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Thread: What Solar System to get ?

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    Default What Solar System to get ?

    I live in Vic and will be ordering a new solar system installation for my place in Melbourne as well as for my holiday home I have down at Inverloch.

    It looks like this is going to be a bit of a maze to work through, I am not in a rush, keen to study and get good advice of course first.

    Still doing more reading also noticed warranties will need to be a careful consideration, lifetime of an installation I expect to be reasonable and not something I need to have fixed every few years

    I note there is some experiences here and some related threads, will appreciate any info or recommendations from members !



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    Admins thread will be a good read and his installers sounded like they knew what products were good

    I think since admins job, thing have moved on a little, you'd probably be looking at inverter panels now

    If you are considering Solar/Battery Hybrid, there are a few good AU YouTube channels of people with those systems and how they live with them
    Last edited by ol' boy; 03-11-18 at 12:59 PM.
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    What time line are you looking at for pay back? Do you want battery ready, eg 6.6 w of panels and Fronius 5 KW inverter? Will your panels be shaded? have you enough roof space? and so it goes on
    Lots of questions, Whirlpool and Solar Quotes are probably better places to get your answers Top tier panels take longer to recoup your out lay (LG and Waico) mid tier panels less so
    I have several quotes for the above size and net quotes after STC rebates, but not including Dan's gift of $2,500 of about $6,700.
    And the thing that stopped me was you can only use this out put during day light hours, you still have to pay for your night time use
    You can sell your power back to your supplier, 12 c per Kw ? but you still will be paying for electricity
    There is a fine line between "Hobby" and "Madness"

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    I don't think any are a viable choice, unless you get one with a battery bank, if you are an average family with working parents. The feedback bonus is now not big enough to make much of an offset for your usage bill during sunlight hours, and your biggest usage will be at night, when your solar is doing diddly.

    Edit: solar hot water is probably the biggest saver in sunny seasons, when you can switch off the electric boost completely.
    Last edited by bob_m_54; 03-11-18 at 02:01 PM.

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    In most areas now power outages are far and few between BUT every now and again, some Naysayer warns that due to 'downsizing' of Power Generators, there could be periods of 'Non Supply' during Heat wave conditions and nothing would be more galling to having a System in place and and not being able to make use of it under such circumstances.
    Hot Water is a very heavy power consumer and going Solar for it makes a lot of sense but in my area, I have been wary of them due to winter temps going down to Minus 10C and then reading the local News when that happens that the Plumbers have been rushed off their feet fixing frost related damage.
    The ideal would be to build from NEW using every idea known for Insulation and collection of Solar energy to provide light, power and heat.
    I stand unequivicably behind everything I say , I just dont ever remember saying it !!

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    I have almost 20KW of DIY panels I have put up myself.
    A few hopefully helpful thoughts at random......

    Whirlpool will only give you 2 answers: You should buy the most expensive system out there by the most expensive installers or, You are an idiot if you don't and there is no possible way you could ever get a decent system if you don't pay top Dollar.
    They are all brainwashed and biased there being a lot are installers and the rest are brainless parrots that just recite what they have heard over and over.

    There are good brands of panels like Jinkos and there are good brands of inverters that are not the most expensive.

    A lot of the " Have to buy the best " mindset is because of 25 yr warranties over 10 Yr. IMHO anyting over a 10 year warranty is going to be useless and a marketing crock. Panels change all the time. already if you have a 3 Yrs old system and a panel or inverter fails you have to replace the WHOLE system thanks to new " Safety" regs that are clearly more about keeping the industry going than any dangers in old systems.
    IF you have a pnel that falls over in say 5 years, Chances are there will be a new series of panels that are not compatible through Voltage, physical size, rule and regulations or other factors. As such they will give you a new panel but you have a real good chance of it not being able to be fitted. in other words, Useless. Push that out to the 15 yr mark and the likelihood the replacements will be incompatible is a certainty.

