Domestic solar PV quotes 2018

antoinolachtnai

It looks like people have done work on this before, for example: http://60chequersavenue.net/wordpress/2017/10/solar-and-stats/

As a matter of interest, can the app be used to make the unit discharge?

unkel

Seanp92 wrote: »

So I’m 2 weeks in to my new PV system running , 4.2kw Solis 5kw inverter with 2.4kw battery and solar iboost diveter , all together including vat was 11,180euro.

I hope you got the EUR3,800 grant, so a net cost to you of a bit over EUR7k?

Seanp92

unkel wrote: »

I hope you got the EUR3,800 grant, so a net cost to you of a bit over EUR7k?

Absolutely got the grant !

john10010860

Hello everyone, I have been thinking of getting a 4kw system with a 2.1kw battery with the hotwater iboost also for the last 6 months. I have gotten two quotes before grant of €9400 & 9700 all included. I am in the Limerick Tipp border does anyone have recommendations of installers for me thanks ( can private pm if not allowed to mention companys in public). Thanks again.

Stefs_42

quick question for ye tech guys.
What is the difference betweed grid tied and off grid hybrid systems? Ive heard that off grid systems are better. Is that so?

Ive been quoted for the following:
10x Denim 355Wp All-Black mono crystalline PV module
1x Solis 3.0 KW single phase hybrid grid tied string inverter
1x 20A AC isolator
1x 3.5 kWP + 1x 2.4 kWP Li-Ion pylontech battery pack
1x santon fireman switch

unkel

Stefs_42 wrote: »

quick question for ye tech guys.
What is the difference betweed grid tied and off grid hybrid systems? Ive heard that off grid systems are better. Is that so?

Off grid is for when your house has no connection to the grid and it is prohibitively expensive to get connected. Like a very remote cottage. Or the dwelling is only occupied now and then like a holiday home. Or you are a prepper, doom is coming and you want to be self-sufficient

Most people are better off with a grid tied system...

How much are you quoted for above system, before and after the grant?

Stefs_42

9436 e before grant
potential grant 3450

Buddy83

wexfordman2 wrote: »

5.85 kwp solar (18 panels)
5kw soltaro hybrid inverter
6kwh battery
Eddi hot water diverter
Ber

12k b4 grant, 8,200 after grant.

Could you PM me the name of your installer? Thanks!

niallers1

Seanp92 wrote: »

Hi all,

So I’m 2 weeks in to my new PV system running , 4.2kw Solis 5kw inverter with 2.4kw battery and solar iboost diveter , all together including vat was 11,180euro. So far I’m very happy with its
Thanks

Does the solar iboost work ok with the battery or does it see the battery as excess PV generation?

i'm thinking of getting this diverter if I picked it up cheap enough but won't bother if it drains the battery?

I have similiar set up with Pylontech battery but have 2 x 2.4kw batteries but even with the battery I expect to give the grid alot of Kwh from April to September.

Evd-Burner

niallers1 wrote: »

Does the solar iboost work ok with the battery or does it see the battery as excess PV generation?

i'm thinking of getting this diverter if I picked it up cheap enough but won't bother if it drains the battery?

I have similiar set up with Pylontech battery but have 2 x 2.4kw batteries but even with the battery I expect to give the grid alot of Kwh from April to September.

Hi Niallers1, see the below reply from quentingargan when I asked something similar. Battery would not be depleted.

quentingargan wrote: »

Nope - the discharge time is for exporting from batteries. Something you don't want to do.

I don't know about Zappi. It works with iBoost. The issue is the "export threshold" - the amount of power the clamp will allow to export before it kick in. On this unit, the threshold is 70 watts. The iBoost cuts in at about 100 watts, so it is fine and the battery takes priority. Other diversion units cut in at 50 watts, so the battery ends up filling the immersion. You want to be sure any diverter you use, heat or car charging, has a theshold of 100 watts or more.

unkel

As you can imagine, this works with the myenergi family of products too. PV should go to house first, then any excess to battery, then to car (Zappi), then to immersion (Eddi), any left overs then go to the grid

Water John

Can could definitely be called a priorities switch.

