Solar power system installation - a first-hand account

Jan

Jan

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Goodbye load-shedding — A first-hand account

We recently had a moderately-sized solar system installed at our home to have backup power during load-shedding and were impressed with how fast and seamless the whole process was.

We have long been using a combination of a 500Wh portable power station, battery-fitted load-shedding bulbs, gas stove, and elaborate scheduling to survive load-shedding.
 
The pair of items worked like a well-oiled machine, at times exchanging some members when one required more hands than the other and regularly communicating to ensure they got cables routed into the right areas.
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They are people. Not items. ;)

Also "thin" maybe?
The thi pipe running to the right of the rain gutter contained the earthing wire.
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Congrats! Tho looking at the layout of your roof… did you consider placing the panels in landscape orientation instead? For ~(guesstimate) R8000 more (3x panels, a rail, brackets and some additional 6mm2 wire you could get ~33% more generation out of that same setup.
 
Nice!

Get some fireball extinguishers and smoke detectors as well just in cases.
 
Congrats enjoy

Budget is always the roi killer

So geyser to timer timeshifts 7.5kwh
Base load of 350w
3.5kwh
Battery charge with 50% reserve for shedding
2.5kwh
Some coffee lunch prep etc
1-2kwh
Total 14.5-15.5kwh produced per day

The more you can timeshift the smaller the loss naturally

Solar panels probably capable of
22.5kwh on sunny day no idea how pretoria is

So in 4 years you probably sacrifice in production = cost of an additional battery if you could capture all the panels can produce with eskom increases probably way more

On a sunny saturday start with an empty battery run the aircon from early morning switch on the heater whatever to prevent the battery from charging full

To see what you can produce max

do the math of roi with current battery capacity

And then rework the roi with extra batteries expense included needed to absorb that missing production
 
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Jan said:
Goodbye load-shedding — A first-hand account

We recently had a moderately-sized solar system installed at our home to have backup power during load-shedding and were impressed with how fast and seamless the whole process was.

We have long been using a combination of a 500Wh portable power station, battery-fitted load-shedding bulbs, gas stove, and elaborate scheduling to survive load-shedding.
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Congrats on the installation, great price point too. What I'm interested in your actual savings. By how much was your Eskom bill reduced?
 
Shwynix said:
Congrats on the installation, great price point too. What I'm interested in your actual savings. By how much was your Eskom bill reduced?
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Definitely plan to do a follow-up piece detailing that at the end of April. Getting a geyser timer installed to try and make the most effective use of sunshine hours. Will eventually replace our 3kW element with 1kW or look at full conversion for the geyser in the future.
 
Hanno Labuschagne said:
Definitely plan to do a follow-up piece detailing that at the end of April. Getting a geyser timer installed to try and make the most effective use of sunshine hours. Will eventually replace our 3kW element with 1kW or look at full conversion for the geyser in the future.
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I would go with a 2kw element, that is what I did, a 1kw will use the same amount of power just takes 3 times longer to heat the water. What I did was look on a sunny day when we have excess power and then set the geyser to run for 45 min in the morning excess and 30 min in the afternoon excess. Also with regards to the geyser, my 2c worth rather install more panels than go solar geyser. Once your geyser is hot then that is it, with solar panels you can use that extra power once the geyser has been heated with the system.
 
Greglsh said:
I would go with a 2kw element, that is what I did, a 1kw will use the same amount of power just takes 3 times longer to heat the water. What I did was look on a sunny day when we have excess power and then set the geyser to run for 45 min in the morning excess and 30 min in the afternoon excess. Also with regards to the geyser, my 2c worth rather install more panels than go solar geyser. Once your geyser is hot then that is it, with solar panels you can use that extra power once the geyser has been heated with the system.
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+1, 1kw is too low.
 
Hanno Labuschagne said:
Definitely plan to do a follow-up piece detailing that at the end of April. Getting a geyser timer installed to try and make the most effective use of sunshine hours. Will eventually replace our 3kW element with 1kW or look at full conversion for the geyser in the future.
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Geyser size ?
With a 1kw element it will run most of the day which is nice for semi cloudy days

Since you have only one 5kwh battery

I would not do anything else to the geyser apart from smaller element since you need that as a load

get a cbi astute or similar that way on crap weather changes you can switch off remotely if not working from home
 
Honestly, with that size install, I wouldn't bother with the geyser, you'd have to manage it extremely carefully so that it doesn't run when there isn't sufficient sunlight and even at 1.1kw depending on the amount of water required to heat could take ages.
Either go gas if you want to be removed from Eskom, or for extreme backup scenario get a generator of 7.5kva min installed with a switch over as backup for days you need the geyser running if you have extended downtime.
 
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