    Are you going to be in the same place in 10 years+? a lot of people move home sooner than that.
    Are you going to want to keep the same panels beyond 10 years? 300W odd panels are the standard now. in 15 years they could be getting 600W or a lot more from the same size layout. In 15 years you may want to charge an EV so keeping a 6 KW setup on your limited roof space may not be economically smart and you'll want to go from 6 KW to 20 anyway. I doubt many people will stick with them because they still have 10 yrs to run on the " Warranty" .

    Panels are generally FAR less trouble than inverters. I would suggest less expensive panels and a better inverter would be money far better spent. All my system is second hand. ALL the panels produce great output with very little measurable dropoff. Given the right day, they will be right at rating or, on a few occasions I have seen, fractionally above it.

    "Ideal" Tilt and orientation for your location is complete and utter bullshit. The tilt is ever changing. It's only the perfect tilt for a week or 2 twice a year as the suns angle is constantly changing.
    I strongly suggest tilt and orientation for WINTER. the sun is weaker, the generation is less and your power useage generally higher. Right now my south facing array ( supposedly the dead opposite of where you want them facing) makes more power than my west facing array because the panels are flatter pitched than the west facing ones. I doubt anyone would tell you to put panels on a south facing roof. They DO suck in winter though. IF you have other forms of heating like wood or gas and your summer bills are higher, then go for that orientation but generally there is so much sun in summer you could probably stand the panels vertical with their backs to the sun and make more power than the perfect direction in winter.

    BE how water smart. DO not go for a direct water heating setup. They make no sense now. In winter they do bugger all. In summer the water is hot by 10 am if not sooner and the panels just sit there doing nothing all damn day. make sure you get an inverter that will divert power to your electric how water heater before it grid exports. Most electricity " plans" ( what fk wit thought of calling power charges, Plans??) charge you more for off peak power than they give you as a feed in tarrif. There have been a couple of exceptions but generally they are limited time like a year when you sign up or the peak power price is BS compared to other offerings.
    My current power extorter for instance charges .17C for off peak but only gives .08 C FIT. I had the hot water taken from the off peak and put on the mains. I also run the HWS off a cheap voltage controlled relay. It detects when the Voltage in the system rises from the solar coming on and then turns on the hot water heater. built in units in the inverters will go better and if you are making say 5 KW and the house is using 3, it will send the balance 2 KW to your water heater. If you are say using 1 KW, it will send all the power the heater can handle before it sends any to the grid.
    Whatever you do, do not pay off peak water heating when you have solar. Make sure the inverter you get has a divert er built in. I believe some inverters can do more than one diversion so you may do the hot water then when that is up to temp it kicks in the pool pump for instance.

    Unless you have a LOT of power outages, a person would have to be a greenwashed zealot to go for a battery these days. You can run all sorts of equations but the bottom line is NONE of them, under ideal, perfect conditions will repay their costs back in 10 years or the life expectancy of that particular cell type. NONE OF THEM!
    A battery is simply pissing money up the wall. If you want to kid you are doing the world a favour and you have more Dollars than sense, then by all means join the other greenwashed Koolaide drinkers.
    If you are trying to save money, then Just buy a generator, have a transfer switch installed in your meter box and buy the fuel as you need it. You will be so far better off it's not comparable.
    One of my arrays can easily be reconfigured so I can take the power from the grid tie inverter and send it to a high amp battery charger. I have 2 deep cycle marine batteries they charge and a 2 Kw inverter.
    I can pull 2Kw on even a fairly overcast day without touching the batteries. At night the batteries will run the TV, a bunch of lights ( all LED now) and keep the fridge freezer going, not that there is much draw from them between midnight and 7am.