Rodstar028

Can you please pm me number also please wexfordman

quentingargan

Just catching up on a few points further back on this.

Diverters will work OK as long as the clamp on the diverter is less sensitive than the clamp for the hybrid inverter. With Solar iBoost and Solis hybrid, this works OK, but I have heard of combinations where it doesn't. Solis sensitivity is about 70w and iboost about 100w so all good.

Someone else mentioned charge control on Pylon batteries being restricted to 10A. This is the BMS over-writing the inverter settings and happens when the batteries want to manage cell balancing. It will flip back to 25A per battery.

Seanp92

Hi All,

Anyone any suggestions for a suitable heater that would work when exporting excess, have a solar iboost doing the hot water but would like to see if I could benefit more with the excess generated ?

Thanks

niallers1

Seanp92 wrote: »

Hi All,

Anyone any suggestions for a suitable heater that would work when exporting excess, have a solar iboost doing the hot water but would like to see if I could benefit more with the excess generated ?

Thanks

Most excess will occur in warmer months so probably low likleyhood of needing a heater. (Unless you need heat for growing plants )

Sending excess to battery or hot water tank would be more useful.

quentingargan

Seanp92 wrote: »

Hi All,

Anyone any suggestions for a suitable heater that would work when exporting excess, have a solar iboost doing the hot water but would like to see if I could benefit more with the excess generated ?

Thanks

You can use any domestic heater or storage heater. You will need to use a relay to redirect the surplus to the second heater. You need the coil of the relay powered via a thermostat.

quentingargan

niallers1 wrote: »

Most excess will occur in warmer months so probably low likleyhood of needing a heater. (Unless you need heat for growing plants )

Sending excess to battery or hot water tank would be more useful.

Agree totally on reflection. Using solar for space heating is a waste. What a pity we dream up all these strategies to self-consume all the power. It would be much better of electricity providers were forced to buy our surplus power and preserve the primary energy value that electricity has. (it would be environmentally better to export your surplus electricity and use gas to heat your water).

unkel

quentingargan wrote: »

Someone else mentioned charge control on Pylon batteries being restricted to 10A. This is the BMS over-writing the inverter settings and happens when the batteries want to manage cell balancing. It will flip back to 25A per battery.

They said they never saw more than 500W going into or out of the battery. Which means the max charge / discharge rates must have been set to 10A at the inverter, surely?

quentingargan

unkel wrote: »

They said they never saw more than 500W going into or out of the battery. Which means the max charge / discharge rates must have been set to 10A at the inverter, surely?

I am told it happens for a while, but should be OK by now. The battery BMS will always overrule the firmware on the inverter (or it should) to ensure long battery life. It happens when batteries are cold, or if they go over 51V in the case of Pylon

billgibney

Hi , I'm wondering if anyone can explain to me why they're getting solar, I was looking at electric Ireland's site and figured with grants etc a basic system would cost around €4000.
This would save me about 240 a year on my Energy bills meaning that it would take about 17 years to recoup my costs. Why would anyone do this? I'm also told that they won't save much environmentally either.

randombar

quentingargan wrote: »

I am told it happens for a while, but should be OK by now. The battery BMS will always overrule the firmware on the inverter (or it should) to ensure long battery life. It happens when batteries are cold, or if they go over 51V in the case of Pylon

There was a limit of 10A set on the batteries all right. I went in to change in the inverter but it never saved the change for some reason.

unkel wrote: »

As you can imagine, this works with the myenergi family of products too. PV should go to house first, then any excess to battery, then to car (Zappi), then to immersion (Eddi), any left overs then go to the grid

Did some testing over the weekend. So the battery was charging away taking the excess up to 500W, if the excess above that was >= 1400 then the zappi would kick in which meant the inverter thought that was the load the house required so the battery stopped charging

rolion

quentingargan wrote: »

You can use any domestic heater or storage heater. You will need to use a relay to redirect the surplus to the second heater. You need the coil of the relay powered via a thermostat.

Not quite sure i follow you here...

If you power a heater of lets say 1Kw via a relay that is controlled by a thermostat.. doesnt means that the heather will take 1,000W of the circuit irespective of the PV electricity surplus or avialability !?

