The field-testing program
Desk research tells you what the datasheet says. Field testing tells you what the equipment does. This page holds the program's standard now, and its results as they are earned.
Current status: honest zero
No field tests are published yet. Everything on this site so far is desk research from primary sources, and every page says so. This program starts producing measured data when my own off-grid build in southern Vermont begins; publishing the standard first means you can hold the results to it.
What every published test will include
- A numbered identity (Field Test #001, #002...) with a stable URL, so results can be cited.
- The exact equipment: brand, model, serial-level configuration, linked to its spec database entry.
- Conditions: location, dates, temperature range, and the load or duty cycle applied.
- Measured numbers: instrumented readings (watt-hours, runtime, fuel burned, capacity delivered, temperatures), not impressions.
- Photos of the actual setup, unedited.
- Problems encountered and what I would do differently.
- The raw data, downloadable, alongside the writeup.
- The verdict boundary: what this one test can and cannot establish (one unit, one site, one season).
How it connects to the rest of the site
When a product has been field-tested, its gear card and spec rows switch from "researched, not personally tested" to "personally tested" with a link to the test. Until then, the labels stay honest. Test results also feed the calculators: measured efficiency numbers replace assumed ones, and the change is logged in the corrections log with a formula version bump.
Want to contribute measurements from your own systems in the meantime? The forum has standing threads for real winter battery numbers, firewood consumption, and well costs; contributed data is credited when it informs a page.