    That's really about all I can't do with anything bar electricity, refrigeration. TV and everything else I can live without for a night or 3. I have a bunch of Diesel generators I can run on veg oil for nothing as another hobby but its good to have batterys to give some power at night quietly. Setup cost less than $500. No need to spend $15K for the occasional blackout protection.
    Bottom line is batterys from ANYONE, Tesla, LG, Enphase, sonnen etc, DO not make any economic sense because they simply can't save you enough power over their lifetimes to repay their cost.... or even close to it. Yes the cost of power may go up but you would be Far better off putting in a bigger solar system and still forget the battery.

    #Rule of solar efficency: INefficency is always the cheapest and most efficent way to go.
    Devices designed to maximise panel efficency such as trackers, moveable frames and other things are NEVER as cost effective as adding more panels. For the gains you get installing tilted frames for instance, you would be better adding more panels up to the same cost and leaving them at the wrong orientation/ tilt. This is never more true than when you need the power most: on an overcast day.
    No substitute for Cubic OR square inches. No matter how well setup for max efficency a 5KW array is, a 6 KW array will ALWAYS produce more KWH per day on a shit day. ( and probably a lot of others as well) When the clouds come over, the light is flat and the most efficent panel is flat. Other than that, more is always better. More panels will also kick the inverter in earlier in the morning and run it later in the afternoon.

    Pay attention to ramp up and ramp down periods. Most systems work on max output at midday. These days that can be detrimental. If everyone else in the street or plenty of the neighbors have solar as well, there is a great chance they will be pushing the grid voltage up at lunchtime which will make modern inverters throttle back loosing you power or FIT. If you are going for best summer production, I would suggest where possible an East/ West split. This will have the power coming on sooner when you are likely to be using it getting ready in the morning and could still be covering the majority of your consumption in the early evening. My 4kw west array can still be easily pushing 2 KW plus at 7PM in summer.
    I still think most people would be better with a North facing array tuned for winter but always exceptions to anything.

    Crunch your OWN numbers. DO NOT rely on what installers and sales people tell you. Measure your roof angle and direction with free apps on your phone. work out how many panels you can fit in what direction. Go to a solar site like PVwatts and punch in the numbers and play with them. At your roof angle and direction if there is more than one, which face or part of your roof will make you the most power when YOU want it? Also if thee are trees around, Download a solar tracker app and run that through the seasons and see where the shadows will fall. Is the antenna on your roof going to shade the panels?

    If you do get shade, consider micro inverters. If there is no shading, they have no advantage over a regular GTI except to make more profit for the guy installing them. Apart from that, from my POV there are more connections and therefore more potential failure and trouble points. I tested some admittedly older Micros in plain sun and found a regular GTI of about the same vintage produced noticably more power. Extra connections on Micros were a real pain in the arse to hook up as well.

    DO NOT pay Up front. you will need to pay a deposit but DO NOT pay the balance until you have been issued all your compliance certificates and the system is working and approved by you power co. There are a lot of scammers out there and even good installers can turn bad. I would worry more about the company supplying the products than the installer. That would bring hoots of protest from the WP zealots but look at it this way, Installer does the best job that can be done. Next day falls off a roof, gets hit by a bus. His little 1-5 man biz shuts down because he can't work any more, who is going to look after warrant now he's gone? That's right, the manufacturer of the products used. Best to have a known brand even if not the so called best brand whom have been around a while.

    The WP guys push one panel brand. Happens to be the most expensive. Bit of digging into the installers pushing said brands own websites and FB pages shows them on overseas Junket tours provided by the company they happen to think is the best panels and a person is an idiot to buy anything else.
    I wonder if thee is any correlation? Well not really I don't but anyway.....

    The solar quotes website seems trustworthy in their information *BUT* do your OWN homework. Think about what is important to YOU, YOUR circumstances, YOUR location etc. Don't matter a shit what they are doing in another part of the country or how many things they sold in another part of the world, YOU are paying for this, make sure you know what is important to your specific circumstances, whatever they are.