The beauty of the solar diverter is that is monitoring the surplus and diverts to a resistive load hw much it needs determined by the smart algorythm and within the variation so that not exceeds the generated PV power.

With a heater on a relay,it will just switch on and off but heater take 1,000w constant and not detemined by the diverter.

Only viable solution is to use 1st output from the iboost for main cylinder and connect a resistive element "such as a heater" to the 2nd output,when available .

Im working on a setup of pre-heater for the main tank.
Fit a 150l cylinder,main feed goes in and output to input of main cylinder
Connects 2nd output to the immersion of the pre-heater tank.
When main cylinder comes "Hot water/Hot tank" it will stop heating it and divert any electricity to immersion in "pre-heat" cylinder.
Just doing the maths to see if i dont disturb any thermodynamics laws by changing temperatures in the main cylinder...

unkel

GaryCocs wrote: »

There was a limit of 10A set on the batteries all right. I went in to change in the inverter but it never saved the change for some reason.



Did some testing over the weekend. So the battery was charging away taking the excess up to 500W, if the excess above that was >= 1400 then the zappi would kick in which meant the inverter thought that was the load the house required so the battery stopped charging

Still not quite right though, is it? The battery charging should take priority over the car charging.

And pretty disgraceful that your installer set the battery charge rate to 10A instead of 25A. That alone would cause you to never to make your money back on the battery system, even after the grant

Rodstar028

Has anybody on this received quotes from a company called NES they are on seai website but cannot get much info on them, just checking maybe someone here have infi on them or dealt with them and can verify their quality.

niall_eidw

Guys,

I have been interested in deploying Solar since about 2002. Back then there was a Solar show on in Lord Edward St, Dublin. Unfortunately at the time the only people promoting Solar were German nationals living in the West of Ireland.

I believe that Solar is a lifestyle choice and I’m not trying to be namby pamby about it. What really annoys me is the fact that Solar has always been promoted on the basis of ROI. I believe that this argument is fundamentally wrong and gives rise to false expectations. For instance you can go onto Apples website and but a laptop for over €3,300.00 or into DID and buy a Samsung TV for €5,750.00. Nobody is jumping up and down about the ROI here.

The people who want and buy Solar seem to have a grasp of what it will do for them and their future.

I hope that those arguing over ROI can see beyond that, for instance maybe in the future the cost of Electricity or Gas will incrase, or the ESB can no longer generate power from fossil fuels, who knows…

Honestly I’m not a tree hugger… But I'am getting close to Solar implementation..

Evd-Burner

niall_eidw wrote: »

Guys,

I have been interested in deploying Solar since about 2002. Back then there was a Solar show on in Lord Edward St, Dublin. Unfortunately at the time the only people promoting Solar were German nationals living in the West of Ireland.

I believe that Solar is a lifestyle choice and I’m not trying to be namby pamby about it. What really annoys me is the fact that Solar has always been promoted on the basis of ROI. I believe that this argument is fundamentally wrong and gives rise to false expectations. For instance you can go onto Apples website and but a laptop for over €3,300.00 or into DID and buy a Samsung TV for €5,750.00. Nobody is jumping up and down about the ROI here.

The people who want and buy Solar seem to have a grasp of what it will do for them and their future.

I hope that those arguing over ROI can see beyond that, for instance maybe in the future the cost of Electricity or Gas will incrase, or the ESB can no longer generate power from fossil fuels, who knows…

Honestly I’m not a tree hugger… But I'am getting close to Solar implementation..

A lot of people see it as a long term investment, much the same as investing in stocks etc. Hence all of the focus on payback, there are probably a lot more people that will get solar as the ROI time reduces, the extra demand will create more competition and further reduce the ROI time.

unkel

Well said, niall_eidw. Thankfully, solar PV is now so cheap, everyone should really plaster their roofs with it imho.

conor_mc

unkel wrote: »

Well said, niall_eidw. Thankfully, solar PV is now so cheap, everyone should really plaster their roofs with it imho.

*Half* their roof!!

unkel

conor_mc wrote: »

*Half* their roof!!

