Solar panels….?

[Deleted member 26715]

Sounds like an installer that has jumped on the band wagon and not skilled in solar?

Good luck sorting - sounds a bit of a mess

One of the advantages of its a local company 5 miles & also a subsidiary of an even closer main company 3 miles so banging on door & talking to the directors is an option. One of which lives less than 1 mile away.

 

[jowwy]

One of the advantages of its a local company 5 miles & also a subsidiary of an even closer main company 3 miles so banging on door & talking to the directors is an option. One of which lives less than 1 mile away.

Id be starting to bang on that door

 

[Hebe]

Solar people have the part and are here again. Hopefully this will be job done today 🤞

 

[classic33]

Solar people have the part and are here again. Hopefully this will be job done today 🤞

It's Tuesday!

 

[Hebe]

It's Tuesday!

Yes! The part came in early and the job they were meant to be doing today wasn't ready for them. So they came here instead. I keep checking my solar app to see if the needle has moved off zero yet.

 

[Hebe]

Well it's in, and seems to be working better than the monitoring app, which currently shows us exporting to the grid several hours after sunset whilst simultaneously not generating anything. The installer is coming back tomorrow to talk us through it all. He did say that the monitoring app could take 24 hours to sort itself out.

 

[Hebe]

Finally 🤞
Our monitoring app was showing some really odd stuff last night after our system went live mid afternoon. It was showing us exporting power after dark (we weren’t). Our battery discharged itself during the day then recharged from the grid after dark, then stubbornly refused to discharge any power to run the house overnight (not how we wanted it to work). Then we lost all the metrics except for real time. I was not happy, given that solar was meant to be saving us money and yesterday’s electric usage from the grid was much higher than normal. The installer noticed the weirdness and arranged to come back round today to sort it all out. It all seems much better now. The battery is behaving as it should, the export is more sensible and the grid usage much lower. I wondered if our meter was broken this morning because the reading hadn’t changed in two hours, but it was just that the solar was covering all our usage. Tomorrow will be interesting as I don’t know if we’ll have enough sun to recharge the battery. Lots to learn!

Anyway. We have a SolarEdge system comprising 14 x 395Wp panels on a south facing roof, a 9.7kwh battery, and an inverter/EV charger. On a 2 year fix from last October, it’s a flat rate tariff not time of use. Plagued by supply chain issues - original installation date was back in June - and we’ve ended up with a slightly better specced system than we expected as a result. If everything is stable tomorrow I’ll call Ovo and see what we need to do to kick off registering for the export payments, though my plan is to use as much as we can ourselves. We need some paperwork from our installers too so I’m guessing it won’t be a fast process.

 

[mistyoptic]

Parents in Law had a system fitted under a Nottingham council scheme (fully funded for pensioners and other qualifying persons). It was a two section job on two aspects of the roof.

Surveyor just been back to check the installation. They’d already had “satisfaction surveys” and innocently said it was fine.

Surveyor discovered that only one bank of panels has been connected to the inverter, other side the wires are still coiled inside the roof 🙄

Quality eh?

 

[CXRAndy]

Parents in Law had a system fitted under a Nottingham council scheme (fully funded for pensioners and other qualifying persons). It was a two section job on two aspects of the roof.

Surveyor just been back to check the installation. They’d already had “satisfaction surveys” and innocently said it was fine.

Surveyor discovered that only one bank of panels has been connected to the inverter, other side the wires are still coiled inside the roof 🙄

Quality eh?

What Muppets. So no one did a proper sign off check

 

[Deleted member 26715]

But at least there was somebody coming round & checking, not just paying the invoice, the council at least needs credit for that.

 

[MrGrumpy]

So deposit paid on a 5Kw array and 10Kw battery. Used my CC just in case it all goes a bit wrong. Not sure when install will be but probably start of next year. Also put my loan request in to energy trust Scotland .

 

[Deleted member 26715]

So deposit paid on a 5Kw array and 10Kw battery. Used my CC just in case it all goes a bit wrong. Not sure when install will be but probably start of next year. Also put my loan request in to energy trust Scotland .

You'll be covered on the loan as well, you don't own it until the final payment is made so they will be fighting in your corner IF it didn't go well.

 

[Deleted member 26715]

Installer back today, he's already sorted out the required extra CT clamp so the inverter knows what is being generated by the PV & direct it accordingly. Not sure really how accurate these are, as logically I shouldn't be pulling anything from the grid if my load is only 0.32kW, I'm producing 2.37kW, the 0.06kW from the grid could be over a 5 minute time period

He's gone off to the wholesalers to get the changeover circuitry so potentially later today or tomorrow the only thing we will be waiting for is the DNO, oh & the bird netting which I have agreed can wait, as long as they don't mind waiting to get their last £1K

 

[Alex321]

Installer back today, he's already sorted out the required extra CT clamp so the inverter knows what is being generated by the PV & direct it accordingly. Not sure really how accurate these are, as logically I shouldn't be pulling anything from the grid if my load is only 0.32kW, I'm producing 2.37kW, the 0.06kW from the grid could be over a 5 minute time period

View attachment 666609

He's gone off to the wholesalers to get the changeover circuitry so potentially later today or tomorrow the only thing we will be waiting for is the DNO, oh & the bird netting which I have agreed can wait, as long as they don't mind waiting to get their last £1K

Your system has to check that there is energy available from the grid, and that seems to draw a small current.

Mine has shown an import of between 0.28kWh and 0.49kWh every day since we have had the battery, even though there have not been any days we have exhausted the battery.

 

[Buck]

As I understand it, you may pull from the grid when you get a spike in demand and the inverter is not able to react quickly enough to pull from battery or solar so it “defaults” to grid