    Yes, there is a LOT to know about solar in order to make the right decisions. I often laugh when I go places and see panels on peoples roofs. Clearly they got a system and that's what they got. No attention to the direction, shading issues or anything else. Salesman came along and said this is what we can do, they slapped it wherever the bastard fit, got their money and off they went. Spoke to someone I met at a party about 3 months ago like that. Told me solar was a waste of money because it made no difference to their bill. Few questions, quick look at their house on google earth, YA!
    South facing panels on a fairly steep tilted roof that were half shaded. No mystery there.

    OTOH, I put an array up at my Dads place. Put it on the shed roof as that was most clear but I knew it would still be shaded and was far from ideal. Wasn't worried, it was a 3 KW used setup I got for $200 with inverter and some cabling. Not going to take much to get a return on that. Much to my surprise the thing does a LOT better than I ever expected. He's all excited now and wants to Chop down some trees to reduce the shading. Unfortunately they are all 100 Ft gums and within striking distance of the house and sheds so I'll just keep an eye out and put up some more panels on the expansive roof area he has.

    Hope this helps and hasn't put you to sleep. thee is a lot to it but this covers a lot of what you need to be aware of. Again, just keep in mind YOUR situation and relate anything you are to how or if this relates to you and would be a benefit, no use or a draw back.

    Wonder if I should put all this in a YT vid and it would get any interest?

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    Quote Originally Posted by checkitout View Post
    I live in Vic and will be ordering a new solar system installation for my place in Melbourne as well as for my holiday home I have down at Inverloch.

    It looks like this is going to be a bit of a maze to work through, I am not in a rush, keen to study and get good advice of course first.

    Still doing more reading also noticed warranties will need to be a careful consideration, lifetime of an installation I expect to be reasonable and not something I need to have fixed every few years

    I note there is some experiences here and some related threads, will appreciate any info or recommendations from members !

    You live in Victoria, go with the cheapest clown you can find. Daniel Andrew's solar bonanza will be similar to Peter Garret's insulation bonanza.

    Jinko panels are a good mid range panel (mine still work after a number of years and most installers have been using them as a mid range panel for the last 2 years). Take your pick on an inverter. Dont worry about the installer, he wont be around in 3 years.

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    Quote Originally Posted by admin View Post
    You live in Victoria, go with the cheapest clown you can find. Daniel Andrew's solar bonanza will be similar to Peter Garret's insulation bonanza.

    Jinko panels are a good mid range panel (mine still work after a number of years and most installers have been using them as a mid range panel for the last 2 years). Take your pick on an inverter. Dont worry about the installer, he wont be around in 3 years.
    I disagree, my installer was, and they came to the party with warranty. It helps if the installer does not only do solar, the one I chose was a medium sized electrical company who expanded into the solar market - they are well known in the Townsville region and that was one of the reasons that I chose them, they weren't the cheapest but I'm getting what I paid for now.

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    I heard that there were physical limitations to what can be fed into the grid from installations, i.e. there are finite numbers of connection points or inward feeds within the power grid, or some component of it.

    Does anyone know of anything like this ?

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    apparently where I am I can only feed in 5kw/day max

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    Well I'm probably in the solar capital of Australia, every 2nd house has panels and we have 300+ days a year of full sun and I'm not limited, 29 kWh went to the grid today

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    Quote Originally Posted by LeroyPatrol View Post
    apparently where I am I can only feed in 5kw/day max
    That will be the system size limitation, not the amount of exported kw/h. I exported 44 the other day.

    Its only some ( or even 1 ?) Victorian distribution company that has the limit from memory.

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    The " common" Limitation is a 5kw inverter with 6.6 Kw of panels feeding it. Overclocking the inverter of up to 33% is permissible under most regs although I have a couple of my inverters carrying almost double their panel rating. Just means the inverters hit full power output much earlier and later in the day and also produce useful output on cloudy days.