Nope the whole roof! :cool: If only it was allowed from a planning permission and maximum power generation point of view

Even a north facing roof at a highish pitch would still generate considerable PV output (about half of a purely south facing roof)

KCross

niall_eidw wrote: »

Guys,

I have been interested in deploying Solar since about 2002. Back then there was a Solar show on in Lord Edward St, Dublin. Unfortunately at the time the only people promoting Solar were German nationals living in the West of Ireland.

I believe that Solar is a lifestyle choice and I’m not trying to be namby pamby about it. What really annoys me is the fact that Solar has always been promoted on the basis of ROI. I believe that this argument is fundamentally wrong and gives rise to false expectations. For instance you can go onto Apples website and but a laptop for over €3,300.00 or into DID and buy a Samsung TV for €5,750.00. Nobody is jumping up and down about the ROI here.

The people who want and buy Solar seem to have a grasp of what it will do for them and their future.

I hope that those arguing over ROI can see beyond that, for instance maybe in the future the cost of Electricity or Gas will incrase, or the ESB can no longer generate power from fossil fuels, who knows…

Honestly I’m not a tree hugger… But I'am getting close to Solar implementation..

Not looking for an argument but why havent you done it yet? Whats holding you back? Its the money, right?!... i.e. ROI?!

I think we are all getting closer to having Solar PV.. but not at any cost. It has to make some sense financially.

Rodstar028

Quote received for 4kw panels and 2.4kw pylontec battery plus water diversion unit panels are 300w monocristalline and inverter is solis price 9000 incl vat fitted and commissioned how would that seem or quote 2 with 3kw of German crystalline panels with 5kw inverter and 5.8kw battery plus 3kw diverter for 10596 incl vat I have not much knowledge of this but to help have esb bill of 180 per two months and want hot water from april to end of September with system. Which is better option. Reason for bigger inverter was for future addition of panels your comments or advice would be welcome on next step

Evd-Burner

Rodstar028 wrote: »

Quote received for 4kw panels and 2.4kw pylontec battery plus water diversion unit panels are 300w monocristalline and inverter is solis price 9000 incl vat fitted and commissioned how would that seem or quote 2 with 3kw of German crystalline panels with 5kw inverter and 5.8kw battery plus 3kw diverter for 10596 incl vat I have not much knowledge of this but to help have esb bill of 180 per two months and want hot water from april to end of September with system. Which is better option. Reason for bigger inverter was for future addition of panels your comments or advice would be welcome on next step

Depends, do those prices include the seai grant?

Rodstar028

Grant will be taken off those prices after.

wexfordman2

Rodstar028 wrote: »

Quote received for 4kw panels and 2.4kw pylontec battery plus water diversion unit panels are 300w monocristalline and inverter is solis price 9000 incl vat fitted and commissioned how would that seem or quote 2 with 3kw of German crystalline panels with 5kw inverter and 5.8kw battery plus 3kw diverter for 10596 incl vat I have not much knowledge of this but to help have esb bill of 180 per two months and want hot water from april to end of September with system. Which is better option. Reason for bigger inverter was for future addition of panels your comments or advice would be welcome on next step

6kw solar, 5kw hybrid inverter, 5kwh battery, ber assesment and hot water diverted +2k inc vat before grant, so cost of 8,200

4kw solar with 3.6kw inverter and 5kwh battery, ber ajd hit water diverter, 11k inc vat before grant, so cost 7200

I went with option a, but those are the prices i got for comparison.

unkel

wexfordman2 wrote: »

6kw solar, 5kw hybrid inverter, 5kwh battery, ber assesment and hot water diverted +2k inc vat before grant, so cost of 8,200

Nice :cool:

niall_eidw

KCross wrote: »

Not looking for an argument but why havent you done it yet? Whats holding you back? Its the money, right?!... i.e. ROI?!

I think we are all getting closer to having Solar PV.. but not at any cost. It has to make some sense financially.

To be honest I dropped the ball on it... As somebody pointed out "its for the future". Who knows what the cost of energy will be then...

rolion

Whatever way you do it...make sure it brings money to you and not savings for the Mr Grid,aka The System !

