Solar for Beginners [ask your questions here]

You would think if they thought that they would have replaced it during the installation.

Yep, just noticed you said it was from Givenery. The installer should still know if it is suitable though not just be ok.

25A at 235v is 5875w. 32A is 7520w.

Maybe you had a sizing issue going on. What is the inverter size and what is the panel size in kW?

Breakers have a "trip curve" where they won't necessarily trip when the current hits 25A on a 25A breaker, they will only trip when there is a rapid over-current or a moderate sustained overcurrent.

Anyway be interesting to see if a better sized breaker fixes the issues, or is it a leakage issue.

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Thanks folks, I'm giving up being detective and I'll wait for the installer to sort it. I've 7kwp 2 strings, 4/3 split. Not sure on cable size. Is leakage and easy thing to find?

someone on the givenergy forum has removed the rcbo and replaced with an mcb.. and has an rcbo on any circuits fed from the inverter i.e. the eps circuit.. is that a 'safe' solution?

Good result, at least you have the extra panel now. Any chance of them putting up the other 1 you wanted when doing it? Paying them of course for the second 1.

Carbon copy of what happened to me. Thankfully I coped it on the install day and they put up one FOC.

Poor form

" I don't think they did it intentionally "

Ah come on, of course they did. I doubt they set out to deceive you but they knew on the day they didnt have the right panels .

hi folks,

while waiting for my installer to send an electrician to check out the rcbo tripping on my inverter. I have a question on the eps wiring circuit. This was installed by a separate electrician and he followed the givenergy guidelines. We have a 10amp rcbo on the eps out from the inverter and then onto a socket. Givenergy said to add an earth to the eps circuit. This bit is a little confusing. The inverter is already earthed - and the eps has a earth/live/neutral post which we wired the circuit to. The electrician wired the earth from the circuit to a nearby earth block which has a path back to the earth rod etc to the rcbo earth

I suppose im wondering if i've a 'double' earth situation going on - and why would the additional earth be required? Could this additional earth be causing the rcbo to trip?

In case anyone is wondering if im diy ing this .. im not.. not touching anything but trying to figure stuff out as the first thing im guessing the installer will point to is the eps socket. The trouble is the rcb has only tripped twice in a month so its very hard to re create the issue. When it does happen the rcbo on the eps does not trip.

Someone suggested this earlier in the thread but should there be a relay on the eps circuit earth that is only open during a power cut? When everything is operational the eps would earth via the inverter to the the consumer board to earth rod, and in power cut via separate earth back to the consumer board to the earth rod (skipping the inverter)

actually thinking this through again - i dont think we need the earth from the inverter at all to the rcbo on the eps circuit - it has a dedicated earth back to the earth rod anyway so we can potentially disconnect that and see if makes any difference.. i suggested that to my electrician and he agreed but he also thinks its unlikely to be causing the tripping..

Cheers,

Mick

Yep it doesnt help that the instructions are uk ish specific. I've asked givenergy if 2 earths are needed to the eps circuit (assuming its earthed via the inverter) we have a dedicated earth on the eps socket back to earth rod which to me would make the earth path via the inverter to the circuit redundant anyway... its an always on socket so powering our router/modem and they set it in 'UPS mode' on the givenergy side so there's no interruption of power during a power cut. Havent had a trip since Sunday and its frustrating as there's been wind/rain/hail and sunshine since. So water ingress seems less likely...

am i a dummy?

my house sits in the middle of 0.9 acres with plenty of space for a ground mount array.

i was planning on having an 7.79kW array with a 5kW solis hybrid inverter (just below the recommended max voltage), however now that the cost of buying solar equipment is coming down i'm getting greedy and i'm thinking about expanding the set up.

so with that in mind what are the pitfalls with this idea (ignore planning permission constraints for now)...

installing a 14.76kWp array (36 x 410w panels) with two inverters, inverter 1 would be the solis 5kW hybrid inverter linked to 7.79kWp as previously planned with a second dumb 5kW inverter linked to the remaining 6.97kWp.

inverter 1 would be responsible for charging batteries and supplying power to the house and eventually two EV's. inverter 2 would be responsible for the export side plus house/EV's.

with a system that size PVGIS is forecasting the system would generate 567kWh in december, the worst month for generation. that's a sizeable amount of power which in cahoots with a battery would cover a sizeable proportion of the expected demand.

i would like to try and maximise export (excess) in the spring, summer and autumn with the credit going towards the winter.

cost breakdown

36 panels = €3,748

5kW hybrid inverter = €900 (already bought)

5kW non-hybrid inverter = €700

DIY tilting ground mount = €800

cables etc. = €600

5kWh battery initially (pylontech US5000C) = €1500

subtotal = €8,247, call it €8.5k.

plus sparky = €10k total give or take.

i would have all the hardware installed myself with the sparky needed for commissioning and signoff.

am i a complete dummy, am i missing something or is the expanded plan actually feasible?

p.s. the house is in a rural location and fully electric. two EV's will be on the drive by January 2025.

even if they were all facing due south?

OK i can manage that, thanks. the back of the house faces west / south west so a roof mount for the array feeding inverter 2 is a possibility i guess. plenty of food for thought.

only inverter 2 which is 5kW would be set to export, inverter 1 would be set to focus on the battery and providing power to the house and EV's.

in that case i might stick to the original plan and next year add on the second array/inverter.