    One has to understand the difference between Kw and kwh. KW is basically a potential in the case of panels and an instant measurement in the case of supply or consumption. KWH is a cumulative total over a period of time. A 5 Kw inverter at max output will be outputting 5 KW worth of electricity ( 5000W) at any given time. If it has done this for 1 Hour it will have produced 5 KW/ H If it does this for 5 Hours it will have produced 25 Kwh. %kw of panels has the POTENTIAL to produce 5 Kw under ideal test rated conditions. Most of the time they will be doing less than this for various reasons... heating of the panel, dust on the surface, lower than rated radiation levels from the sun, imperfect tilt / orientation etc. That is why over clocking the generally expensive inverter with relatively cheap panels is a good idea. as most installations are not at the best angle and orientation, adding more panels is a lot cheaper than putting them on brackets and frames to get them correct... which is a fallacy anyway because the sun is always moving so they will be correct for a few weeks a year no matter where you aim them.

    The more time you can get your inverter doing it's max output or the highest possible for the longest time, the more power you will get. The 3.6kw Inverter I have yesterday did 24 Kwh even though it was pretty cloudy most of the day. I doubt it ever hit max output at all but I know it was right up there producing good power all day thinks to being over rated on the panels. I think from memory that array has about 8Kw of panels on it.

    Light Cloud can actually produce high outputs.
    There is a thing could cloud edge effect. Basically as I understand it, the water droplets in the clouds act like little magnifying glasses and concentrate the suns rays. Same as you can get sunburnt on a cloudy day even though the sun itself isn't actually that intense. When the light hits the panels, the things can actually produce above their rating. I have seen this a few times and it can be both good and bad. It allows your setup to produce very good power but I have noticed repeatedly is also seems to push the voltage the panels produce way up even when the actual total output is far from maximum. I have no idea why this happens but it's a problem for me due to having my main array well overclocked and on the edge of what the wiring is rated to given it's long run. I don't know how But even thought the output from the panels is 200V below the inverters rating, the output side voltage seems to climb substantially. I have thought about re configuring my arrays from 8 panel strings to 6 to see if this helps but I make so much power even if the inverter bounces on and off for a few hours a day the effort is not worth the reward..... Although I am curious if it would make a difference.

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    Quote Originally Posted by george65 View Post
    One has to understand the difference between Kw and kwh. KW is basically a potential in the case of panels and an instant measurement in the case of supply or consumption. KWH is a cumulative total over a period of time. A 5 Kw inverter at max output will be outputting 5 KW worth of electricity ( 5000W) at any given time. If it has done this for 1 Hour it will have produced 5 KW/ H If it does this for 5 Hours it will have produced 25 Kwh.
    Yep, well explained, I believe thats where Leroy's confusion is.

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    well mine finally started producing today once i finally got the meter installed
    and am happy.

    6.3Kwh worth of panels

    As of 5pm Today's Energy 40.7kWh

    and just signed up with AGL

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    Thanks All - I have finally have got around to getting some quotes in for a Solar system installation

    This is a high level config of the first option (a more expensive one):
    Selectronics SPMC481-AU Inverter, Victron Regulator, 25 x 300w Canadian Panels
    3 x 3.3kW Batteries

    A second much much cheaper option is configured here:
    25 x 300w Canadian Panels, Solar Edge 6000-RW5 Inverter, Battery - RESU 400v 9.8kW Nominal Energy

    I know that there has been debate that batteries are not worth the money, regardless I still am considering this.

    It will be great to get feedback from members here for experience and call outs on brands, overall from what I have read and been told these components have good warranties.

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    Quote Originally Posted by checkitout View Post

    I know that there has been debate that batteries are not worth the money, regardless I still am considering this.
    For what reason?
    If you are grid tied and have any thought it will save you money, you are absolutely, positively, without exception... WRONG.

    They simply do not add up.

    I was crunching numbers for someone the other day and on the LOWEST battery cost I could find, The price of batteries would have to go down to at least 25% of what they are now ( That's $25 instead of $100, NOT 25% cheaper) or power would have to go up about 4 Times what it is now, ( so at least $1 per kw) to make them worthwhile.

