RedViking
Nord of the South
I would guess the installation is the pricey part.The wife gave me a budget and genius me, spent all the money on the equipment, forgetting about the callout and labour to install the stuff
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Load shedding solution assistance
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The_Ogre
Honorary Master
Yup, I got one quote for R11k
Yup, I got one quote for R11k
What I did was a DIY job. 11k is highway robbery IMO. job shouldn't take more than a couple hours
Bought wiring, cable ties, voltage sensor/detector, multi meter, changeover switches, earth leakage detector, fuses and a few other ancillaries and wired it all myself.
Then paid 1k (maybe a little less, don't quite recall now - it's been a few years) for a sparky to come over and do a once over check. All was fine.
Saved the install costs as well as got some kit out that I use a lot since.
PS: just be very careful with DB wiring - live electricity is no joke. Triple check everything. Helps to draw/map it out on a piece of paper, recording exactly how the wire runs will be done and where it will terminate etc etc. Labeling is also key.
PPS: That voltage detector can save your life
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PsyWulf
Honorary Master
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Because they are,doesn't stop you from making a kettle-> 3pin coupler and plugging any nominal load in
Good idea. "Kettle plugs" are very easy to find.
What would the difference between this and something like this https://www.geewiz.co.za/long-run-u...5ah-battery-4-hour-battery-life-kit-720w.html be besides the plugs ?
Sideshow Bob
Honorary Master
Thanks, looks like this is what I am looking for.
https://www.wootware.co.za/ups-c14-male-to-2x-type-m-three-prong-janus-female-cable-adapter.html
RedViking
Nord of the South
If you want to. Or you can just use whatever you have already and attach a kettle plug to a lead.
Be careful - I bought that UPS and already after one week of loadshedding it is starting to shut down before the 2.5 hours are over. It also uses about 40 to 50W of power from the battery with nothing connected to it. I wouldn't buy it again if I had the choice.
georgelza
Expert Member
ok, wellcome to shoot me, pretty sure between all these pages these questions have been asked before.
What I'm thinking...
So the thinking is, Grid tied (as grid backup, NOT intending on feeding back into grid), if the power goes off, then batteries kick in, depending on time of day/night i can either start the 7.5 Kva generator to take over primary load, or leave on batteries (being assisted by the panels ? if during the day, or just batteries if at night).
Can 2 smaller inverters be combined feeding off one pool of batteries connect in serial/parallel to provide the required voltage, aka start smaller and grow by adding a 2nd,
- similar have a set of panels connected/dedicated to each inverter.
If I provide a Kw/day used (low week, 150-> 185)... can that be a starting point, (idea would be if power fails the geysers will be switched off).
From what I've been able to see, most batteries are 12V, the inverters mostly take 24 or 48 volt so some batteries in strings of series to get voltage up, and then multiple strings in parallel to up the AH ?
How Do I decide what size inverter I need, then how can determine based on above W/d what type of AH I need and for how long it will last,
Solar panels... another complete subject... to charge the batteries... so i simply don't just charge from Eksdom non existing feed.
Guessing the wattage of the panels is just the math needed to determine how quickly they can charge the batters and provide excess power to house.
early stages so lots of questions.
Please advise
G
What I'm thinking...
So the thinking is, Grid tied (as grid backup, NOT intending on feeding back into grid), if the power goes off, then batteries kick in, depending on time of day/night i can either start the 7.5 Kva generator to take over primary load, or leave on batteries (being assisted by the panels ? if during the day, or just batteries if at night).
Can 2 smaller inverters be combined feeding off one pool of batteries connect in serial/parallel to provide the required voltage, aka start smaller and grow by adding a 2nd,
- similar have a set of panels connected/dedicated to each inverter.
If I provide a Kw/day used (low week, 150-> 185)... can that be a starting point, (idea would be if power fails the geysers will be switched off).
From what I've been able to see, most batteries are 12V, the inverters mostly take 24 or 48 volt so some batteries in strings of series to get voltage up, and then multiple strings in parallel to up the AH ?
How Do I decide what size inverter I need, then how can determine based on above W/d what type of AH I need and for how long it will last,
Solar panels... another complete subject... to charge the batteries... so i simply don't just charge from Eksdom non existing feed.
Guessing the wattage of the panels is just the math needed to determine how quickly they can charge the batters and provide excess power to house.
early stages so lots of questions.
Please advise
G
Loot has stock of that unit.
The_Ogre
Honorary Master
This is what I have and it is going to be mounted and connected directly to my DB. Should there be an interruption in the grid power, it will seemlessly switch over to solar, should it be during the night or there's too little sunshine available, it will switch over to the battery backup.
However, what I was planning to do is to connect the panels, via the two micro-inverters to the grid input of the the inverter and connect the grid input to the generator input of the inverter.
The grid will thus be the backup or supplement to power from the panels (or batteries) should meyhouse be pulling too much power.
Would you rather recommend Mecer then?
https://www.wootware.co.za/mecer-me-2000-vu-line-interactive-ups.html
The_Ogre
Honorary Master
LOL, I'm not sure whether you quoted akes by mistake, but since he was talking to me, I thought you were referring to the kit I've bought. Apologies if it was not the case.
I'm no expert, so my opinions are:
There are two figures things you need to know when determining the sizing of your system. The one figure determines the size of your inverter and the other the amount of batteries, for the most part.
First figure is what is your peak load you plan on putting on your backup. This will determine the size of your inverter. So if you plan to run a 750w pool pump, a 150w tv and a 100w dstv/media player setup simultaneously - then your peak draw is going to be 1000w. Or 1kw. So you'll need at least a 1kw inverter.
The next figure would be to determine how long you plan on running all this for. So if you wanted to run the above setup for 3 hours, then you'd need at least 3kw of storage in your batteries. That's 3000w of stored electricity. If you were running a 12v system then that would be about 3 100AH batteries. (300ah x 12v = 3600W).
If you needed to have more than 4 x 100ah batteries then you should be on a 24v system in my opinion. So that would change things.
You get 12v inverters as well, not just 24 and 48 - Once you go over 1kw inverters though you'll find that they are mostly 24v/48v/... not 12v.
No idea - I haven't tested this one.
Spot on.
Inverter rating = MAX LOAD
Batteries = Runtime
People often confuse the 2.
Re a 100ah battery - work on an average of 600Wh per battery (based on my formula given above)
Cool, thanks for that correction.
Do you agree to not put, as a rule of thumb, more than 4 x 100ah batteries on a 12v system?
Ja, 4 sounds about right.. More than that would take a while to charge the batteries
... and with loadshedding stage 5/6/7/8/9/10/11/12/13 coming - we're going to have less time to charge batteries - right now we have 6 hours.