Where are my Fcuking Carbon Tax money when i daily feed in the grid kilowatts after kilowatts !!! Oh,wait,we will increase the charges and the taxes ... but no FIT 'couse we will have to pay the house owner...now,without the FIT and with PV grants,we can take all the fcukign free diverted electricty ... and we can aford to charge them as well for their own systems ! And we can have a laugh too...

So,i'm sitting here looking at my real time reports and asking...where is the common sense and financially viable solution !??? In my pocket or in their fatty bonuses !?? Cause the environment gets fcuked irespective if I, the small guy, does or not something...



HALF OF MY PV GENERATED TODAY GOES FREE TO MR GRID !!!

Yew

I'm new to Boards.ie. I have a small semi-d in Galway with a suitable south facing roof but only enough area for 7-8 panels and very in solar pv for the purpose of reducing BER now at C1.

I have received quotations from an installer in Cork for 2.4kwp 8 panel system, with ? premium van der valk mounting for 4096 (inclusive 1400 grant and VAT). Pricey? Any concern about post install roof issues, leak etc?

Another installer in Dublin has quoted 4220 for 8 panels excluding VAT, excluding grant which works out to 3389 inclusive VAT and grant.

From what I've read on this thread and my own enquiries, the installer for kceire and wexfordman2 (thank you) are about the lowest?

I plan a minimum (panel prices on the down trend) SEAI compliant panel install and piecemeal Eddi, Zappi, battery upgrade, perhaps DIY, how hard can it be?

I'm new to Boards.ie. I have a small semi-d in Galway with a suitable south facing roof but only enough area for 7-8 panels and very in solar pv for the purpose of reducing BER now at C1.

I have received quotations from an installer in Cork for 2.4kwp 8 panel system, with ? premium van der valk mounting for 4096 (inclusive 1400 grant and VAT). Pricey? Any concern about post install roof issues, leak etc?

Another installer in Dublin has quoted 4220 for 8 panels excluding VAT, excluding grant which works out to 3389 inclusive VAT and grant.

From what I've read on this thread and my own enquiries, the installer for kceire and wexfordman2 (thank you) are about the lowest?

I plan a minimum SEAI compliant panel install and piecemeal Eddi, Zappi, battery upgrade, increasing panels later. (perhaps DIY, how hard can it be?)

denismc

Yew wrote: »

I'm new to Boards.ie. I have a small semi-d in Galway with a suitable south facing roof but only enough area for 7-8 panels and very in solar pv for the purpose of reducing BER now at C1.

I have received quotations from an installer in Cork for 2.4kwp 8 panel system, with ? premium van der valk mounting for 4096 (inclusive 1400 grant and VAT). Pricey? Any concern about post install roof issues, leak etc?

Another installer in Dublin has quoted 4220 for 8 panels excluding VAT, excluding grant which works out to 3389 inclusive VAT and grant.

From what I've read on this thread and my own enquiries, the installer for kceire and wexfordman2 (thank you) are about the lowest?

I plan a minimum (panel prices on the down trend) SEAI compliant panel install and piecemeal Eddi, Zappi, battery upgrade, perhaps DIY, how hard can it be?

I'm new to Boards.ie. I have a small semi-d in Galway with a suitable south facing roof but only enough area for 7-8 panels and very in solar pv for the purpose of reducing BER now at C1.

I have received quotations from an installer in Cork for 2.4kwp 8 panel system, with ? premium van der valk mounting for 4096 (inclusive 1400 grant and VAT). Pricey? Any concern about post install roof issues, leak etc?

Another installer in Dublin has quoted 4220 for 8 panels excluding VAT, excluding grant which works out to 3389 inclusive VAT and grant.

From what I've read on this thread and my own enquiries, the installer for kceire and wexfordman2 (thank you) are about the lowest?

I plan a minimum SEAI compliant panel install and piecemeal Eddi, Zappi, battery upgrade, increasing panels later. (perhaps DIY, how hard can it be?)

I had 8 panels (2.1kWp) installed last year for just 3200, this was before the current grants were available, from your quotes it looks like installers are just using the grant to bump up their prices.
Regards leaking roofs I have had no issues and I haven't heard of anyone complaining of such.
You mentioned that your BER is C1, I would have thought investing in improving the heat retention of your house a better use of your money.