    In most cases, you are NOT saving .30C kwh ( or whatever you pay) you are only saving the DIFFERENCE between what you pay and your FIT. If you are savvy, you can get .20C Kw Fit right now and although that may be limited to 2 years, good chance you'll be able to re negotiate it and even if you only get it 2 years, it just makes the ROI of batteries that much worse.

    You wouldn't be saving .30C Kwh you use at night, you's only be saving .10C because of what you lost on the FIT you would have got.
    And it's not even that good. You are going to loose some on the round trip efficiency of the battery as well meaning you have to put , say, 5 Kw in to get 4 Kw out. in that scenario you'd still loose the 5 KW Fit to save the 4 Kw of power cost.

    If you want backup, buy a generator OR proper Off Grid batteries.
    All these Trendy packaged batteries now are a Complete and utter crock.

    There are more options with solar now. You CAN put 10 or 50Kw worth of panels on your roof -IF- you limit your gris export to 5 or 10 KW, depending on what your extortionist supplier allows.
    What's the good of this? It means you can be running your pool pump, hot water, AC And weed growing room AND still be sending that 5KW back to the grid or at least not pulling from it. You would be using your own power and Getting a FIT which would make you more than batteries would ever save you.

    Seriously, If you have the money to buy batteries ( even under some Crock scheme) You have more than enough money to set up a system that WILL save you money rather than piss it up the wall on batteries that will never give a return and have no benefit you couldn't do better and cheaper with other approaches.

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    People a few doors down have had panels and battery back-up installed a few months ago - around $13k worth all up. At the time of installation I spoke with the owner and he was confident that the electricity bill would be zero.

    I am waiting until I think he will have had his first account and then go down and ask if the system is all he hoped it would be.
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    Think Solar Quotes are saying 15-20 years at present to recoup battery oulays, there advice sit and watch until prices fall
    There is a fine line between "Hobby" and "Madness"

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    Quote Originally Posted by Guiseppe View Post
    I am waiting until I think he will have had his first account and then go down and ask if the system is all he hoped it would be.
    Even if it were zero, Divide $13K by the bill you would have after solar which may be $200 or less and see how long it takes to recoup. Plus interest lost or paid etc.

    If you really want to stir him up, wait till the NEXT Billing cycle over winter has ended which should be about late August.
    It would be VERY unlikely his system will make enough power over winter to do much at all. He'll definitely get a lesser bill by having the solar but a zero bill I would find unlikely particularly if you are in VIC. Qld, better odds but still I'd rank as a long shot.


    Solar Quotes are saying 15-20 years at present to recoup battery oulays, there advice sit and watch until prices fall
    And the kicker is, it is EXTREMELY unlikely any battery system will last that long. If you have to replace it before it's paid off which is a virtual certainty, then you are double behind the 8 ball.

    Like I said, If one has the money/ borrowing capacity to purchase a battery, they would be FAR better off putting the battery cost to more panels and if need be installing a Limited feed back inverter. That would go a long way to covering your night time purchase cost and if you have a big solar array and use the power you have wisely by running things through the day rather than night, there is a very good chance you could MAKE money . Probably not a lot but the difference between loosing money and making anything is worthwhile enough.

    There is endless hype about batteries and some fall for it but the truth is just as solar Quotes says.

    I don't see batteries falling in price anytime soon. Every time I say this there are a bunch of people that come out with all sorts of rebuttals but i'm standing by my position. As the demand goes up, prices will be stable or go up too. The usual rebuttal is they were XXX so many years ago and now you can buy them for xxx less but that assumes a constantly falling price which never happens. The idea increased production is flawed too and the FACT is tesla put the price of their batteries up $1000 last year. That's a LOT different to the things getting cheaper.

    The best bang for the buck atm is the old fashioned lead acids, particularly in the form of a forklift pack.
    If you are grid connected they are still not economical but if you are off grid, they might be old tech but they are tried and proven and reliable.
    The thing with LA is even when they are done you get a substantial return on the things as scrap!

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