Solar Geyser - Why not?

Speedster said:
Cold water in the geyser won't affect the collector temp. You need the water in the collector to circulate to avoid over heating.
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I ran everything down so that the geyser temp was 26 and the collector was 30. Obviously geyser will stay the same and I'm interested to see what the collector rises to :p

Snyper564 said:
if this time of year is concerning for you December is going to be a nightmare for you...
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I'm getting it sorted soon, just deciding on a method. I have a major upgrade to my system coming soon, been working it out with solar guy and should be underway in the next few weeks. I've got such a unique layout for my property (lots of roof space, lots of trees as well) and the different buildings (house, cottage, office and laundry) with db and sub db etc, that it's taken quite a bit of organising and decision making.
 
Spizz said:
I ran everything down so that the geyser temp was 26 and the collector was 30. Obviously geyser will stay the same and I'm interested to see what the collector rises to



I'm getting it sorted soon, just deciding on a method. I have a major upgrade to my system coming soon, been working it out with solar guy and should be underway in the next few weeks. I've got such a unique layout for my property (lots of roof space, lots of trees as well) and the different buildings (house, cottage, office and laundry) with db and sub db etc, that it's taken quite a bit of organising and decision making.
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And what happened?
 
New to solar geysers.

Does it have a built in element that runs on electricity automatically when Sun is not out or do you switch on manually?

How do you know that the solar geyser is running without checking for hot water everytime? Is there a way to see the current temp?
 
aomar296 said:
New to solar geysers.

Does it have a built in element that runs on electricity automatically when Sun is not out or do you switch on manually?

How do you know that the solar geyser is running without checking for hot water everytime? Is there a way to see the current temp?
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Geyserwise
 
Speedster said:
Are you sure you don't have a backup battery / panel on your pump?
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Pretty sure. Last week it went off the scale hot. Maybe emptying the geyser and reducing the temp in the collector helped along with late afternoon sun. Tomorrow we go again :p
 
Have 2 x 455 watt panels
Dual PTC element
Geyserwise TSE controller

Works very well. Cost was R9600, estimate break-even less than one year as minimal AC power needed now

Even on cloudy days, panels still produce 400 watts and work all day. On sunny days it gets to 70 deg
 
I use a combination of gas and solar for water heating.

Solar to heat the electrical geyser if there is enough sun. If the geyser is not hot enough - the system directs water to the gas water heater before it gets to the taps.

Which means the house never has cold water coming out the taps and the shower never runs cold.

Works well and having constant hot water at a set temp (adjustable via a keypad) is something I never knew I needed until I had this system installed a few months back.
 
aomar296 said:
Solar geyser or heat pump?
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It all turns on whether you wanna get solar. Rather put the money towards that otherwise solar geyser or heat pump are good options.

Either you put 15k to more overall power or just put it towards hot water
 
How much do I need for a decent solar inverter setup that will run geyser and basic appliances?

From the little I know, the batteries alone is more than double the cost of a heat pump
 
aomar296 said:
How much do I need for a decent solar inverter setup that will run geyser and basic appliances?

From the little I know, the batteries alone is more than double the cost of a heat pump
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There is more to it than that.

You need to figure out what you want at the end of the day and go from there.

Slapping a cheap system together will likely cost you more in the long run.

If you wanna run a geyser a 5kv sunsynk will work but you pref wanna go 8kv but there is so much more to this rabbit hole.

If you want to get a solar system for hot water thats not a good idea - overall better life with minimal impact from Eskom now we talking.
 
AfricanTech said:
I've had a solar Geyser for about 10 years - now that I'm looking at Solar for the house I have decisions to make since the Geyser panels are occupying the space that I need for the house panels.
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Toss it, get a normal geyser, and use the space for your proper panels.

You can then add a heat pump if you want to cut down on power usage from the geyser. Or add more batteries that benefit the whole house (in the event that you need to heat the geyser at any point outside sun hours). This should be the real choice.

Batteries are expensive but the better option in the long run...
 
Mike Hoxbig said:
Toss it, get a normal geyser, and use the space for your proper panels.

You can then add a heat pump if you want to cut down on power usage from the geyser. Or add more batteries that benefit the whole house (in the event that you need to heat the geyser at any point outside sun hours). This should be the real choice.

Batteries are expensive but the better option in the long run...
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yep

That's where my thinking is going.
 
Snyper564 said:
There is more to it than that.

You need to figure out what you want at the end of the day and go from there.

Slapping a cheap system together will likely cost you more in the long run.

If you wanna run a geyser a 5kv sunsynk will work but you pref wanna go 8kv but there is so much more to this rabbit hole.

If you want to get a solar system for hot water thats not a good idea - overall better life with minimal impact from Eskom now we talking.
Click to expand...
Question is will my heat pump budget of R20-25k get me close to a decent solar system?

At the moment I'm more concerned about cutting my electricity bill rather than surviving loadshedding
 
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