Installing a diverter only makes sense if you have someone using lots of hot water during the day or if you have a large hot water tank to store all your hot water, a standard 120lt cylinder only needs 3-4 kWh to reach 60C, and then the rest of your surplus will get exported.

unkel

denismc wrote: »

Installing a diverter only makes sense if you have someone using lots of hot water during the day or if you have a large hot water tank to store all your hot water, a standard 120lt cylinder only needs 3-4 kWh to reach 60C, and then the rest of your surplus will get exported.

And only if you have a medium or large PV setup. Minimum 3-4kW for it to make any financial sense at all (provided you already have an efficient oil or gas boiler in the house)

If you are getting the €600 subsidy for a car charger, a smart charger like a Zappi (€585 + install costs) makes a lot more sense than an immersion diverter

Stefs_42

denismc wrote: »

I had 8 panels (2.1kWp) installed last year for just 3200, this was before the current grants were available, from your quotes it looks like installers are just using the grant to bump up their prices.
Regards leaking roofs I have had no issues and I haven't heard of anyone complaining of such.
You mentioned that your BER is C1, I would have thought investing in improving the heat retention of your house a better use of your money.

Installing a diverter only makes sense if you have someone using lots of hot water during the day or if you have a large hot water tank to store all your hot water, a standard 120lt cylinder only needs 3-4 kWh to reach 60C, and then the rest of your surplus will get exported.

yes heat loss is a big thing! BER can be easily improved by pumping walls and replacing windows from single, to double glazing, who can afford to tripple
changing your boiler to newer model also helps.
I for instance flushed away about 6 grand 8 years ago into my house and bumped my BER from D to B2.
Now with PV install hoping to bump it to A

Yew

denismc wrote: »

I had 8 panels (2.1kWp) installed last year for just 3200, this was before the current grants were available, from your quotes it looks like installers are just using the grant to bump up their prices.
Regards leaking roofs I have had no issues and I haven't heard of anyone complaining of such.
You mentioned that your BER is C1, I would have thought investing in improving the heat retention of your house a better use of your money.

Installing a diverter only makes sense if you have someone using lots of hot water during the day or if you have a large hot water tank to store all your hot water, a standard 120lt cylinder only needs 3-4 kWh to reach 60C, and then the rest of your surplus will get exported.

It was a fairly aged, `leaky‘ house with a D1 rating before cavity insulation raised the BER to C1. I only considered low to medium cost strategies with high impact to BER rating to raise property value.

If I understand correctly, hot water diversion doesn’t offer enough of a reservoir for excess production to offset installation cost with a standard cylinder?

Yew

unkel wrote: »

And only if you have a medium or large PV setup. Minimum 3-4kW for it to make any financial sense at all (provided you already have an efficient oil or gas boiler in the house)

If you are getting the €600 subsidy for a car charger, a smart charger like a Zappi (€585 + install costs) makes a lot more sense than an immersion diverter

Unless there is another BEV charging during the day, a zappi makes even less of an argument vs eddi?

Yew

Stefs_42 wrote: »

yes heat loss is a big thing! BER can be easily improved by pumping walls and replacing windows from single, to double glazing, who can afford to tripple
changing your boiler to newer model also helps.
I for instance flushed away about 6 grand 8 years ago into my house and bumped my BER from D to B2.
Now with PV install hoping to bump it to A

Have you figured out the relationship between number of panels/kwp installed vs improvement in BER?

Yew

unkel wrote: »

And only if you have a medium or large PV setup. Minimum 3-4kW for it to make any financial sense at all (provided you already have an efficient oil or gas boiler in the house)

If you are getting the €600 subsidy for a car charger, a smart charger like a Zappi (€585 + install costs) makes a lot more sense than an immersion diverter

In a 2kwp situation, the max my roof will take whilst remaining seai compliant, pointless to install either?

unkel

Most EVs can be limited to 6A charging. This is about 1.4kW. Presuming the rest of your house draws only a few hundred watt, it means you can charge your car (trickle charge) in bright sunlight with your 2kwp system. If you go for say 8 * 320W panels, you'll have over 2.5kwp

To give you an idea, I have a 3.8kwp setup and I saw over 3.6kW begin produced yesterday early afternoon. In March. Not bad.

