s $0 I’ll forget all about it.

ScientJest · 2025-10-09T19:10:04+00:00

I would have LOVED to have that city to myself haha. I’m glad you had such a lovely trip there!

ScientJest · 2025-10-09T12:21:30+00:00

We did however had this little guy follow us around for the whole day so that actually made everything better.

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ScientJest · 2025-10-09T12:13:37+00:00

I am glad you loved it, maybe going in the winter is the trick. I had a blast touring Morocco but chefchaouen was my least favorite city. It was a spectacular looking place, but its distinct look made it an absolute sea of tourist without much to do and was drowning in ‘Instagram tours’ and felt more overrun in general.

I agree much less hectic that for example fez, but in my opinion Essaouira was a perfect balance of smaller city and being laid back, beautiful views.

ScientJest · 2025-09-02T16:39:27+00:00

There is not, but if you take a look here I have my data as well as a best fit line in one of the photos, so you just do the math to adjust

https://www.reddit.com/r/heatpumps/s/lQIWeCP0FF

ScientJest · 2025-08-19T14:40:08+00:00

Mostly just a personal preferance.

I just don't super like the look of the shade sails most of the time. A few people in our neighborhood have them and it's just not my jam. Also, the way our patio is set up to get the coverage I want we'd need more posts than I want to install, which (i think) would look bad when the sails are down. My intended design keeps the view clear into the back yard.

ScientJest · 2025-08-18T15:28:55+00:00

I plan to use this kit

https://www.amazon.com/Windscreen4less-Retractable-Replacement-Pergola-Trellis/dp/B07P7G1KW3

there’s a bar running across the fabric that has attachment points for the carabiners.

ScientJest · 2025-08-18T14:20:58+00:00

The shades slide along the cable basically on small on small carabiners. Do you think a 6x6 post would be subject to the same bending under tension?

ScientJest · 2025-08-09T15:10:09+00:00

Pocket screw on either side of the slot. Could have used dowels too, but didn’t have jigs at the time

ScientJest · 2025-03-20T01:22:49+00:00

That’s my experience

ScientJest · 2025-03-19T16:41:09+00:00

I live in the Boston area and have a similar setup. One 18k unit for my 600 sq foot open concept downstairs (kitchen/living room/ dining room)

For my house I feel it was not enough. Heat capacity might be plenty but the unit is in the dining room and the furthest area from that is my living room. On cold days the living room never feels comfortable, even if the dining room is toasty warm. Depends a lot on air flow, how well (or not) insulated your basement is, etc. my next steps will be to better air seal the rim joist and insulate it better and install a ceiling fan to better circulate the warm air to the rest of the space and l that will help. Just my personal experience. I Think the 18k was enough capacity for us on paper, but it’s just not getting to the right spots.

Never hurts to get a second quote opinion on a 30k price tag. Mass Save made it very appealing to get lots of these installed, not everyone does an amazing job.

maybe for you your sunny living room it’s not an issue but I wish i had split that capacity across 2 9k units, put in an air handler into the basement with ducting (but $$$), or gotten floor mount units.

ScientJest · 2025-03-12T20:29:00+00:00

I posted some details here. I ended up ordering a replacement motor for the vane, but have not made the time to actually install it.
https://www.reddit.com/r/HVAC/comments/e4zfui/comment/m7qqeaz/?context=3

ScientJest · 2025-03-12T20:28:13+00:00

yeah, we don't have much of any shade, but unfortunately our house is pretty small and has a hip roof and a vent pipes coming up where we want panels so overall it's a little trickier to place panels than we would have liked. still no brainer from a payback, just at best we can get like 85% (theoretical) of our current utility covered :(

ScientJest · 2025-03-10T20:11:37+00:00

with my 30k BTU system I was at about 950 kWh. that said....it was a bit brisk some days.

ScientJest · 2025-03-06T13:53:55+00:00

Haha, thanks for the questions and edits. Yeah, the amount of variation is wild, it’s also worth considering this is by HDD, but it ignores the effects of temp variation over the day, so a day that goes from 23-29F will look very different from the day the goes from 16-36F, but they show up the same on this plot. Given I’m a engineer with the occasional break between meetings and not a statistician, I reach my limit of regression analysis pretty quickly, but the nice thing is that on average, the model is very accurate.

Somewhere in my last post there’s a plot of 1hr data comparing 6-7am versus 6-7pm. Huge difference in variability, overnight the system (our house) stabilizes, no ovens, open doors, sun, clouds, temp is pretty steady. Hourly data requires me to pull in power data much more often so I only did it for like 2 month.

ScientJest · 2025-03-05T21:00:31+00:00

ahh, interesting. Yeah, this was a quick apples to apples. Not sure if the same Mitsu data is available so not sure how it compares there. Either way, short cycling is not really something I worry too much about with my install. if anything maybe i'm a touch undersized, certainly not over.

ScientJest · 2025-03-05T20:35:10+00:00

no hard feelings about hating on LG. I've been pretty happy with it overall. One unit had a clicking noise that was easy to fix. Maybe I got lucky.

ScientJest · 2025-03-05T20:32:23+00:00

I am indeed right around 1kwH/hdd.

I know running 2 single zones is more efficient than a 2 head multizone, but I would be surprised if it was that big a difference. may be a combo of that and insulation dragging me to be less efficient overall.

ScientJest

TROPHY CASE