Solar for Beginners [ask your questions here]

Cheers, I ended up finding the thread I was thinking of in the Bargain Alerts forum.

When taking Dual Fuel into account, gas being our main source of heat in the winter, Bord Gais energy EV dual fuel seems to come up a bit better, their gas rate is cheaper than Energia's but their buy back rate not as good, and only credit twice a year.

Seems to be in the ball park. I got a quote of 4.2kw for 4,500 not sure it includes a BER so the above looks good.

I am sure its been asked but its a huge thread.

I got solar installed with a 5kw battery. Its set to self consumption mode now.

I have the option for TOU which would charge it from the grid at my cheap rate between 2 and 4pm , I assume this is a winter mode option when the solar is not doing much. When should I change it?

I have 2 options on the TOU page which I don't understand

Priority of excess PV energy: Feed to grid or charge

Allowed AC charge power KW: Does ESB Networks have a limit?

Thanks.

You are exempt up to €400 per person on the bill so just add any eligible person to the account to avail of more, some here have 4/5 people named on their accounts.

Would only be myself. Was considering a cheap system as I may sell in 5 years. Being taxed on FIT in my mind makes a battery a no brainer. Surmised that the marginal increase in value of the property might offset any savings not recouped on the system, not really possible now.

Honestly I'd be happy if they removed it altogether, at least then we'd all be on a level playing field.

Are installs any cheaper if you went down the route of avoiding feeding back to grid at all?

Edit: This may seem counter intuitive on a Solar thread, but has anyone simply foregone solar altogether and hooked up a battery to their house to charge it overnight on their EV rate?

Is there any device there to measure how much solar can be generated in a particular location by leaving it there for maybe 12 months.

Is there a minimum and maximum amount of power that can be sent to an EV?

For example I'm looking into EVs and I noticed today our panels were generating 6.3kWh at one point and the house was using 0.5kWh and the battery was full.

Yes single phase and 6kw Solis inverter

Hi all,

Just started the search for a solar panel install.

First quote 14k for 20x 435 longi, 5kw solis hybrid and a 5kwh weco battery.

The 20 panels are split 12 south. and 4 east, 4 west.

Two questions;

1 - ANy issues with the Solis or weco? Could i do better in terms of tech?

2 - Optimisers. Installer is telling me that the south panels ,4 of them need optimsers due to a chimeny. Thats fine.

For the East/West, hes saying he can put them all on the same string and use optimisers on the one side. e.g. west has optimisers but east doesnt. Does this sound right?

Anyone able to offer advice on whether it is worth paying extra for a hybrid inverter over a standard string inverter, if not installing a battery now?

I'm inclined to not buy the hybrid now and looking to make sure that isn't a big mistake.

On the hunt for a system and have gotten about 10 quotes so far. There's a wide variance of price between them all but it's difficult to make an apples to apples comparison because of how they set out the quotes. But I'd also like to figure out if there's a valid reason in the significant difference down to quality and cost for various brand panels, inverters and batteries. In terms of inverters I've so far come across the Solis (vast majority seem to be using it) with Dryness or Weco batteries, Powerall, Livotek, Duracell Dura-i and Huawei inverter and battery systems. For the panels Huasun, Jinko, JA, Longi and Trina are the ones I've come across.

Has anyone seen some good price to quality comparisons or breakdowns anywhere or can offer their experience with these various brands. To a degree there seems to be a much of a muchness, but there has to be a degree of difference in manufacturing quality and customer service when it comes to warranties etc.

Longer term, we'd like to build on a utility room, either in the house or shed. I was thinking to get the solar panels now and in future look at batteries. Do you still think getting an inverter now would make sense in this scenario? I think not in that we would have to have a lot of wiring work done anyway at that point.

Our electricity usage is below the national average at the moment with gas central heating and hot water heating but in future with potentially having a HP and EV, it would go up significantly.