And charging your car with your solar during the day saves you the 8c/kWh it would normally cost to do it at the night rate. So the savings are quite good. Heating your water however can be done with gas or oil which costs only 4c/kWh and you would have to pay for a solar diverter, which does not attract any subsidies (unlike a home car charger for which you will get €600 subsidy)

Evd-Burner

unkel wrote: »

Heating your water however can be done with gas or oil which costs only 4c/kWh and you would have to pay for a solar diverter, which does not attract any subsidies (unlike a home car charger for which you will get €600 subsidy)

When I finally have my own place (hopefully this year) I'll start looking at what is feasible etc.

I have an electric car already so I would likely sell it to the missus to get a grant and put the zappi in. I got my leaf second hand before the grant came out. If I go solar I'd hopefully go for about 4kwh on the roof and backed up with either 2.4 or 4.8kwh worth of battery. I was thinking of doing some scripting that can pull data from the inverter, battery and zappi (not 100% on data pull from zappi yet), depending on the time of year and daylight hours id use a controllable relay to power on and off the immersion. As I can't control the power I would end up using the battery but I'd put in triggers to turn off the relay if the battery went below a certain threshold etc. The relay would only cost about 50 or so and the brother is an electrician so he could fit it.

What do you think?

wexfordman2

Evd-Burner wrote: »

When I finally have my own place (hopefully this year) I'll start looking at what is feasible etc.

I have an electric car already so I would likely sell it to the missus to get a grant and put the zappi in. I got my leaf second hand before the grant came out. If I go solar I'd hopefully go for about 4kwh on the roof and backed up with either 2.4 or 4.8kwh worth of battery. I was thinking of doing some scripting that can pull data from the inverter, battery and zappi (not 100% on data pull from zappi yet), depending on the time of year and daylight hours id use a controllable relay to power on and off the immersion. As I can't control the power I would end up using the battery but I'd put in triggers to turn off the relay if the battery went below a certain threshold etc. The relay would only cost about 50 or so and the brother is an electrician so he could fit it.

What do you think?

The relay control of your immersion has it's limits compared to commercially available units.like the eddi.

The problem.with your relay solution, is that in the on state, your immersion will draw full power, say 3kw, so you would need to manage your relay to switch in when you are generating an excess of 3 kw. If you are only generating an excess of 1.5kw, then it's either wasted back to the grid, Or you draw an additional 1.5kw from the grid to power your 3kw immersion.

A system like the eddi, only pushes your excess to your immersion,.so if you are producing.only 1.5kw excess, it will send just that 1.5kw to.the immersion.


I like the idea of.scripting some smart control, I run an openhab system in my house controlling lights add, and would love to pull in inverter and battery data to put some.level.of.control on appliances etc based on excess power and battery status

Evd-Burner

wexfordman2 wrote: »

The relay control of your immersion has it's limits compared to commercially available units.like the eddi.

The problem.with your relay solution, is that in the on state, your immersion will draw full power, say 3kw, so you would need to manage your relay to switch in when you are generating an excess of 3 kw. If you are only generating an excess of 1.5kw, then it's either wasted back to the grid, Or you draw an additional 1.5kw from the grid to power your 3kw immersion.

A system like the eddi, only pushes your excess to your immersion,.so if you are producing.only 1.5kw excess, it will send just that 1.5kw to.the immersion.


I like the idea of.scripting some smart control, I run an openhab system in my house controlling lights add, and would love to pull in inverter and battery data to put some.level.of.control on appliances etc based on excess power and battery status

Yeah I've thought of all of the above and that is why I would set parameters to switch the relay off if either the PV production drops below say 2kwh or if the battery is more than 50% depleted as I would expect the immersion to draw battery power, I would also need to look at the time of year and day for deciding when to turn the relay on so that the battery will be recharged for use of electricity that be offset at the day rate.

It may be possible to see what is being imported from the grid via the inverter and if it goes above a threshold I could switch the immersion off.

Right now it's just an idea and I haven't delved into the detail however I just don't see the point in those commercial units. The payback is just way too long, that's if they don't fail in that timeframe!

With the Eddi I would need to divert 11mwh before I'd break even!!!